MYTIME Dining

[beeper99]

I think we will give Mytime dining a shot. Any feedback on this?

[lablvr2]

We just did it on Serenade and it was great. Worked for us! 7:15 dining worked better than 6 or 8:30. Enjoy your cruise!

[cb at sea]

If you plan on going to the shows, you'll still have to eat at or around one of the "traditional" dining times....all of the shows revolve around those seatings. Other than that, enjoy--let us know how YOU like it!

[jmom5]

Does anyone know if you can switch to mytime dining once you are on the ship? I want to use my onboard credit for my tips because I have a lot of credit for my upcoming cruises, so I was thinking that as soon as we board, we could switch to mytime and then pre-pay tips then with my onboard credit. Would love to hear whether anyone has done this.

[lvtheater]

Just had MTD on IOS last week. It was great. 7pm was perfect for us. We never made a reservation, just went to MTD desk and was seated right away. We were always seated in the same section and always had nice dinner companions at next table. We also never missed a show and was never rushed. We loved it.

[HappiTravels]

We just did MTD and I will never go back to traditional dining. It was great. We had the same waiter/asst waiter every night (by our request) and they treated us like VIPS.

[printingchick]

Another vote for MTD. Tried it on Freedom last January and can't imagine going back to traditional dining. We were hesitant to break from tradition, remembering the friendships we've made in the past over dinner. Then I really thought about it and realized that we made those friendships on fewer than half of our cruises. More often, people just don't show up for dinner in the MDR.

 

You don't realize how much stress it adds to your vacation feeling like you HAVE to eat at an assigned time, regardless of that day's events. We'd look over the Compass each night, plan our activities for the next day and fit our meal into an open slot of time. How relaxing!!

 

We LOVE it. Will be trying it for the second time on Serenade in five weeks. I'm anxious to see how well it works out on a smaller ship.

[oh2cruisemore]

Do you have to go at the same time every night or can you change times depending on how your day goes?

[HappiTravels]

Do you have to go at the same time every night or can you change times depending on how your day goes?

That is the beauty of MTD. You can go for dinner anytime between 6pm and 10.30pm. We never ate at the same time twice. It just depended on how our day went.

[lappy22]

We have done anytime dining on Princess, Carnival, and RCCL and would have to say that the service we had each night on the Mariner was the worst service we have experienced on cruise ships. Slow and not very consistent. One person running the front desk. No Matre D' in the dining room. Just not the same experience we had on Carnival and Princess.

 

That being said, when we cruise RCCL again we will select My Time just for the great flexibility that it gives you. Some nights we were hungry at 6pm and other nights we are hungry at 8:30.

[printingchick]

Our experience on Freedom was excellent. Really no different from traditional dining in terms of service.

[chopper825]

Just off the Explorer and we did have several problems with MTD but I think it was how we used it. They suggest you make a reservation so you can continue to stay with a certain wait staff or at a certain table, which we did. However, out of the 4 times we made a reservation - twice we were sat someplace else with a different wait staff. Really annoying as we accepted reservation times based on the table availability and not our preference. The wait staff we had on those nights was no where near as good as the staff we had reservations for. If they tell you to make a reservation and you do, they should honor your request. If you don't care where you sit or who your waiters are, then it probably works much better. We were not happy at all about half of the time.

[CaribeDiver]

We have done anytime dining on Princess, Carnival, and RCCL and would have to say that the service we had each night on the Mariner was the worst service we have experienced on cruise ships. Slow and not very consistent. One person running the front desk. No Matre D' in the dining room. Just not the same experience we had on Carnival and Princess.

 

That being said, when we cruise RCCL again we will select My Time just for the great flexibility that it gives you. Some nights we were hungry at 6pm and other nights we are hungry at 8:30.

 

DW & I are booked for the Mariner in August. We are Diamond and have been loyal to RCCL but, we just took the NCL Spirit out of New Orleans last month (since the Voyager was charging $599 3rd person and NCL was charging $149 3rd person for our 3 yo we gave them a try). We really liked the flexibility of their Freestyle Dining but, the service ranked from OK to holy crap! how do you still have a job. Anyway, we are considering doing MTD on Mariner but, don't want the dissappointment of poor service especially since the dinners are so important to DW's cruise memories. So, can you elaborate on your experience?

And if anyone else can chime in, about your experience on any of the ships, that would be great.:)

[negc]

We have done anytime dining on Princess, Carnival, and RCCL and would have to say that the service we had each night on the Mariner was the worst service we have experienced on cruise ships. Slow and not very consistent. One person running the front desk. No Matre D' in the dining room. Just not the same experience we had on Carnival and Princess.

 

That being said, when we cruise RCCL again we will select My Time just for the great flexibility that it gives you. Some nights we were hungry at 6pm and other nights we are hungry at 8:30.

 

Everyone's experience will, of course, depend on the individuals serving you and that is true both in traditional as well as my time dining. Our experiences with MTD on Navigator of the Seas and on Jewel of the Seas were the opposite of yours and we will definitely sign up for MTD on future cruises, especially those where the time we want to eat dinner may be affected by our onshore activities etc. On Jewel, the young woman in charge did a fantastic job and seemed to know exactly what was going on at every moment in the dining room and was quick to step in and help if the wait staff was temporarily overloaded.:)

For the poster who questioned whether or not they could sign up for MTD once they boarded, that option should be available to you but I suggest going to the dining room to make those arrangements as soon as possible after you board.

[pltag]

Do you have to go at the same time every night or can you change times depending on how your day goes?

Here are your options.... when you finish dinner on any certain night you can make a reservation for the next night. Just go with your best guess. Or, you can go without any reservations...just show up and they will seat you as soon as possible.

 

We loved it. Ate around 7:15 - 7:30, had the same 2 - person table right by the windows. Even caught a few sunsets! :)

[lovemylab]

We had MTD on the Adventure this past December and loved it. We never had to wait for a table and usually went to dinner around 7:30pm. We had the same waitstaff all week. We will definitely be doing MTD on future cruises.

[teacherkim]

We did MTD on Brilliance and loved it! Each night at the end of dinner we dicussed the next day's plans (we were a party of 6) and then made a reservation as we left for the next day. Same wait staff, great service, never a wait. The only concession we ever had to make was a couple times when we made the reservation we took a time 15 minutes before or after our original request in order to have the same wait staff, no biggie.

[abigailinmaine]

Is this correct:

 

You can make a reservation but generally no more than 24 hours ahead?

 

Anyone have issues with feeling like MTD is shunted off to some less desirable location? I remember reading a post about not being able to see the action or something, though our dining interest is usually our companions and what's in front of us.

 

I signed us up for MTD on a whim because neither of the traditional times is appealing, but really haven't been sure how it works -- thanks!

[msbptg]

That would be my question. are you able to sit in the main dining room each time. I don,t want to be placed on the 3rd level or anywhere people are walking buy like a corridor..

[Cruz'n-n-Booz'n]

I did it and it was OK at best. The best thing about Mytime is being able to eat in between the 2 normal dining times. So, it worked for that reason. The part I did not like is we always sat with different people.

[novalab]

I am sorry to read that Mariner is still experiencing problems with MTD. We tried it last June on Mariner & it was not a good experience. First, they didn't have us on the list when we first checked in on boarding day (we had prepaid our gratuities 3 months before the cruise). After they ironed that out, we were seated in a different section each night with different waitstaff. Most nights, the service was so slow that on one evening, we had to flag down the Matre'd to ask him where our waitstaff was (we had already been seated for 1/2 hour without seeing a soul in our section, not even water for our waterglasses). Things did improve after that night but for the 5 nights we ate in the main dining room, we all had to agree that MTD was not working on the Mariner at that time. In all fairness to the staff, Mariner had only been on the MTD program a short time. The Matre'd did promise us that it would be much better in the very near future.

 

Well....we are going to give it a try, again, this April, on Mariner. Here's hoping..:rolleyes:

[AtlantaAlly]

I think the MTD works if it's just 2-4 of you. However, I was on NCL with 10 of us and if we wanted to make reservations, the only time we could was for 5:30pm or 9:30pm. Groups weren't allowed to make reservations inbetween, which was VERY frustrating. Groups weren't allowed to call for reservations either, we had to walk down to the reservations desk the morning of the meal. We didn't go in the MDR at all because of this. For this reason, I'm hesitant to try it at all. I saw the boards- the MDRs had waits of 45min-1:15. The last thing I want to do on a vacation is wait for a table... But again, this was on NCL.

[andrzej5914]

Here are your options.... when you finish dinner on any certain night you can make a reservation for the next night. Just go with your best guess. Or, you can go without any reservations...just show up and they will seat you as soon as possible.

 

We loved it. Ate around 7:15 - 7:30, had the same 2 - person table right by the windows. Even caught a few sunsets! :)

 

the third choice is making reservations the same day. There will be a person stationed there at certain hours during the day. (9-11 and 1-3, etc)

 

To the posters that are concerned about where they will be seated or if it's even the MDR. You will be seated in the main dining room and many of the 2 tops are right by the windows or many other tables, regardless of size are overlooking the balcony to the main floor of the restaurant. And as any other restaurant in the world some of the tables are in between. It feels like a private club, so nothing to worry about.

 

Don't worry so much. You are on a vacation, ENJOY! ;)

[patr]

Just off of Voyager and this was the 3rd time we used MTD. Just a note when you sign up for MTD they automactically chanrge your Sea Pass account for the tips. This was fine with us as we use the automatic gratuity anyway.

[abigailinmaine]

Thanks, everyone, for the info & experiences.