Has Oceania service and quality deteriated?

[keelelady]

My husband and I did the Nautica Beijing to Bangkok leg in March this year. It was our second cruise with Oceania (first was on Regatta 5 years ago). We had a concierge cabin on deck 7.

The cruise itinery was excellent, however we both felt that the food and service in the main dining room was of a lower standard than we had previously experienced.

There was an extremely poor selection of side dishes with the main courses and the sommelier service was slow despite being reminded several times. This was the opposite of our normal experience in restaurants where sommeliers offer wine lists and service once customers are seated.

Perhaps their tardiness had something to do with the fact that we had purchased a premium wine package. However this did cost us about 1500 pounds stirling. We complained when we received a customer satisfaction survey early in the cruise and the lead sommelier assured us that things would improve , however nothing changed.

I find it amusing when people talk about Oceania as offering such a wonderful product and can only say that they need to look at their service or customers such as myself will definitely shop around.

[surfyachtie]

My husband and I did the Nautica Beijing to Bangkok leg in March this year. It was our second cruise with Oceania (first was on Regatta 5 years ago). We had a concierge cabin on deck 7.

The cruise itinery was excellent, however we both felt that the food and service in the main dining room was of a lower standard than we had previously experienced.

There was an extremely poor selection of side dishes with the main courses and the sommelier service was slow despite being reminded several times. This was the opposite of our normal experience in restaurants where sommeliers offer wine lists and service once customers are seated.

Perhaps their tardiness had something to do with the fact that we had purchased a premium wine package. However this did cost us about 1500 pounds stirling. We complained when we received a customer satisfaction survey early in the cruise and the lead sommelier assured us that things would improve , however nothing changed.

I find it amusing when people talk about Oceania as offering such a wonderful product and can only say that they need to look at their service or customers such as myself will definitely shop around.

Seems to be a number of these sort of complaints about the GDR lately.! Will confirm in 19days

[pacheco18]

I am on Nautica now. Day 20 of a 21 day cruise

 

Best service and quality of experience of my 5 o cruises

 

Superb is an understatement

 

I cannot evaluate GDR since I ate there only once with the f & b manager and of course all was perfection

 

I cannot rave enough about my experience this cruise. Everyone from the gm to the servers went above and beyond

[keelelady]

Glad you have been fortunate enough to avoid the GDR obviously the vast number of passengers do not have this benefit but are still paying passengers and deserve to be treated as such

[pacheco18]

Glad you have been fortunate enough to avoid the GDR obviously the vast number of passengers do not have this benefit but are still paying passengers and deserve to be treated as such

 

What benefit ??

I eat in the Terrace with the masses of paying passengers

I avoid the GDR to avoid long drawn out meals and to have a chance to taste more items

You could be just as fortunate

 

Assumptions are dangerous but I see you suffer from second post syndrome. Attack without information

Not a good strategy on cruise critic, particularly on the o boards

[pacheco18]

Glad you have been fortunate enough to avoid the GDR obviously the vast number of passengers do not have this benefit but are still paying passengers and deserve to be treated

 

Duplicate

Sorry

[keelelady]

Obviously i have upset you ,however i just wish to offer a balanced view of the product which oceania is now offering and i did not find it to be of the same standard as my previous experience with them and as i stated earlier they also didnt rectify issues raised earlier.

You however pointed out that your only experience of the GDR was when in the company of a member of the management team. So therefore your assessment of the service was probably going to be different from the customers who choose to eat in that venue.

[sacarr]

We have sailed with Oceania 6 times in the past 6 years. My thought was that the food and service had improved since our first time with Oceania. Our last two cruises have been on Marina and possibly these things are better on the O ships.

 

I do agree, however, that the sommelier service is sometimes poor. Particularly in Red Ginger and also at times in the GDR. With the automatic 18% gratuity that the customer has no control over there is little incentive to hustle. Some of the sommeliers are great and very knowledgeable, but some are rather indifferent. Part of the problem may also be that they are understaffed. There may not enough sommeliers to do the job.

 

One time when our entrees were brought at Red Ginger, I asked the waiter to retrieve our bottle and refill our empty wine glasses. The waiter of course could not do that! I wanted to enjoy the wine with warm food, so after waiting for 10 min or more for the sommelier to get our bottle of wine from the ice bucket across the room, I got up verified that it was ours and brought it to the table. I can assure you that got their attention. Guests are not supposed to do that.

 

Other than the wine service however, I believe that service and food overall has improved over the years.

[pacheco18]

Obviously i have upset you ,however i just wish to offer a balanced view of the product which oceania is now offering and i did not find it to be of the same standard as my previous experience with them and as i stated earlier they also didnt rectify issues raised earlier.

You however pointed out that your only experience of the GDR was when in the company of a member of the management team. So therefore your assessment of the service was probably going to be different from the customers who choose to eat in that venue.

 

Read my post again

You still have not read it

I said I CANNOT EVALUATE THE GDR

I did not

I implied that one meal with an officer is no basis for GDR evaluation

I made no assessment. That's the point you missed and still miss

 

You assumed something else

You assumed I had special treatment and was not like other paying customers

 

You did not upset me

You just need to read and not make assumptions

[beechwood]

I agree with the opening poster about the food in the GDR-although not the quality of it which, for the most part was excellent, but the temperature of the dishes both at breakfast and dinner.

 

We repeatedly had to send food back as it was luke warm rather than hot. Although it was always replaced with much apology, the meal was then not as enjoyable as one of us would have finished their hot meal whist the other was just starting their replaced luke warm meal. In spite of us saying each time when we ordered that we wanted our food hot and didn't mind waiting (there seems to be a system of lining up dishes so they can serve you quickly with the next course, often as soon as you'd put your fork down), time and time again our food was not hot. This was the first time we'd eaten in the GDR for breakfast as there were so many at sea days and we could see the problem there was that they brought your fruit/ cereal course out at the same time as your hot course, so the latter just sat at the serving station getting cold.

 

We are from the UK and don't know whether the issue is that generally Americans prefer their food warm rather than hot as no one else seemed to have a problem with the temperature. In particular, I know at breakfast that some Americans eat their cooked food at the same time as their fruit so the two courses coming separately, with the cooked food cold from waiting, would not have been the case for them.

[G&G]

We just took our first Oceania cruise for 24 days on the Riviera. The service was outstanding !

[no fuss travel]

I agree with the opening poster about the food in the GDR-although not the quality of it which, for the most part was excellent, but the temperature of the dishes both at breakfast and dinner.

 

We repeatedly had to send food back as it was luke warm rather than hot. Although it was always replaced with much apology, the meal was then not as enjoyable as one of us would have finished their hot meal whist the other was just starting their replaced luke warm meal. In spite of us saying each time when we ordered that we wanted our food hot and didn't mind waiting (there seems to be a system of lining up dishes so they can serve you quickly with the next course, often as soon as you'd put your fork down), time and time again our food was not hot. This was the first time we'd eaten in the GDR for breakfast as there were so many at sea days and we could see the problem there was that they brought your fruit/ cereal course out at the same time as your hot course, so the latter just sat at the serving station getting cold.

 

 

 

 

We are from the UK and don't know whether the issue is that generally Americans prefer their food warm rather than hot as no one else seemed to have a problem with the temperature. In particular, I know at breakfast that some Americans eat their cooked food at the same time as their fruit so the two courses coming separately, with the cooked food cold from waiting, would not have been the case for them.

 

I'm sorry, but your second paragraph had me laughing. The first trip I made to Britain, the food at breakfast was never hot. I can remember one day near the end of the trip saying to my travel companions, the one thing I was looking forward to when I got home was hot toast. Magically the cold toast disappeared and much warmer, not hot toast appeared. It does depend on the size of table you are sitting at and if your fellow table mates, eat slow or fast, how hot your food is when it arrives in the GDR. When we sat at a table with slow eaters, one or two times the food was not quite as hot, but the waiters did get to know you by the end of the cruise. We enjoyed our food but did find that we ate in the Terrace quite often because of the choice. I simply could not get my sushi fix in the GDR.:D

[CAG]

My husband and I did the Nautica Beijing to Bangkok leg in March this year. It was our second cruise with Oceania (first was on Regatta 5 years ago). We had a concierge cabin on deck 7.

The cruise itinery was excellent, however we both felt that the food and service in the main dining room was of a lower standard than we had previously experienced.

There was an extremely poor selection of side dishes with the main courses and the sommelier service was slow despite being reminded several times. This was the opposite of our normal experience in restaurants where sommeliers offer wine lists and service once customers are seated.

Perhaps their tardiness had something to do with the fact that we had purchased a premium wine package. However this did cost us about 1500 pounds stirling. We complained when we received a customer satisfaction survey early in the cruise and the lead sommelier assured us that things would improve , however nothing changed.

I find it amusing when people talk about Oceania as offering such a wonderful product and can only say that they need to look at their service or customers such as myself will definitely shop around.

 

We were also on this cruise, it was our 13th on Oceania. I will have to concur with you that the wine service on this cruise was not up to Oceania standards. We also had a few problems with the sommeliers and reported our concerns to the lead sommelier and the restaurant manager. Things improved somewhat, but never got quite to the high level we have been accustomed to. I can only surmise what the problem must have been and guessed that they were understaffed. We did not purchase the wine package but one evening we had 5 open bottles of wine at our table and we did get up to retrieve and pour our own white wine after waiting 25 minutes for a sommelier to return. Hopefully my guess is correct and that this has been rectified. We will be on Regatta in a few weeks so will see.

Cenia

[beechwood]

I'm sorry, but your second paragraph had me laughing. The first trip I made to Britain, the food at breakfast was never hot. I can remember one day near the end of the trip saying to my travel companions, the one thing I was looking forward to when I got home was hot toast. Magically the cold toast disappeared and much warmer, not hot toast appeared. It does depend on the size of table you are sitting at and if your fellow table mates, eat slow or fast, how hot your food is when it arrives in the GDR. When we sat at a table with slow eaters, one or two times the food was not quite as hot, but the waiters did get to know you by the end of the cruise. We enjoyed our food but did find that we ate in the Terrace quite often because of the choice. I simply could not get my sushi fix in the GDR.:D

Then you should have sent the food back, most people from England expect their food to be hot! There was only two of us so no reason for the food not to be hot in the GDR.

[Condocat]

We just returned from the Bangkok to Dubai cruise on Nautica, our 5th cruise on Oceania.

 

We thought the GDR this time around was the best ever, as were the other venues.

 

The cruise was fabulous...still missing it!

[moggyhill]

That's just too funny

 

"Assumptions are dangerous but I see you suffer from second post syndrome. Attack without information

Not a good strategy on cruise critic, particularly on the o boards"

[Mura]

We have also tended to PREFER the GDR. To each his own, but we like the variety of courses. And we know some people who disagree violently with our assessment and will refuse to dine there.

 

But to say that you were "compelled" to dine in the GDR seems a bit off to me as well. Everyone is guaranteed a certain number of reservations in the specialty restaurants and on many cruises you can get extra reservations. I agree, it depends on the cruise. There are cruises were the majority of people don't care about the specialty restaurants, and cruises where everybody wants extra reservations. You don't know what you will encounter until you are on board. And obviously the "O" ships have the advantage of two more specialty restaurants and an absolutely spectacular buffet restaurant.

 

We've rarely had the temperature or sommelier problems some have complained about, and I do like my food hot! But I wasn't on your cruise and so I don't know if I would have felt the same. (I do have to agree that food we've ordered in the UK has generally not been hot either. But certainly not cold, and we've generally had very good meals in the UK despite many complaints about British cooking that I've read here and elsewhere.)

 

We were on Marina in Oct '11 and Regatta in August '12 and found both "up to snuff". I do remember on our one B2B (10 years ago now) where there was a crew change-over mid-cruise and service was clearly inferior for the first few days of the second leg. Part of that could have been due to the fact that the first leg only had about 500 passengers on board while the second leg was almost full, with many new crew members to boot. Sometimes that can be a factor.

 

I'm sorry you were disappointed with your cruise.

 

To the person who waited for 25 minutes for someone to pour your wine --- I MIGHT have waited 5-10 minutes, but no more!

 

I gather that this can be a greater problem with people who are on the liquor package as opposed to people who buy a bottle for dinner. If you have to wait for additional glasses of wine to be brought to the table, there isn't much you can do about it. If you have a bottle of wine on your table or next to it, you really don't need to wait for a glass to be poured. (Admittedly, proper service will be attentive to the level of liquid in your glass.)

 

Mura

[capecodder2]

A year or 2 ago, O made some changes with the wine service and cut back on the number of sommeliers, it has been slow since. On one cruise the wine was served by the dining room staff, luckily that has changed again as they just don't have time to do that. I think they have cut back on a lot of staff over the last couple of years making things slower and temperatures of food cooler. If enough people note that on their surveys, perhaps things will change for the better. 7 days and we will be on the Marina - hurray!

[pacheco18]

We just returned from the Bangkok to Dubai cruise on Nautica, our 5th cruise on Oceania.

 

We thought the GDR this time around was the best ever, as were the other venues.

 

The cruise was fabulous...still missing it!

 

We boarded when you disembarked.

The next 21 days were also great

[PY33]

Just got back from the AEgen Gems cruise on Riviera and I think the service was superb. Read my review....

 

http://www.cruisecritic.co.uk/memberreviews/memberreview.cfm?EntryID=220126

[potterhill]

We were on the Beijing to Bangkok cruise also. I asked my husband about these two issues ( he never forgets anything ;-)), cold food and poor wine service. Neither were an issue for us. We did have issues finding the ship to board, as apparently it was moved. But we got there after an extensive tour of the port, which surely must be one of the largest in the world!

 

One area that has some service issues is on the Starboard side of Terrace at the few tables behind the coffee setup. It is like you are invisible as they serve everyone around you, but never you. No clearing of dishes, no drink service of any kind. It seems one is under Harry Potter's invisibility cloak. We came, we sat, we ate and we left with no acknowledgement at all. We usually sit outside or on the Port side, on the rare occasions we dine there other than breakfast, so can't really say if this is normal. On the two days we ate in this specific area, it was very busy, so that partly accounts for it but it really seemed that no one was assigned these tables. We are perfectly capable of getting our own drinks and did so. However, for some people this would be an issue. Or if you wanted alcohol of some sort.

 

One thing that impressed me was that you could order at Waves and retreat to the warmth or cool of the Terrace ( we had both- either too cold or too hot. ;-) ) and they always found you and delivered your order.

 

We had a lovely cruise, our longest at 25 days. And for the first time I did not want to come home.

 

Mo

[hypercafe]

We were on the Rivera in March. I think the service was fine however there were times it was hard to get bar service. These ships have lots of dinning rooms for there size open all at the same time, this takes a lot of staff and I am sure there are never enough. The Ex Chef told me there were around 200 cooks onboard out of a crew of 800. They already use the forward part of deck 6 for crew so they most likely have no place to sleep more.

[keele]

I can see that i have sparked off quite a debate but I am just giving my honest opinion of a 21 day cruise.

As discussed itinery great, rooms fine, beds good, very nice deck areas etc; but i am afraid that i do not equate such slow service to 5 star establishments.

I note that somebody has mentioned on the post that there is a possibility that having the premium drinks package might lead to slower service but i do not feel this is satisfactory as the package is not inexpensive.

I felt that there was a lot of waitor staff in the GDR who spent an inordinate amount of time refilling glasses of water. It would have been nice if this could have translated to more sommeliers on the floor.

Bear in mind that UK residents already seem to pay a premium for their cruises in comparison to our US counterparts.

As discussed I would consider an Oceania cruise again at the right price but will also look at other alternatives, add on the price of speciality restaurants on an almost nightly basis, a decent stateroom, tips etc; and still think that the balance would be the same.

Oceania need to look beyond their most loyal customers and realise that they need to address and respond to complaints from people cruising with them.

[orchestrapal]

I can see that i have sparked off quite a debate but I am just giving my honest opinion of a 21 day cruise.

As discussed itinery great, rooms fine, beds good, very nice deck areas etc; but i am afraid that i do not equate such slow service to 5 star establishments.

I note that somebody has mentioned on the post that there is a possibility that having the premium drinks package might lead to slower service but i do not feel this is satisfactory as the package is not inexpensive.

I felt that there was a lot of waitor staff in the GDR who spent an inordinate amount of time refilling glasses of water. It would have been nice if this could have translated to more sommeliers on the floor.

Bear in mind that UK residents already seem to pay a premium for their cruises in comparison to our US counterparts.

As discussed I would consider an Oceania cruise again at the right price but will also look at other alternatives, add on the price of speciality restaurants on an almost nightly basis, a decent stateroom, tips etc; and still think that the balance would be the same.

Oceania need to look beyond their most loyal customers and realise that they need to address and respond to complaints from people cruising with them.

 

Have you voiced your comments directly to Oceania?:confused:

[Mura]

I note that somebody has mentioned on the post that there is a possibility that having the premium drinks package might lead to slower service but i do not feel this is satisfactory as the package is not inexpensive.

 

 

If you are referring to my comment, it had to do with the drink package including glasses of wine rather than full bottles. In that case, I can see where delays could happen. I wasn't trying to say that this is okay, because it isn't.

 

But if you have a bottle of wine close to you, then you don't have to depend on the waiter or sommelier to refill your glass. (In a nice restaurant you shouldn't have to pour your own wine, that goes without saying, but I've been known to do so.)

 

Mura