Summit - Celebrity SELECT Dining - Anyone?

[bigedwin]

Hello!

We will be sailing On March 20th Summit.

We had selected "Select dining".

I know they just started it on the Summit.

 

Anybody has experienced it yet.

Any coments.

Where is it located.

How are they handling it?

Any recomendations, suggestions.

 

Thanks to all.

 

Ed

[dalitos]

Hi, I haven't tried it, but am looking forward to trying it as well on our April 17th cruise.

Appreciate any information people can give us on this thread.

For what I've read on their website and some other post here, you just show up at the MDR when you want to have dinner, and they find you a table (you may or may not have to wait). Also you can make reservations up to 4? days in advance if you know at what time you want to eat. And you have to prepay gratuities.

And here's another question, can you select main early dining but then decide you want to eat a bit later and change it? I'm not talking about just showing up late but changing the time beforehand, basically mix up main early dining with select dining.

Thanks!

[JLind]

We loved it.

The main dining room is called the Cosmopolitan and is located aft on decks 4 and 5.

The Select Dining host/hostess has a podium at the entrance on deck 5.

It seemed to me that the Select Dining people were all in one section of the upper level of the MDR.

You just show up- or you can make a reservation.

They will ask if you prefer to dine alone or with others.

We made reservations twice for parties of 4, when we had met others who asked us if we wanted to eat together...

Otherwise, we just showed up when we were ready to dine.

Only one time did we have to wait- and we were asked to have a seat in the Martini bar, which is just right exactly where you are standing at the entrance to the dining room- and my husband had only ordered a glass of wine, when we were 'fetched' by a waiter and brought in to a table.

The hostess when we were onboard the Summit last week was Farrha, and we liked her very much. On embarkation day, we stopped by in the afternoon and asked her how it worked, and if there were any times we should avoid- but we just showed up whenever it was convenient, and we were very impressed with how well Farrha handled the flow (and how consistently pleasant she is.)

We liked having the ability to eat whenever we were ready, without any time pressure, and we also enjoyed having the flexibility to join new friends we had met on our excursions, and then sometimes eating alone when we wanted to hurry through a meal in order to attend an event.

Regarding the question to switch back and forth... probably not. There is a blurb in the daily newsletter "Celebrity Today" which you receive daily, on our first day, when we embarked in the beginning, saying that it was still not too late to enroll in Select Dining. I would ask, but it seems that the difficulty would be in the gratuity structure. Select Dining cruisers pre-pay their gratuities, and MDR passengers tip at the end- I think that is where it could be tricky to switch midway. But ask...

Bottom line for us was that we loved it and would choose it again without a doubt.

 

Happy cruising!

[dalitos]

Thanks JLind!

I think we are going to go with it, it seems better (to me) to have some liberty when it comes to eating times.

Glad it worked out for you (you made me wanna try it too), as I read some negative opinions as well.

[bigedwin]

We loved it.

The main dining room is called the Cosmopolitan and is located aft on decks 4 and 5.

The Select Dining host/hostess has a podium at the entrance on deck 5.

It seemed to me that the Select Dining people were all in one section of the upper level of the MDR.

You just show up- or you can make a reservation.

They will ask if you prefer to dine alone or with others.

We made reservations twice for parties of 4, when we had met others who asked us if we wanted to eat together...

Otherwise, we just showed up when we were ready to dine.

Only one time did we have to wait- and we were asked to have a seat in the Martini bar, which is just right exactly where you are standing at the entrance to the dining room- and my husband had only ordered a glass of wine, when we were 'fetched' by a waiter and brought in to a table.

The hostess when we were onboard the Summit last week was Farrha, and we liked her very much. On embarkation day, we stopped by in the afternoon and asked her how it worked, and if there were any times we should avoid- but we just showed up whenever it was convenient, and we were very impressed with how well Farrha handled the flow (and how consistently pleasant she is.)

We liked having the ability to eat whenever we were ready, without any time pressure, and we also enjoyed having the flexibility to join new friends we had met on our excursions, and then sometimes eating alone when we wanted to hurry through a meal in order to attend an event.

Regarding the question to switch back and forth... probably not. There is a blurb in the daily newsletter "Celebrity Today" which you receive daily, on our first day, when we embarked in the beginning, saying that it was still not too late to enroll in Select Dining. I would ask, but it seems that the difficulty would be in the gratuity structure. Select Dining cruisers pre-pay their gratuities, and MDR passengers tip at the end- I think that is where it could be tricky to switch midway. But ask...

Bottom line for us was that we loved it and would choose it again without a doubt.

 

Happy cruising!

 

 

Thank you for Providing update.

Seems like they just started it on the Summit and was very curious if they will be ready and organized.

it sounds like it is working well......

 

We are so Looking forward our SUMMIT Cruise in March 20th...Thanks

[bigedwin]

Hello.

JUst wondering if anybody else had had any experinece either positive or negative on the New Celebrity Select dining?

 

Ed

[cruisinelsewhere]

I will be sailing Summit tomorrow and have chosen Select Dining. I have always gone with traditional dining in the past and I found this to be an interesting option. I will be sure to post upon my return.

[beebee]

We sailed on the Equinox in Feb. and the Select Dining option did not work well for us. We found that the problem was too much inconsistency. We lasted for four days before switching to the traditional late dining. Two of the nights were fine but two of the nights we had to wait in long, slow moving lines, and had to wait to be seated, which in itself was not a problem, but we had reservations and had to wait for those who didn't or who had made earlier reservations but chose to come at a later time. We had made reservations for 8 each night but the two nights when it didn't work, we were seated around 8:45 so the flexibility of not having traditional dining didn't work for us. I still think it is a great concept but when I go on a cruise I want it to to be "hassle free" and I didn't like the uncertainty of the select dining option. I know some people had no problems but it didn't work for us.

[Dharma517]

Have fun!!

 

Jenn

 

I will be sailing Summit tomorrow and have chosen Select Dining. I have always gone with traditional dining in the past and I found this to be an interesting option. I will be sure to post upon my return.

[ECHIF@COMCAST.NET]

I tried the select sitting on my last cruise but I like the traditional better. I enjoy meeting a new group of people and the timing works out good if you enjoy going to the shows.

[luannsimon]

If you make reservations before hand for select dining, will they hold you to it? Say we changed our minds one night to eat at 7 , but I had already set up before hand to eat at 6, what would you do?

[Whistlespitter]

We just returned on 3/6 from a week on the Summit and did the select dining. It works pretty well. If you ask for a table for two, you could expect to be asked to wait in the martini bar until one is available. This is not always the case but, I would expect it to happen more often than not. If you agree to sit with others, you will be seated almost immediately. We had a table for two on one night and the rest of the time took pot luck. We found ourselves with repeat table mates on several nights. One night they seated us at a table for 8 by ourselves. The waiter took our orders and just as we got our first course, they seated 6 other people. I think most people will tell you that it is okay but a bit more disjointed than the regular, traditional seatings. You have no waiter continuity and there are often delays between courses. Select dining is in an area on the second level of the main dr by itself. We sat with people that we enjoyed and a few that we didn't.

 

John

[safein]

Thanks for the info! We're sailing on the Summit on May 2nd. I'm fairly sure that my husband will want to stick with the traditional dining.

 

Anita

[dtraveler2006]

What are the hours you can eat in the MDR with Select Dining? From what time to what time?

[AAAAmerican]

I do think SELECT is misnamed. It should be NEGLECT>.

 

With Celebrity trying to count and Pinch Pennies as we all have seen since the new Administration and Officers in the Corporate part were put in .. they even fired and now have rehired the Named Cruise Line Chef.

 

Dining is very subjective and a personal choice. Not what Clebrity once had .. which was top of the line in most all of commercial cruise lines. Now they just passed NCL again...:eek:

 

 

 

[JLind]

dtraveler2006:

We were on the Summit Feb 27- March 6th 2010 (a week ago as I write this).

In the printed material that I have from our cruise, the official stated seating times for Celebrity Select Dining was from 6pm-9:30pm

 

AAAAmerican: it is unclear to me what you found to be unacceptable about Select Dining. (We definitely had frustrations on our cruise regarding amenities arranged by our TA which we had to spend time 'proving', and gifts sent by those at home which we were not notified of, and hundreds of dollars overcharged to our account. We were told countless times by benign Guest Relations people that 'corporate' was unable to efficiently process onboard credits and gifts sent. But- we loved the Select Dining option. I have to say. I'm not unsympathetic when it comes to being frustrated with the corporate accountability and level of service we encountered when trying to straighten out issues with our account. But Select Dining was one thing that really worked for us!)

[bigedwin]

Thanks J Lind!

 

We are signed up for select dining so Hopefully we will be able to add some more info after our cruise.

We will be on the MArch 20th Summit Cruise.

Last night we finally decided to have a "Adult" night out and signed up for Dinner in Normandie. Hopefully I will be able to provided some feedback about it too.

 

Thanks

 

Ed

[AAAAmerican]

JLind,

 

We have been cruising for decades now. EG: Yes before even Celebrity was called that.

 

Sorry your vision of my American English, did not have you phathom what i meant..;)

 

In other words if I wanted to wait in lines I would not have to go on cruises to that. Being seated is a pleasure to us and having the same wait staff serving us is great as they then understand your needs more and some do it quite well. I have been in a few 4-5 6 stars places in Nyc/NJ and met waiters who had worked previously on the cruise ships and served us aboard them too. Celebrity used to have Professional Waiters as all good land based-sea-locations do, eh.

 

Yes good service is very important to us when we do pay for it. Purser staffing I do think in training as well public contact methods has gone very downhill too |\ .

 

One would think in a service based business training staff to serve and do well would be a normalcy. Yes at even just Par.

 

 

 

 

dtraveler2006:

 

 

AAAAmerican: it is unclear to me what you found to be unacceptable about Select Dining. (We definitely had frustrations on our cruise regarding amenities arranged by our TA which we had to spend time 'proving', and gifts sent by those at home which we were not notified of, and hundreds of dollars overcharged to our account. We were told countless times by benign Guest Relations people that 'corporate' was unable to efficiently process onboard credits and gifts sent. But- we loved the Select Dining option. I have to say. I'm not unsympathetic when it comes to being frustrated with the corporate accountability and level of service we encountered when trying to straighten out issues with our account. But Select Dining was one thing that really worked for us!)

[zuggie]

Our experience with Select Dining and "My Time" on Royal has been very good. For us, early Traditional dining is too early, late is too late. Tablemates in Traditional can be a hit or miss affair. When we've had good ones, it's been a a great experience. When we haven't, not so good.

 

We like visiting with other people, and always ask for a large table in Select. We enjoy visiting with difrerent people each night. We usually go around 7PM without a reservation, and have always been seated immediately.

 

Dave

[JLind]

Hi Ed-

We had one dinner in the Normandie- the dinner was included in the package offered by our travel agent.

It was wonderful! I'm usually easy going about things, but when we were seated I asked if we could be seated at at window instead of the table in the middle of the restaurant we were being led to... And I was so happy to look out the window as we were dining at the full moon, and also islands that we were passing and another beautifully lit ship out on the water.

 

The food was scrumptious and service was impeccable. It was March 2nd, my husband's 50th birthday, and truly a perfect special birthday dinner.

 

We saw three other tables with new friends- lots of 'hellos' - and it was fun when they all came over to our table to sing happy birthday and embarrass my husband when the birthday cake was brought to the table.

 

My only advice would be to eat a light lunch so you have room for the abundant amount of delicious food you will encounter at the Normandie.

 

Your cruise is just days away- have a great time!! :)

[greg_atlanta]

Select dining worked fine on March 6 sailing. It looks like only 1/4 of the dining room is reserved for select dining (deck 5 starboard), the rest is traditional dining.

 

The only night we made a reservation we wanted a table for 6 at 7 pm, the hostess said all that was available was at 6:45 but if we showed up at 7 pm it was fine ("just a limitation with the reservation system").

 

We ate with a mix of strangers, by ourselves, or friends, only had to wait one night for about 10 mins.

 

In my opinion select dining means "everyone and their mother wants to eat at 7:30"..... so you're better off eating earlier or later than 7:30 if you want a table for two.