Have cruise lines passed or failed when it comes to customer service

[myfuzzy]

I have sailed the major lines and have drawn my own opinions of customer service given to todays cruisers. Have the lines been giving better service or have they dropped the ball on giving the customer the best they can. If you can give your opinion of the customer service you have recieved--ex: have you asked and recieved or have gotten an satisfactory upgrade, settled any pre, onboard, or post cruise problems to your satisfaction, has corporate america listened to any suggestions or have given any feedback to you. After all, we have chosen to spend our hard earned money with many of these companies, and are wondering, are we given the fair shake for our money?

[myfuzzy]

So, with the lack of replies, I take it everyone has had no problems on any of their trips. Thats wonderful, then they are doing their jobs. Smooth Sailing everyone!!!

[Scrapnana]

We had good customer service on the Disney Fantasy. We had two rooms but one OBC. It was very easy to get the OBC put on one of the rooms and also to redeem my Disney gift card. Visited guest services a couple of other times and they were very friendly and easy to deal with.

[Keith1010]

Like most things in life the answer will vary by person and by cruise line.

 

Keith

[myfuzzy]

Like most things in life the answer will vary by person and by cruise line.

 

Keith

 

Yes, but what might be an issue for one, might not be for another. And if you've only sailed a couple of lines, maybe they are not the right ones for you. Thats why I'm asking.

[RayS - Puerto Rico]

We made a reservation with Royal Caribbean this November 23, 2013 and paid for it in full for a guaranty ocean view cabin. However, less than 24 hours later another fare appears for a better cabin within the same category appeared announced for $120 more than what I have paid. We were told that the change cannot be done directly and only through cancellation costing me $1,200 more. However, our cruise booking confirmation indicated that there were no restriction on promos using our fare.

 

After 12 cruises, this is my first time on RCCL and is the first time I have seen something like this. Of all my reservations in other cruise line, there is something know as flexibility and reasonableness. I made this reservation and payment less than 24 hours from the date of the new offer. I was willing to pay the difference of $120, but Royal Caribbean makes up the excuse that this was only for new booking on Saturday and Sunday (not mentioned anywhere else). I think that the information offered by these reservation and customer service officials is made without any support or rationale. I do not want to think that I have been denied access arbitrarily to a fare (for which I was willing to pay the $120 difference).

 

This was not a good starting experience at all, specially for a family of 4.

 

In the meantime, I must enjoy this cruise (since I am outside of the window for a full refund) and wait for the my next vacation with a cruise line dealing with clear and well established terms.

 

I will definitely not return to RCCL in the future. Sometimes quality is better than size of the ships and quality of service should start since the time you made the reservation.

Edited November 3, 2013 by RayS - Puerto Rico

[Mineka_C]

I only have one account, since I try to avoid customer service as much as possible (I can't deal with conflicts).

Long story short, due to lack of sunscreen I wasn't going on a shore excursion that I had booked. This was brought to the shore excursion desk less than 24 hours before we were to arrive in said port. Which according to their policy equals NO refund. But me, being in agonizing pain decided to ask anyway. They gave me a 75% refund without any issue.

 

I think Carnival should keep up with what they're doing, except they need to make the comedy rooms larger.

[fendbass]

Lets start with this:

 

"...has corporate america listened to any suggestions or have given any feedback to you..."

 

Where the heck do you think you are. Nevermind Cruising, has ANY corporate entity ever paid attention to you? The only thing more obstinate than Corporate America is politicians

 

All we can control is where we spend our money. After all the trouble Carnival had last year, they couldn't give cabins away

 

I personally think that people have unrealistic expectations. My wife was telling me about a different Cruise Critic thread where, the customer viewed a brochure showing bright, sunny days, and you guessed it, it rained for most of the cruise. Of course, they wanted 50% compensation

 

Others complain about the dining room, how an excursion didn't live up to their expectations, how there were chair hogs, or the drinks were too expensive, usually followed by "I will never cruise with that line again", and they're right. Vote with your feet

 

My customer service experiences have generally been pretty good, except I couldn't get into certain shows that weren't available on line, and were fully booked by the time we got to the reservations desk, and one, when one of our bags wasn't delivered (we found it ourselves, it was on the wrong deck). Oh, well, stuff happens, we don't let it bother us

[em-sk]

I think you need to more clearly define customer service. I don't think free upgrades is either good or bad customer service.

 

Good customer service comes down to delivering on what you promise. Treating your customer with respect and in a friendly way. When things go wrong making them right.

 

I have cruised NCL and I actually think they do well on this front. The other cruise lines that are still in business likely do the same.

 

The crew are friendly. They appear to be generally interested and concerned about my welling being as a passenger. Some examples:

 

- The cruise critic meet and greet session, a fair number of officers turn up for the meeting and hand out cards with their names and their direct numbers. They then state if you have any problem, instead of posting it when you get home just give us a call and we might be able to resolve it on the spot.

- When you go to the main dinning room and say "I would like this dish, but can you do this variation" and the response is we can do that.

- When you are waking down the hall and cabin steward noticed you are heading to your cabin, he drops what is doing to open the door for you.

- When a supervisor notices a long line at customer service and comes out of his office and walks over to the passengers in line and sees if he can help resolve some of the issues.

- When an officer or crew member comes up to you asks if you are enjoying the curse and how they can make things better.

- When they make a mistake on a bill, saying I am sorry and will fix that immediately.

 

Getting a cabin upgrade, a free drink, or OBC credit is nice and I would not discourage a cruise line from doing that, but honestly that tends to be more common of an organization that does poor customer service trying to make up for it.

[Gunner22aa]

Pre cruise my TA deals with anything that might come up. For example on our next cruise we had a suite booked. For some reason unknown to both my TA and I Princess had us on a wait list for the same suite but on a deck I prefer more. They contacted her and she jumped on it knowing my preference. Thats good customer service, knowing your client.

 

As to on board I am left to resolve any issues on my own. Having cruised 4 different lines I can say I have only had customer service issues on one. NCL. I had a billing issue for a spa treatment that DW could not have had as we were ashore with a large party of relatives. Customer service insisted it was her signature on the slip. The cabin number was ours for some reason but the signature was far from hers. She gave them a sample signature. They argued that she had changed the way she wrote to get out of the bill. We actually had to go to the spa and have the staff confirm that it was not my wife who received the service that day. One cruise with NCL was two too many.

 

All of the other lines we have been on, Princess, Celebrity and especially Cunard have had fantastic customer service in my mind.

[clearsea]

I have always found customer service on cruises excellent. At the end of the day, I do believe this works both ways. The customer and the service staff have to be nice to eachother. And in particular I do believe the customer has to be very well behaved, its all too easy for a customer to be horrid these days over a silly situation. Cruise staff and all staff work best to try and help thier customers, and as a customer I firmly believe this!!! :cool: Respect on both sides needs to be number one, with neither party losing their cool!!!

[wdclements]

I booked a cruise that's coming up on NCL. I booked the cruise almost a year in advance, it's our first cruise. I paid for it almost a year in advance. While checking prices one day I noticed the price had dropped for an inside cabin and they were offering OBC and free upgrades so I called and asked if I could get that same deal and I was told they can only do that for new customers. I've since called 3 more time trying to get an upgrade and the answer is always no. The other day I stumble on this form you can fill out if you find the price lower anywhere else they will either give you that price or refund you 110% of the difference as long as you fill out the form within 48 hours. Wish I would have been told by they uninforming customer service rep! Could be the first and last cruise with Norwegian.

 

 

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[iancal]

We have only ever had one issue-an on board issue with an NCL cruise.

 

In our case, NCL's on board customer service and subsequent follow up surpassed our expectations. We were impressed.

[calliopecruiser]

I have sailed the major lines and have drawn my own opinions of customer service given to todays cruisers. Have the lines been giving better service or have they dropped the ball on giving the customer the best they can. If you can give your opinion of the customer service you have recieved--ex: have you asked and recieved or have gotten an satisfactory upgrade (that's not about customer service), settled any pre, onboard, or post cruise problems to your satisfaction (I haven't had any significant problems I've complained about), has corporate america listened to any suggestions or have given any feedback to you (I don't expect them to listen to my suggestions (I don't make suggestions to corporate America), since we have very different goals). After all, we have chosen to spend our hard earned money with many of these companies, and are wondering, are we given the fair shake for our money?

 

Mainstream cruise lines are offering very inexpensive cruises compared to other hospitality industry offerings (and compared to what they used to charge), so it wouldn't at all be surprising if they are not offering customer service to the level they used to. Good customer service costs money, and most customers want more food/drink/days of vacation bang for their buck (not more service bang for their buck).

[cb at sea]

Most businesses will have a "bad apple" or two in their customer service dept....99% of the time, everyone's discontent is settled satisfactorily.

 

Now, the phone companies...try and get good service from them, without jumping through hoops!