regnig

Well I might as well ask my question here. We are on a Med cruise beginning on July 11. We are getting some OBC, a three bottle Navigator Wine pkg and 2 $50 soda cards.

Well, neither DH nor I drink soda (I actually cannot drink any carbonated). I would be happy getting bottled water instead or a beverage card.

Any ideas on how to do this?

Thanks for your help.

Terri

Terri on our last cruise our TA gifted us wine (not a drink card) and we had a card in our stateroom that we were to hand over when we order it. I believe the gift price specified on the card was $50. We called room service and asked if we could exchange it for beer for DH and they said sure. They asked what kind DH wanted and sent up couple of buckets. So I suggest you give it a try to exchange them for bottled water. They may only give you the "retail" price value of $25 each but that's better than nothing.

Peter he asked about 6166 and 6177:)

Joanie

Whoops Joanie, no he didn't he asked about 6166 thru 6177 so I think Peter's answer, along with yours, was helpful. :)

Does anyone have knowledge of good or bad features of the aft cabins on the Eurodam? i am looking into VB6166 thru VB6177. The loooong walk is not a factor for me.

While the advertisement for this sale says 'shore excursion OBC', on my copy of the confirmation all of the OBC (sale credit, FCD) is lumped together under On Board Credit (USD). There is no distinction made.

That's the way mine reads too. We finally had our TA re-fare ours today to pick up the Anniversary Sale. Although our stateroom went up just a tad the two dinners in the up-charge restaurants alone are free and if we can use any or all of the OBC all the better. :D

Only if you think yoga pants are proper attire to go to the grocery store or pajama pants are ok to shop at the mall. If you have to ask, then No, they aren't.

Randy while I wouldn't recommend you wear capris of any type in the dining room :eek: I certainly agree that nice ones are acceptable for women. Maybe you should stick to advising men about T-shirts or baseball hats. :D

We no longer do "formal" either and have found the food and atmosphere in the Lido suits us just find. And no, you will not feel uncomfortable if you go elsewhere on the ship. Also, if you have not read it here on CC, be aware that you can order dinner from the main dining room menu without charge if you chose to dine in your stateroom.

I agree that HAL's veranda staterooms are very similar to the Mini-Suites on Princess. The bathrooms are almost identical and we have never been bothered by having only 1 TV. The port and starboard balcony staterooms on Deck 4, Upper Promenade, are the widest (other than the aft facing cabins) on the ship. And, if you can grab either 4166 or 4168 the balcony is twice as long as the others. We are particularly fond of the VB & VC staterooms towards the aft on Deck 4 as they are very quite with very little foot traffic.

Although I wrote this 3 years ago you might want to read my comparison between the two lines. http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1603771 It was our opinion after our 1st HAL cruise and we feel the same way.

Since the "cooler" is a bit smaller than most dorm size refrigerators, no not really. There is no problem having your stateroom attendant remove the items. Most of the time they put them in the round stool at the desk. We usually just stow them away ourselves.

It had to be good to sleep in your own bed after such a long day. I look forward to reading your summary of both cruises.

Mary Ann & Bill

As your adventure comes to an end I send you many many thanks for taking your time to make daily posts. What an unselfish expenditure of your holiday time for all our enjoyment.

I look forward to "sailing" with you on your next adventure.

Glad Disney is heeding the warning about Puerto Vallarta but it's a shame an unscheduled stop in Costa Rico could not be arranged.

Enjoying to read about the differences between lines. The restaurant names would have thrown me for a loop. :D

Enjoy the rest of your trip home... it sure beats a cramped airplane.

Except what happens if you hand cash to someone who has no idea who you are, and therefore has no way to determine at the end of the cruise if you removed the HSC or not. ;)

In anticipation of just that situation we always go prepared with envelopes and on the front I put our name & stateroom number. With that information an employee can always check with their supervisor if necessary. Since Princess had the same type of Hotel Service charge and pooling plan this system has worked well for us for years.

We just got off the Zuiderdam and had the Explore 4 package. We thought there was a separate card besides your stateroom card. There is not. Your stateroom card acts as the Explore 4 for drinks and you will not see anything on your stateroom bill. You get a receipt when you order a drink but it will not show up on the bill. It worked real nice. Our Pinnacle Grill dinner had pre-reserved date that did not work for us. We just checked with the manager and changed it with no problems.

On the Noordam in March we had two gold "drink cards" (from a distance they looked just like the ones you could buy) awaiting us in our stateroom. So, my guess is it must vary ship to ship (as if that is any surprise :rolleyes:).

And yes, our Explore4 info was buried way beyond the 1st page of our express docs.

........ I have been doing all of the ironing in our home for years now ............................. ever since I commented gently on a double crease on a shirt sleeve.:o

:D:D My how I wish my DH would make such a brilliant statement!! :D:D

Bring them on .... that's why we are still hanging around! :D

In the morning when it is only coffee & tea - $2.00

On the rare occasion that we order in something for dinner off regular room service menu normally $5.00

Diane & John,

Many thanks for letting us enjoy the wonderful voyage with you. I really appreciate you taking time out of your holiday to keep us updated. Looking forward to your next voyage regardless of where it goes.

Mary Ann & Bill.... MANY, MANY thanks for taking us along with you on this wonderful voyage. We appreciate the time you took to make your daily posts. Looking forward to hearing about Disney.

To all of you still on the Westerdam and those that have already disembarked so many thanks for this wonderful thread, I know it took time out of you holiday to make all these posts. For those of us currently land locked having so many of you contribute really really gave us a much better sense of what has been going on. We have so enjoyed being able to sail along with you.

Mumsy, glad you reached home safe. The rest of you travel safely too!

I think she's going to be on the East Coast after the Alaska Season. I wonder if Tampa or FLL?

Ft Lauderdale :D

Your room key is the same size as a standard credit card.

Would it kill you to post the URL to the PDF? I used BlackWidow on the site and I honestly cannot find the text your quoting in any PDF on the site.

 

You seem to know how to cut and paste. Surely pasting a link is something you can do.

:o Sorry about that POA1, I simply used the URL you posted and read more than the 1st page. You forgive me don't you??? ;)

That certainly spells out a lot of topics that are often argued about here - but I can't find the paragraph quoted in post #69. Maybe that is from an older version?

The quote came from Page 22 of the Crew Services Cabin Directory which is a PDF file you access by clicking on the link that says “View the Crew Services Dirctory”.

Copy and pasted directly from that document ...............

TIPPING NOT REQUIRED POLICY

All ships have the Rewards for Excellence (RfE) Plan which

consists of Hotel Service Charges and Beverage Service

Charges. If a guest chooses to adjust out of the RfE Plan

and instead provide cash tips to an employee, the employee

is required to turn in this cash to their Department Head

so the money can be added to the RfE plan. Any “tips”

received above and beyond the guests standard amount

may be kept by the crewmember.

It's sad that your adventure is coming to an end. :( Hopefully you post from Disney on this same thread ..... please. :D

Elorac123, what happened in the last 13 days since on 4/10/2015 you wrote the following: :confused::confused:

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?p=46218686#post46218686

Let's be clear here, no one is saying it makes "sense". It just is the way it is!

It still is.

So why on Earth, then, if someone gives them cash instead of an automated daily service charge do some say they are compelled to turn it into the company (because that is the company rule and these employees need their jobs), just for the company to give it back to them? But the point you are missing is that the company does not give it back to them in the entirety. Those employees involved in the HSC pool only get a percentage of the HSC. To illustrate lets say the HSC is $12 a day and the cruise was for 7 days. That’s a total of $84pp or $168 for a couple. If out of the HSC your stateroom steward gets $2.50 a day per person that’s a total of $17.50pp/$35 per couple and his/her share equates to 20.8% of the total HSC. If you were to drop the HSC and simply hand him $50 the most he could get in return is $10.40 with the remainder going into the pool. If the point was to avoid crew being "stiffed" why would the company take cash from them? The being "stiffed" part comes from the days prior to the HSC. The number of passengers that left NOTHING were the ones stiffing the crew and the HSC was implemented in an attempt to see to it that all shared as a percentage of something is better than nothing. Makes no sense.

 

There WAS a time, actually not very long ago, that the gratuity WAS baked right into HAL's cruise fare and they advertised that no tipping was necessary.