Ryalie1

5 hours ago, Cruiser24 said:

Where did you get the forms for reimbursement?  I have emailed the address they gave me but have not received the forms.  All I get is a “we are very busy” reply.

No one mentioned forms to me? I just emailed and attached all my receipts.

From my letter:

"Guests Who Do Not Live Within Driving Distance of the Port or are Unable to Drive

Continue Isolating in Shoreside Accommodations: You can choose to continue isolating ashore by arranging your own accommodations. A list of local hotels is available upon request. Based on the location of your accommodation, we may be able to assist you in arranging private transportation to the hotel. Accommodation costs can later be reimbursed, up to a limit of $ 250 USD per hotel room per night, as well as meal costs, up to $ 100 USD per person, per day. Air change fees are covered up to $ 400 USD per person. Once you are ready to submit your reimbursement claim, please email RoyalGuestRelations@rccl.com."

Flew to Vancouver at the beginning of May from the UK. Like others have mentioned, there was some queuing - it didn't take forever to get through (maybe 45 mins) but certainly wasn't a walk straight through. Just wanted to highlight that they were random covid testing in May, so check if that still applies as that could add time too - it was approx 1 in 6 people they were sending for testing, so pretty high chances of being tested (especially if you are travelling with others). 

I submitted my receipts on 18th May. Received a generic sounding reply saying refunds are taking 30 days, and had nothing since. I am waiting on cruise fare refund, hotel and meal expenses, and refundable onboard credit from cancelled excursions/packages. 

If it helps, this is the letter I received onboard Ovation in the second week of May:

Dear Guest,

When you test positive for COVID-19 during your cruise, our health and safety protocols require you to isolate onboard. Isolation times may vary based on the applicable public health guidelines in effect for your voyage. During this isolation period you may be subject to additional testing. If as a result of this additional testing our medical team onboard determines that you are able to discontinue isolating, you must continue to wear a well-fitting mask while outside your stateroom and eat all meals in your stateroom. 

If public health regulations at your port of disembarkation require you to continue to isolate after you voyage ends, the following options are available:

Guests Who Live Within Driving Distance of the Port

Drive Your Own Car Home: If you drove your own car to the port, you may drive it home and complete the isolation period in the comfort of your own home. 

Arrange a Rental Car to Drive Home: Alternatively, you can arrange a rental car to drive yourself home. The costs associated with the car rental can be reimbursed, up to $150 USD per day. 

Guests Who Do Not Live Within Driving Distance of the Port or are Unable to Drive

Continue Isolating in Shoreside Accommodations: You can choose to continue isolating ashore by arranging your own accommodations. A list of local hotels is available upon request. Based on the location of your accommodation, we may be able to assist you in arranging private transportation to the hotel. Accommodation costs can later be reimbursed, up to a limit of $ 250 USD per hotel room per night, as well as meal costs, up to $ 100 USD per person, per day. Air change fees are covered up to $ 400 USD per person. Once you are ready to submit your reimbursement claim, please email RoyalGuestRelations@rccl.com.

After you have completed the isolation period, we can assist with travel arrangements to get you and members of your traveling party back home. If you booked your air arrangements through us, you can contact our Travel Team at +1 (800) 256-6649 then select option 2 for assistance. 

If public health regulations at your port of disembarkation do not require you to continue isolating after your voyage ends, you may disembark and continue your travel journey. If you require a negative test result to return home, you will need to arrange this test on your own, with a local vendor. You will be solely responsible for the cost of any accommodations required shoreside while you await a negative test result to resume your journey home.

We hope this information is helpful to you, and we thank you for your continued cooperation and understanding. 

Sincerely, 

Guest Services Team

Royal rearranged our flights for us from Seattle back to the UK. We had to book our own hotel - I have submitted the receipts for hotel and meals - I have yet to hear back, so am currently out of pocket. We did not need to test to return to the UK, thankfully, as we were still testing positive 12 days later. Royal just pushed the flight by 2 days so we could complete quarantine. 

1 hour ago, Itchy&Scratchy said:

@ReneeFLL I think you mentioned that they gave you free wifi while you are in quarantine, but did they also give you free PayPerView/OnDemand movies, by any chance?

 

What about you, @Ryalie1?

 

Years ago our friend was patient zero with norovirus or rotavirus and he was isolated for 5 days. RCI gave him free movies to watch while in quarantine. 

I am just thinking ahead in case our family needs to quarantine - do we need to download some movies while we are still at home, or will they be provided for free... Otherwise, some of us may go stir crazy after being used to having wifi/streaming movies available 24/7 at home.

We had a letter to say we had free movies, however we couldn't find how to access them on the TV so we asked Guest Services and none had been loaded for our cruise. I think I saw someone else on a different ship mention they didn't have them either, so it's not guaranteed. We used that to argue to upgrade to Surf and Stream rather than just the Surf they'd given us. 

Crew TV channels turned up on our TV half way through the cruise so we had the passenger movie channel and crew movie channel - not ideal because you have to get your timing right to start watching but at least it doubled our chances. We did enjoy watching the crew HR channel though - we learnt all about dress codes, how to smile etc 😂 I don't think us having the crew channels was deliberate though so I wouldn't count on that. 

Conclusion - best to have some downloaded as a back up. 

2 hours ago, trafaelwyr said:

Were there any Covid outbreaks on this sailing you just did?

When they were collecting up the covid passengers to disembark there were 3 or 4 pages of staterooms listed, and I would say very approximately 20 staterooms per page. This is just what I could observe while trying to keep my distance, so please be clear this is VERY approximate. My husband was the second passenger to test positive, this was first thing day 4. Most passengers seemed to be collected from their rooms and not the red zone, so possibly tested positive in the last couple of days or were close contacts and not positive cases. 

2 hours ago, RFerrington said:

I think I read somewhere that they are allowing smokers to smoke in the bathroom.

This is correct for Ovation (so I assume on all Royal ships as it sounds like room assignment is pretty much the same for all). Smoking allowed in the bathroom. First thing I noticed when I was taken down to the red zone was how smokey the corridor smelt. Our bathroom had a horrible musty smell which I would guess was an attempt to cover up a smoke smell. The letter we received said to smoke in the bathroom only so as to be considerate of other people's health conditions such as asthma. 

@1947wwjd I'm sorry to hear that you are poorly and have been placed in quarantine.

I have recently been in quarantine on Ovation, and my top tip for you would be proactive about getting anything you need from Guest Services as early as possible. This includes requesting your medical paperwork, any refunds (eg drinks packages, excursions) you're entitled to, information about disembarkation etc. I found that as more and more people tested positive throughout my cruise, the more difficult it was to get hold of someone to talk to.  On the final evening I still had outstanding questions but was on hold with Guest Services for about an hour and 20 minutes before giving up. So I'd suggest make a nuisance of yourself if you have to, to make sure you have all your questions answered. Ask all the questions you have, as soon as you have them. 

I hope that things go smoothly for you. 

2 minutes ago, ReneeFLL said:

 

Setting my table in anticipation of my feast that's yet to come. I have my different silverware (different lengths also), bread plate with butter knife and bread. Oops, but no butter. Why are the water glasses always larger than the red and white wine glasses. They obviously have that backwards and dessert silverware.

I LOVE this! I feel like you've beaten the system 😂

I hope you have an amazing dinner. 

30 minutes ago, rabidstoat said:

Wait, so if you test positive on the cruise and have to quarantine a few days in the port city before flying home Royal will reimburse the hotel? Is that even if you don't have insurance through Royal?

 

Also if you report cold symptoms and get COVID tested on the ship do they charge for that? How much? Does it matter if you test positive or negative?

Yes you don't need insurance through RC for this. We have separate insurance but RC are covering it all at the moment so we haven't needed to call on our insurance (therefore no excesses) yet. They are paying for our hotel, food and the new flights back to the UK.

No medical charge at all for covid - for the tests or any treatment (and they will throw everything at you to treat whatever symptoms you have - nasal spray, throat sweets, aspirin, sinus stuff etc). Our medical bill is zero. 

The policy is pretty generous, it's a shame they undermine it all by being incapable of properly taking care of guests in quarantine while on the ship (from a simple food and fresh air and communication perspective - no medical complaints). 

36 minutes ago, Sunshine3601 said:

Royal used to send people to specific quarantine hotels.   I believe now you book whatever hotel you want and get reimbursed up to $250 per day hotel.   Plus I think $100 pp per day towards meals.   

I believe in the US quarantine is 5 or 7 days then you fly home commercially.  Anytime spent in quarantine on the ships counts towards that number of days.   There is noone stopping anyway from just leaving on their own.

Or you can opt for no quarantine, rent a car and drive yourself home and they reimburse up to $150 day for car rental.

This is correct. Hotel up to $250 a night, and $100 a day per person for meals - we have to keep receipts and have an email address to send copies.

Guest Services have told me that CDC no longer require RC to be responsible for making sure guests quarantine - they just have to advise, and if the guest chooses to ignore that it's not RC's problem.

I am not actually clear on if the quarantine is a legal requirement or a guideline, but we were advised 5 days. 

At Seattle there actually WAS a process to stop covid guests leaving - they could only exit the port on a germobile. RC had to drop everyone at their hotel, car rental or airport. I know this because someone had arranged their own transfer from the port back to Vancouver and the staff were working out how to accommodate this. However once you're dropped at your hotel/other, yes nothing to stop you leaving. 

RC are rearranging our flights from today to Sunday, supposedly. I wondered why Sunday (as far as I am aware I am done with quarantine tomorrow, Saturday), but if it's 7 days before you should travel that might be why. 

We used DocHQ to board an RC ship without issue.  The tests arrived through the post within a couple of days, and the video appointment was easy, negative certificate arrives before the end of the call so you have the opportunity to double check the details before hanging up.  However appointment slots do seem to fill up quickly, so for best choice of timings I would advise not leaving it too late. Although if cruising from Southampton and not needing to get the timing right for both flying and cruising you probably have more flexibility ☺️

3 minutes ago, Sunshine3601 said:

I hope they got it straightened and realized you were not crew so you can order from the MDR or regular room service menu.       

I hope you are feeling better today for your disembarkment.    And I hope that all got straightened out.    I have heard quarantine passengers are either the first off or the last off the ship, again depends on the ship.    Are you moving into a hotel for the duration of your quarantine?

Thank you.

We were able to order from room service when we called, we just had to frequently explain that we were guests but once explained it was fine. I guess as the same rooms are used it just comes up as "red zone". My husband was only the second passenger to test positive, so they just weren't used to it. 

Feeling much better today - I still have a cough and very tired, but I feel like I'm in the recovery stage now rather than active virus ☺️ I just have today left to quarantine - we were supposed to be flying home today but the flights are being moved to Sunday, we think. RC told us to sort our own hotel in Seattle to complete the quarantine - this doesn't seem a sensible process as a regular person booking a hotel gets a regular booking with check in time around 4pm. Luckily the hotel we've booked has allowed us to check in 8 hours early, but otherwise, how am I actually supposed to complete my quarantine?! My husband is done with his quarantine so he has gone in search of food. We'll get room service for dinner this evening and hoping for a hot meal!

Disembarkation for covid guests (and there were a lot by the looks of it (3 or 4 pages of names)) was chaotic on Ovation today. We got collected from our room at 7:30am so I don't think we were first or last off, but we did have a separate exit - never saw any other guests.  But we spent quite an extended period of time standing in the crew stairway waiting for other covid passengers to be rounded up. Again, remembering that these are all poorly people, leaving us standing in a very hot area with nowhere to sit for around 20 minutes wasn't good planning. I think there was a 7:30 and 9:30 round up of covid passengers, but they got all the luggage mixed up. So some people have been bussed to their hotels without luggage, and other people's luggage has done a tour of Seattle on the bus while they themselves are still on the ship.

Chaos. 

6 minutes ago, Jimbo said:

How can you run out of cups..................I mean is this  the Minnow from Gulligans Island on a 3 hour tour?

 

This is only a 6 day cruise isn't it?

Mine is an 8 day cruise. It explains why I didn't get my cup of ice with dinner yesterday. Also, they ran out of fries of all kinds. 

1 hour ago, Sunshine3601 said:

Makes me wonder what type of service and food quality the crew in quarantine is getting.   

I suspect they are at the bottom of the totem pole.

😍

I can help with this one as Ovation have spent most of this week thinking we are crew. Obviously crew don't get a choice a room service - they get a choice of about 4 options for each meal, and food is delivered to the whole quarantine corridor at the same time. There is a form they can fill out online with their meal choices, and if that isn't done they receive a phone call asking what they're having. I received a call asking what I wanted for breakfast at 5:44am. 

The food is cold, but that's no different to the rest of room service I've received anyway. Not sure it's really any worse than the guest food at all, just fewer options. I'll attach some screen caps from their form with the choices. 

Good for you @ReneeFLL getting your food sorted! I hope you will be feeling well enough for the fabulous meal you should be expecting today!

Just a heads up, I'd suggest starting to insist on disembarkation information as early as you can. We're getting off this morning but have been left completely in the dark - I called Guest Services at 9:50pm last night and gave up waiting for someone to answer more than an hour later at 11:15pm. I won't bore you with a rant on onward travel and accommodation processes as luckily it sounds like you'll not need to worry about those 🙂

My final morning breakfast has just shown up - orange juice in a soup container! They have explained they have run out of plastic cups. 

We seem very close to Seattle already - do we just hang around outside the port all night?

1 hour ago, crzndeb said:

Last night of cruise, and discovered life jackets no where to be found in my cabin. Looked under bed and in closets, and even the 2 cubbies above the bed, that most people don’t know about for extra storage.  🤦🏼‍♀️
😂😂

They're at the muster station. I did the same search on day 1 😂 

Ooh look what just arrived - I waited 2.5 hours for my breakfast order, which was supposed to be white toast and orange juice. I received brown toast and... coffee in a soup container!

1 hour ago, ReneeFLL said:

 

No, but I did order some soup. It wasn’t good, but it did come in a soup container so I was disappointed it wasn’t in a coffee cup. It would have been more to post about. 😄 I do plan on posting pictures of my dinner because it was horrible and I can eat just about anything. I’ll order some tea today for lunch.

 

How are you feeling? Hope you and your hubby are getting better.

 

Still a bit up and down with the symptoms - woke up with an astounding headache this morning after coughing all night, but the headache and cough have eased a bit since getting up. I can partially breath through my nose this morning for the first time in a few days, so that's nice ☺️

My main concern at the moment is I'm hungry - we ordered breakfast more than 2 hours ago and it hasn't arrived. I just phoned room service again and apparently whoever tried to deliver has marked it down as no one in the room 🤷‍♀️

Like you, I've found the room service food quality a bit inconsistent. Finding most of the room service menu a bit salty. Have ordered the French onion soup from the main dining room a couple of times and once it had the bread and cheese, and once it was just the broth. Soup at least was hot, pretty much everything else has been cold. 

Voom has been fine on the current Ovation Alaska cruise both in port and at sea, with the exception of a few hours on the Endicott Arm/Juneau day - they said they had satellite problems and someone was trying to fix this so the impression I got was that this was not an expected outage based on location, but a technical issue so theoretically shouldn't be a problem for any subsequent cruises. 

I found Surf pretty challenging, but the Surf and Stream speed is good. 

Not sure what this switching off in port thing is - it's been fine for us. 

14 hours ago, ReneeFLL said:

 

Maybe I’ll order some chamomile tea tonight and see what happens. 😆

@ReneeFLL Did you order this - I'm waiting to hear if your tea order went better than ours 😂

I hope you're feeling ok tonight. 

Just now, Ozark_Kid said:

Has anyone tried Fish and Ships?  Was it good?

We tried this on day 2. The food was fine enough - it was nice to have some proper chips (although being British, I definitely think they should have offered vinegar!). We only tried the complementary options and not the paid for ones. They had no lobster. 

Not sure if it's improved throughout the cruise, but they were struggling to keep up. There were only a small number of people in front of us to order but we still had to queue for half hour to place our order and then it was another half hour wait for the food. This was when they first opened for lunch so I would think pre-peak. So don't consider this a quick option. 

I believe, and I may be wrong, that deck 3 is for early and late dining, and deck 4 they are doing early dining and then my time dining. My time dining doesn't start until 6:45pm. 

Just now, Itchy&Scratchy said:

my kid had a cold 3 weeks ago and is having one now as well. Both times his sore throat/nasal congestion lasted 4+ days. His last cold ended on day 6. He is on day 4 of his second cold now, still with sore throat and a ton of snot. So, the part with the sore throat and snot last more than a few hours during a cold as well.

 

P.S. Yes, he got tested for covid and strep both times - negative for both.

Sorry yes, I didn't mean to downplay how long colds can go on for either - the sore throats and stuffy noses can go on for days. I was meaning, from my own experience of colds, the peak part where I get shivers and a completely fuzzy head and want to just curl up in bed - that part lasts a few hours/a day max. Other symptoms can last a while. Covid to me right now is feeling like that peak part of a cold, but more relentless. I would usually be able to continue to work through a cold, I think I would have had to take some time off work for this.