Dine My Way - new MedallionClass enhancement

[Steelers36]

6 hours ago, Tedferg said:

Sorry if this has been answered in earlier post. We are looking at Ruby R/T out of LA Sep 18 2021 and the dining option for Traditional an Anytime are still shown as a booking option. Ruby is Medallioned right ?

They may not ever remove this option as it gives them an idea of the dinner service for each voyage.  They may be waiting until the new system is well implemented.  They can also continue to assign people default TD based on their reservation selections and then up to customer to change or customize. 

[caribill]

This feature is basically designed to let anytime diners reserve an anytime slot for each evening of the cruise at the time they want which can be different each evening.

 

Only real experience will show if mopst people will find availability at the times they select or if so many people pick certain times, others will just have to pick a different time.

 

Making such a reservation is not casting it in concrete. A person could cancel a time if they want or can change the time they picked for an evening. If you are onshore at a beach and do not want to rush back to the ship for an early time that day, if you have Internet access on shore you can change to a different time.

 

As for me, if I had selected anytime, it would be because each evening might be different based on other ship activities and events. I would not be making reservations ahead of knowing what is scheduled for when.

 

 

[Wishing on a star]

I don't know about all different types and regions of cruises...  But, on our last cruise (Princess), Traditional Dining has empty seats and tables...  At the most busy dining hour, there could be waits for Anytime...  They sent us down to the lower Aft dining room, which was all but empty!!!

I think that many people 'think' they want to book Traditional, but then find it inconvenient or just don't want to stick with it after the first few days of the cruise.

 

I think that the habits and culture of cruising with todays cruisers is changing, a lot.  

I think that Princess is probably late to waking up to this.

 

This new system could be a way of phasing out what we know as Traditional Seatings.

And, a really good effective reservation system is what would be needed in order to control crowding and help create some social distancing.

 

Just my thoughts!

[LACruiser88]

We have been avid fans of Late Traditional Seating for many years.  We are not into the shows/games/Trivia and enjoy a leisurely dining experience with the same wait staff every night.  We hope they keep this type of seating available for those of us that enjoy it.

 

"Just my Thoughts!" 

[Wishing on a star]

With the new system,  it seems that all you would have to do is to make that late reservation..

Could be a win - win!

Edited May 29, 2021 by Wishing on a star

[memoak]

Having seen the long lines even before anytime dining opens I can forcast tons of early reservations and many disappointed when they can’t get what they want 

[dides]

2 hours ago, LACruiser88 said:

We have been avid fans of Late Traditional Seating for many years.  We are not into the shows/games/Trivia and enjoy a leisurely dining experience with the same wait staff every night.  We hope they keep this type of seating available for those of us that enjoy it.

 

"Just my Thoughts!" 

Traditional Dining with set times in that sense is no more- had this confirmed by someone at Princess. You just need to book repeating timeslots in the same dining room.

[phabric]

2 hours ago, dides said:

Traditional Dining with set times in that sense is no more- had this confirmed by someone at Princess. You just need to book repeating timeslots in the same dining room.

On the large Royal Caribbean ships, on your planner (in advance at time of booking) you could book your daily dining time.  At the restaurant, there were 2 lines, 1) reservations and 2) no reservations. They held your reservation time for 15 minutes 

[Redwing55]

All these comments about social distancing.  It's like it's the panacea of prevention.  The fear mongering unfortunately continues it's impact.  

[LACruiser88]

4 hours ago, dides said:

Traditional Dining with set times in that sense is no more- had this confirmed by someone at Princess. You just need to book repeating timeslots in the same dining room.

All 8 of our upcoming cruises show confirmed for Late Traditional Seating.  The 1st of those cruises is on November 5th.  We will see....

[LawDog61]

If this works really well, I am wondering if I will still find Club Class a benefit worth the cost.

[wowzz]

4 minutes ago, LawDog61 said:

If this works really well, I am wondering if I will still find Club Class a benefit worth the cost.

Good point.  Apart from a slightly different menu, what other benefits will you get with Club Class? 

[dides]

38 minutes ago, LACruiser88 said:

All 8 of our upcoming cruises show confirmed for Late Traditional Seating.  The 1st of those cruises is on November 5th.  We will see....

 

 

Princess did say in the small print that *Previous dining selections (including traditional dining) will be honored.

 

[Tedferg]

45 minutes ago, LACruiser88 said:

All 8 of our upcoming cruises show confirmed for Late Traditional Seating.  The 1st of those cruises is on November 5th.  We will see....

I suppose that just means that you have virtually filled in your request for My Time, and those who choose Anytime have decided virtually not to pick a My Time.

[caribill]

9 hours ago, phabric said:

On the large Royal Caribbean ships, on your planner (in advance at time of booking) you could book your daily dining time.  At the restaurant, there were 2 lines, 1) reservations and 2) no reservations. They held your reservation time for 15 minutes 

 

Royal Caribbean ships also do something else different than Princess. A level of a dining room is shared by both traditional time diners and anytime diners, including those who made reservations. The number of tables for anytime will change each cruise depending how many passengers have traditional.

[PrincessLuver]

14 hours ago, LawDog61 said:

If this works really well, I am wondering if I will still find Club Class a benefit worth the cost.

 

We like Club Class and believe it will still be worth it because we prefer having the ability to eat breakfast and dinner whenever we chose and not have to wait and we also like lunch on sea days in Club Class......we like how the staff really gets to know you because they are not dealing with large numbers of passengers....we tend to do 20/30 day cruises so the convenience is worth it to us.......

[Steelers36]

8 hours ago, caribill said:

 

Royal Caribbean ships also do something else different than Princess. A level of a dining room is shared by both traditional time diners and anytime diners, including those who made reservations. The number of tables for anytime will change each cruise depending how many passengers have traditional.

Unless you mean they do this in all their DR's, I don't see this as much different than Princess.  The mid-ship Deck 6 DR has a mix of TD and AT for early dining.  I am thinking most cruises the late TD can be fully accommodated in the aft DR.

[caribill]

2 hours ago, Steelers36 said:

Unless you mean they do this in all their DR's, I don't see this as much different than Princess.  The mid-ship Deck 6 DR has a mix of TD and AT for early dining.  I am thinking most cruises the late TD can be fully accommodated in the aft DR.

Royal Caribbean only has one dining room, but it is multi-story.

 

 

[Wishing on a star]

True...  and, personally,  I do not really appreciate eating in one huge, crowded two-three story dining 'Hall'.   

Makes me think of a food court in a huge mall-of-america type thing.

[Steelers36]

1 hour ago, caribill said:

Royal Caribbean only has one dining room, but it is multi-story.

 

 

I remember way back when on Celebrity a couple of times, they had a two-level DR with open center.  Those smaller ships are long-gone I believe.

 

[booklady26]

1 hour ago, Steelers36 said:

I remember way back when on Celebrity a couple of times, they had a two-level DR with open center.  Those smaller ships are long-gone I believe.

 

I haven't been on any of X's Edge class ships, but the Solstice class ships (100k-115k tons) have the same layout as you describe. The lower level is for traditional dining and the upper level is for what they refer to as Select dining, or Anytime dining. We are able to make reservations when we book the cruise on the Cruise Planner and have never had to wait more than a couple of minutes to be seated. If you like a particular server, you can request to be seated in their section. It works very well. Hopefully, this new arrangement will work well for our cruise on the Enchanted next year.

[dreaminofcruisin]

Just saw this on a cruise for next year that I was looking at...seems it is coming for future bookings....note the Dining Option.

 

 

[Sea Hag]

On 5/30/2021 at 11:18 AM, Steelers36 said:

I remember way back when on Celebrity a couple of times, they had a two-level DR with open center.  Those smaller ships are long-gone I believe.

 

We did a spur-of-the-moment cruise on the Carnival Splendor some years back. The dining room was like that. We had a booth next to the rail on the second story of the dining room. The people watching from there was spectacular. That might have been my favorite location that we ever had on a cruise

[Doug R.]

On 5/29/2021 at 5:14 PM, Redwing55 said:

All these comments about social distancing.  It's like it's the panacea of prevention.  The fear mongering unfortunately continues it's impact.  

Oh Hush!

[PrincessLuver]

On 5/29/2021 at 2:14 PM, Redwing55 said:

All these comments about social distancing.  It's like it's the panacea of prevention.  The fear mongering unfortunately continues it's impact.  

So let me understand this......you are AFRAID of prevention?