3/4/16 Dining Room Times Not Available

[Oceangoer2]

Would anyone have any idea or opinion on why both 6pm and 8:30pm dining times are unavailable on the March 4, 2016 Equinox cruise? One TA I spoke with thought there may be a large group on board but I can't imagine the line would do that and only make Select dining available. It occurred to me perhaps they were redesigning the dining space to allow for Luminato (sp?) and won't open the rest of the dining room until they know the number of guests they will have to accommodate in that space? Sound reasonable or can you think of another reason? Thanks for your help. If it's that large a group, we'll be changing our sailing date.

[jsf]

It's SOP now a day's, no one seems to know why.Chances are you will get your time.

J.

[MareT]

I don't know why but I'm curious. We originally booked a b2b for November and were wait listed for late seating and were given Select Dining. Then we had to move this cruise from November to January 2016 and the same think happened. Usually early seating is the one that books fast but not late seating . . at least that's been my experience.

 

Maryann

[gdpups]

I've booked cruises (way in advance) and had the dining time I want show full, so just asked to be put on the wait list and usually within a few weeks I'd get an email letting me know I got the time I wanted. I don't think there is any way to find out why, but we tend to like Select now anyway for the flexibility, especially when going to Europe.

[sarahc78]

I think Celebrity is using this as a way to get the gratuities pre paid in advance. Ran into the same thing for my upcoming sailing that the only thing available was select dining.

 

It was odd that when I called to complain about having to pre pay the gratuities they were able to get us into 6 pm dining no problems what so ever.

[Oceangoer2]

Thanks for the comments....I thought it was unique to our cruise but if you all have experienced the same then there's some reason why they're closing off the dining times. A year ahead doesn't fill up that fast. Select is probably a good way to go anyway as the MDR was really crowded with pushed together tables on our last cruise a few weeks ago. Making room for the Lumin(?) area took up a lot of the normally larger dining area.

[VaCruzers]

I think Celebrity is using this as a way to get the gratuities pre paid in advance. Ran into the same thing for my upcoming sailing that the only thing available was select dining.

 

It was odd that when I called to complain about having to pre pay the gratuities they were able to get us into 6 pm dining no problems what so ever.

 

I agree that it's THIS.

[FlorenceItaly]

I think Celebrity is using this as a way to get the gratuities pre paid in advance. Ran into the same thing for my upcoming sailing that the only thing available was select dining.

 

It was odd that when I called to complain about having to pre pay the gratuities they were able to get us into 6 pm dining no problems what so ever.

 

I believe this to be the case. Last month we booked on board for a April 2017 cruise and we were told the early dining was full! We were booked into select, and are waitlisted.

[VaCruzers]

If you are able to get an assigned dining time, are you able to switch to select once onboard? Although I think we'd prefer select, I'd rather not have to pre-pay the gratuities since we will have a significant amount of onboard credit I'd like to use for the gratuities. Anyone have insight on this? It's our first Celebrity cruise so I'm not sure whether you can switch onboard or not.

[jelayne]

I think Celebrity is using this as a way to get the gratuities pre paid in advance. Ran into the same thing for my upcoming sailing that the only thing available was select dining.

 

It was odd that when I called to complain about having to pre pay the gratuities they were able to get us into 6 pm dining no problems what so ever.

 

I'm not so sure. They don't actually get the gratuities paid until final payment and they can't accommodate everyone in Select Dining. My guess either being cautious until the impact of the new Suite dining room is know, OR the booking system has another glitch in it.

[Denny01]

When we initially reserved our May 2016 and Oct 2016 cruises, both were shown as Select dining only. I told our TA we wanted main/early dining. She said she'd get it for us when we made the deposit, and when she made it, we got main dining.

 

Doesn't seem to make sense it would all be booked a year plus ahead with lots of cabins avail and then be avail at initial deposit.

 

I'm not a biggie on the idea that Celebrity is trying to get the prepaid gratuities but I have no other rationale idea why. I initially thought it was just not to tie up set dining times until you made a financial commitment, but others are reporting they are on wait lists. Go figure.

 

Den

[ghstudio]

Has anyone considered that this might be the first step to changing to offering only select dining?

[minz56]

Has anyone considered that this might be the first step to changing to offering only select dining?

 

I wondered this too. I was looking at a 5 night cruise out of Singapore in January 2016 and there was only Select. I wondered if they were thinking of trialing Select only on this short, port intensive cruise.

[Christine Frances]

I have Early Seating booked for my 2016 & 2017 cruises. I think this is an IT glitch as it has only just been reported lately.

[charmed101]

Yes, you are permitted to change to select once on board (go see MD as soon as you get on the ship) but be careful, select is becoming very popular so it may fill up before sailing.

[jsf]

I have Early Seating booked for my 2016 & 2017 cruises. I think this is an IT glitch as it has only just been reported lately.

 

Happened to us twice in 2012, both times we got our perfered seating before sailing.

J.