Saving lounge chairs at the pool enforcement?

[DJLDRUMS]

I had read stories of the 30 minute rule of being away from your lounge chair more than 30 minutes only to come back and find towel and belongings removed by pool attendants or staff officers.

Previously it was not being strictly enforced on most ships. Has a trend began to enforce that policy more all all of their ships or just now and then if it's being taken advantage of more ?

I may have been a post from people on the Independence ?

Thanks to all who reply !

[cb at sea]

It's "hit or miss" on chair hogging....if you bring a swath of hogged chairs to the attention of the pool staff, they will do something, eventually. Maybe. However, even with the "chair hogging" we've never not been able to find loungers. We don't particularly care about sitting right next to the pool, where it's VERY crowded and loud....so we generally go up a deck, where we can spread the loungers apart a bit, affording easier access to your seat, and the noise level is much lower, as is the traffic!

 

Now, we have had problems in the Solarium, where there are limited loungers....hogging is more apparent and annoying in there. Ask someone sitting nearby if those towel-draped chairs are being used. If not, ask the attendant to remove said offending towels, and have a seat!

Edited March 30, 2014 by cb at sea

[dodgeball24]

I have never had my stuff touched but I am usually there early go to breakfast and come back so I am in my chair by 8ish and then go to lunch but by that time the staff has seen me in the chairs and I leave my bag there, best advice leave a beach bag on top of your towel.

 

I hope they do enforce the rules, when I am there early I see the parent come out and put 8 towels across a row and nobody shows till noon in the other chairs sorry but that is rude. When I come out of ny I see that more then anywhere and I just shake my head at that and the idiot that takes a chair and moves it into the walkway because there was a space, yes there was it was to walk thru:confused:

[LMaxwell]

Never have seen deck patrol do anything about this issue.

[leaveitallbehind]

That was my post. They were enforcing it in the Solarium on Independence with the "30 minute" card on the 3/1 sailing. Wasn't foolproof but at least an attempt and one of the few times we've seen a formal effort to enforce this on RCI.

[kurukthemal]

Install little timers...every time the chair senses no weight it starts the countdown. Probably too expensive to do though.

[LMaxwell]

Install little timers...every time the chair senses no weight it starts the countdown. Probably too expensive to do though.

 

Other cruise lines empower their staff to tag/sticker empty chairs. Then they simply make another round at timed intervals. RCI seems content to let passengers deal with this themselves the majority of the time on most ships.

[DJLDRUMS]

Ahhh..ok that's where I saw it. Thanks for your reply to my question. I didn't know it was fleet wide or a way to tighten things up a little more. yes, it's true some people take advantage of this and spoil it for others.

One other piece of information is that with the 40 cruises we've taken, pool patrol and staff officers walking around are not always attentive to asking parents to remove their children from the main pool (standing and sitting on the sides) while they're still in diapers. We've seen parents pull a "nutty' when told to take their diaper wearing child out of the pool.

On out last cruise on the Legend in January it happened again. But to add more to it when the child in diapers was asked to be taken out of the pool he cried, threw a tantrum then threw up. I know you know what that means.... shut the pool down and sanitize with bleach, and with any luck will reopen late in the day or next day. All which could have been avoided.

[MandyMooToo]

We were on Oasis last year and the policy was being enforced...both ways. Husband and I had been in our chairs for a couple hours when I needed the restroom (dang mango daiquiris). I excused myself and he decided to get an ice cream from the soft serve machine (mistake for both of us to get up at the same time). When we got back to our seats, 10 minutes later maybe, a woman had taken my husband's shirt/towel/shoes and placed them on my chair and laid down. Pool staff, aided by the new friends we made sitting near us, had the woman move and give us the chair back. All in all the staff did well that cruise. We never saw any children in the adult main pools either so maybe we just got lucky?

 

 

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[FTLcruisers]

That was my post. They were enforcing it in the Solarium on Independence with the "30 minute" card on the 3/1 sailing. Wasn't foolproof but at least an attempt and one of the few times we've seen a formal effort to enforce this on RCI.

 

we were on the Independence on the Feb 15th sailing and they did not enforce it in the solarium! We saw people leave their towels on chairs and then packed up their stuff to get off the ship!

 

Marianne

[lovesthebeach2]

We stayed at Disneys Aulani last August and they had a great way of enforcing the no chair hogging rules. Every hour the attendant went by and folded every towel with an empty chair over the back. if it was still there when they made the next round the belongings were removed and the chair became available. People caught on very fast and changed they ways.

[SamFritz]

I like the 30 minute courtesy card idea. I've never seen it in use, but it seems like good way to identify offenders and let others know that the rules are being enforced.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk, please excuse all the typos.

[waterbug123]

Has a trend began to enforce that policy more

 

Gosh, I hope so! :)

[palofmine]

I have seen this pretty well enforced on Oasis when we went in 2012.. last year on grandeur, there were tons of chair hogs, but also nice people who gave up their seats. My husband got up at 6am to get a seat for us, and we were there almost all day. We also brought our own towels, and i returned to my chair about every 15 - 20 minutes as well.

[kccrzr]

Depends upon the ship/sailing. It was not enforced at all on our recent Radiance sailing but was enforced on Enchantment.

[Virtopia]

I just came off the Explorer yesterday and it was heavily enforced. They would collect the towels and if there were belongings on the chair, they were brought to the towel exchange desk.

 

 

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[pdbcruisers]

Just wondering if there is more enforcement on sea days as compared to port days? On the Adventure three weeks ago, the pool attendant was really enforcing the 30 minutes on our sea day. We stayed on the ship at St Maarten and practically had the Solarium to ourselves.

[Folk Singer]

Never have seen deck patrol do anything about this issue.

 

see this all the time. it is enforced.

[Host Kewlguy]

On Independence in January it was strictly enforced, thankfully. Yet on Freedom three weeks ago there was no enforcement at all. Actually there didn't seem to be enforcement of any rules on Freedom's pool deck. It was pretty much anything goes and the pool attendants were usually invisable.

[Bobal]

They were enforcing it on Allure on the Beach Deck a few weeks ago. This was by far the most popular area and they were out in force bagging up towels and belongings and placing stickers with times on the back of chairs.

 

We were on the deck above (which had plenty of empty loungers) watching the pantomime which ensued when the original owners returned to find someone in 'their' seats.

[erniebert]

On our recent Explorer cruise they were enforcing it to an extent - would have been more than 30 minutes but there was a staff member doing a regular sweep and removing belongings from empty loungers

[impatientlywaiting]

On the Serenade at Christmas the Solarium attendants were enforcing the "no kids under 16" rule which we really appreciated. One lady brought in 6 or 7 teenagers and then left them. When the attendant told them they had to leave, one of the kids ran out to get the woman and she pitched a 9 acre fit. Really? She was sunning out at the main pool. Later I saw all the teenagers using the outside hot tub as their private pool. :rolleyes:

[Folk Singer]

We were on Oasis last year and the policy was being enforced...both ways. Husband and I had been in our chairs for a couple hours when I needed the restroom (dang mango daiquiris). I excused myself and he decided to get an ice cream from the soft serve machine (mistake for both of us to get up at the same time). When we got back to our seats, 10 minutes later maybe, a woman had taken my husband's shirt/towel/shoes and placed them on my chair and laid down. Pool staff, aided by the new friends we made sitting near us, had the woman move and give us the chair back. All in all the staff did well that cruise. We never saw any children in the adult main pools either so maybe we just got lucky?

 

 

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;);)

[slyster]

Well from what i'm reading here, it's not consistent. I do like the idea of folking someones towel and then as the attendant comes back through another 20-30 minutes later, they remove the towels.

 

What I don't want is someone trying to take my things early, meaning after a few minutes. I had a situation where my neighbor (I didn't know him from adam) asked if I could watch his towel and book...he was going to the bathroom and grabbing an ice cream cone. He was gone maybe 5 minutes when an attendant and older gentleman came over to move his stuff. I told them he would be right back. They said he had been gone a while and I said, "5 minutes is a while???" The attendant looked at the older gentleman like that's not what you told me. Thankfully the neighbor was walking up right about then.

 

Really irked me this poor guy couldn't get up for 5-10 minutes max before some was ready to confinscate his stuff. Good thing I was watching it for him.

[At Sea 4Ever]

Well from what i'm reading here, it's not consistent. I do like the idea of folking someones towel and then as the attendant comes back through another 20-30 minutes later, they remove the towels.

 

What I don't want is someone trying to take my things early, meaning after a few minutes. I had a situation where my neighbor (I didn't know him from adam) asked if I could watch his towel and book...he was going to the bathroom and grabbing an ice cream cone. He was gone maybe 5 minutes when an attendant and older gentleman came over to move his stuff. I told them he would be right back. They said he had been gone a while and I said, "5 minutes is a while???" The attendant looked at the older gentleman like that's not what you told me. Thankfully the neighbor was walking up right about then.

 

Really irked me this poor guy couldn't get up for 5-10 minutes max before some was ready to confinscate his stuff. Good thing I was watching it for him.

 

 

Yea let's hope it doesn't go to the other extreme where one gets up for a towel or to use the restroom or grab a drink from the bar and they come back to find their stuff moved. That's not realistic either!

 

 

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