Princess Medallion

[Aus Traveller]

1 minute ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

It's the Medallion app that is causing the problems not the Medallion itself. If that works well it will be worth it.

 

But I understand what you mean about dropping traditional dining, although that had its minuses at times. We had a couple of cruises where we ended up dining alone on a big table.

We always used traditional dining until anytime dining became available on Aussie ships. We found it to be brilliant. We didn't have the problem of others not turning up to the traditional dining time slot leaving us alone. With anytime dining we didn't have the pressure of knowing we had to be there exactly on time. We went around the same time each evening and encountered a 'rotating' group of others who also went at that time. We wouldn't go back to traditional dining, but I thought it was still available on the Coral. We booked our preferred time, our dining room and choose 'share with others' - similar to anytime. We don't have to be at the same table every evening.

[valantine80]

1 hour ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

It's the Medallion app that is causing the problems not the Medallion itself. If that works well it will be worth it.

 

But I understand what you mean about dropping traditional dining, although that had its minuses at times. We had a couple of cruises where we ended up dining alone on a big table.

On our Hawaii cruise we were at a table for ten with only one other couple. There was  a table of six beside us but they would not let us all sit at the same table even though it was served by the same waiter.

 

On our 42 night Japan cruise , we ended up at a table by ourselves but after a request from us were moved to a larger table, though we were "on approval"from the other diners for a couple of nights.

 

[arxcards]

Nothing worse than disembarking from a cruise, and returning to this APPrenticeship - sigh -

[OzKiwiJJ]

So this sod of an app finally lets me get into the Health section again, then demands I upload vaccination certificates but won't accept pdfs, which is what downloading the vaccination certificate creates!!!!!!! Grrrrrr!!!!

I guess I'll have to take photos of them?

[arxcards]

1 minute ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

So this sod of an app finally lets me get into the Health section again, then demands I upload vaccination certificates but won't accept pdfs, which is what downloading the vaccination certificate creates!!!!!!! Grrrrrr!!!!

I guess I'll have to take photos of them?

Was there mention a little ways back that people were taking pictures of their certificate in order to upload them as an image file?

[NSWP]

3 minutes ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

So this sod of an app finally lets me get into the Health section again, then demands I upload vaccination certificates but won't accept pdfs, which is what downloading the vaccination certificate creates!!!!!!! Grrrrrr!!!!

I guess I'll have to take photos of them?

Chuck it in ye olde Lane Cove River, Julie, demand a cruise card at checkin, take hard copies of vacc certs etc. 

Edited June 4, 2022 by NSWP

[OzKiwiJJ]

19 minutes ago, arxcards said:

Was there mention a little ways back that people were taking pictures of their certificate in order to upload them as an image file?

I think there was but since there have been upgrades to the app since then I was hoping it was now smart enough to accept pdfs. Wrong!

[OzKiwiJJ]

20 minutes ago, NSWP said:

Chuck it in ye olde Lane Cove River, Julie, demand a cruise card at checkin, take hard copies of vacc certs etc. 

It's not the medallion, Les, it's the bloody app! And I'm not chucking my phone in the river just because of that. 

 

And we already have hard copies of our vax certs, as recommended during the webinar.

 

I'm actually looking forward to seeing how good (or bad) the medallion is. 

[arxcards]

6 minutes ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

I think there was but since there have been upgrades to the app since then I was hoping it was now smart enough to accept pdfs. Wrong!

Yeah, it should. 

[Aus Traveller]

1 hour ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

So this sod of an app finally lets me get into the Health section again, then demands I upload vaccination certificates but won't accept pdfs, which is what downloading the vaccination certificate creates!!!!!!! Grrrrrr!!!!

I guess I'll have to take photos of them?

We photographed our vacc certificates and up-loaded them as jpg.

[CDaze71]

4 minutes ago, Aus Traveller said:

We photographed our vacc certificates and up-loaded them as jpg.

Yep same here. 

[OzKiwiJJ]

I'll do that tomorrow but, seriously, we should not have to do that with a certificate. The app should be able to accept pdfs since that is the format you download them in. Grrrr!!!

[Bubbeh]

On 6/1/2022 at 6:52 PM, valantine80 said:

On our Hawaii cruise we were at a table for ten with only one other couple. There was  a table of six beside us but they would not let us all sit at the same table even though it was served by the same waiter.

Who is 'they'?  Assuming it was the staff rather than the other diners, my next query would be 'who is the customer here?'.  

 

On 6/1/2022 at 6:52 PM, valantine80 said:

On our 42 night Japan cruise , we ended up at a table by ourselves but after a request from us were moved to a larger table, though we were "on approval"from the other diners for a couple of nights.

Bet you were on your best behaviour those nights.  LOL!

[Aus Traveller]

9 minutes ago, Bubbeh said:

Who is 'they'?  Assuming it was the staff rather than the other diners, my next query would be 'who is the customer here?'. 

We have had waiters refuse to let us move to another table still within his service area.

[Bizziecruzer]

Even though the table is not full, the seats may be allocated to other passengers, who for whatever reason weren't at the dining room. We met a couple on the last day of a cruise who didn't realise dining room was included in their fare. They had had all their meals in the buffet.

[Aus Traveller]

2 minutes ago, Bizziecruzer said:

Even though the table is not full, the seats may be allocated to other passengers, who for whatever reason weren't at the dining room. We met a couple on the last day of a cruise who didn't realise dining room was included in their fare. They had had all their meals in the buffet.

Agreed, however we are talking about traditional dining when it has passed the time that passengers are generally admitted to the dining room. If two people are sitting at one large table and four at the nearby large table, it makes sense to me that they could join together. This would be for that night only.

[OzKiwiJJ]

Part of the problem with Traditiinal Dining was that everyone was allocated to a table whether they wanted it or no. Then Anytime Dining was introduced which added to the confusion. 

 

With the Medallion they could actually get it correct if they tried but "same table, same time, it isn't working from what I've read. And from what I've seen of the options in the app the wording and how the choices are displayed are wrong.

[Bubbeh]

7 minutes ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

Part of the problem with Traditiinal Dining was that everyone was allocated to a table whether they wanted it or no. Then Anytime Dining was introduced which added to the confusion. 

For our first probably half a dozen cruises we ate all our meals in the buffet as my husband prefers this.  Despite having hearing aids, he struggles to hear in noisy environments and finds the dining room very isolating and stressful.  In addition, he doesn't like to 'dress up' and sit for over an hour making 'pleasant conversation'.  I liked the idea of eating the occasional lunch / dinner in the dining room but I understood his predicament and agreed to eat at a table alone (wherever possible) in the buffet. 

 

We didn't realise that our decision was impacting on our fellow diners who must have felt disrespected every evening.  It was our TA who pointed this out (in a very delicate and sensitive way) so once Anytime Dining became available, we always book this and from time to time we do go to the Dining Room now for the occasional breakfast and lunch and maybe once or twice a cruise for dinner but, never on a formal night.

 

As I've gotten older I've become more confident and I am planning to take my glad rags with me on our next cruise and if I have to go alone to the Dining Room and sit with random singles then I'll be happy to give that a try.  Always open to meeting new people.

[OzKiwiJJ]

You weren't being disrespectful of your fellow diners, Bubbeh, you were choosing a dining option that suited you in what was, at the time, a system that was too rigid. The only thing you could have done would have been to advise the Maitre'd, at the start of each cruise, that you preferred to dine in the buffet.

[valantine80]

7 hours ago, Bubbeh said:

Who is 'they'?  Assuming it was the staff rather than the other diners, my next query would be 'who is the customer here?'.  

 

Bet you were on your best behaviour those nights.  LOL!

We were of the belief that it was the other diners to approve and also us. Was all good anyway. We had started off at table with another couple but was obvious after a few days they were not going to turn up.

 On the Hawaii cruise where there was only four of us on the table for ten, the four of us were the only ones assigned to that table.

 

 

[arxcards]

6 hours ago, Bubbeh said:

For our first probably half a dozen cruises we ate all our meals in the buffet as my husband prefers this.  Despite having hearing aids, he struggles to hear in noisy environments and finds the dining room very isolating and stressful.  In addition, he doesn't like to 'dress up' and sit for over an hour making 'pleasant conversation'.  I liked the idea of eating the occasional lunch / dinner in the dining room but I understood his predicament and agreed to eat at a table alone (wherever possible) in the buffet. 

 

We didn't realise that our decision was impacting on our fellow diners who must have felt disrespected every evening.  It was our TA who pointed this out (in a very delicate and sensitive way) so once Anytime Dining became available, we always book this and from time to time we do go to the Dining Room now for the occasional breakfast and lunch and maybe once or twice a cruise for dinner but, never on a formal night.

 

As I've gotten older I've become more confident and I am planning to take my glad rags with me on our next cruise and if I have to go alone to the Dining Room and sit with random singles then I'll be happy to give that a try.  Always open to meeting new people.

However delicate, your T/A comment is disrespectful. My general thought with empty seats is more bread rolls for me. My wife has a hearing aid, and yes, it is a delicate balance between turning it up for conversation and getting all the extra background noise at the same time. She enjoys the dressing up part, but finds it hard work to follow conversations in the noise and can feel a bit isolated. It also doesn't help that she can only hear with her right ear, and that is the side the waiters will address you. With that in mind, same time same table is a huge plus, as the waiters and others at the table already know for the following nights.

 

The only time I think it is disrespectful is that if you know you are dining a different way the following night, it is a nice courtesy to say we won't be here tomorrow night. It also helps everyone to know they aren't waiting on others to arrive before ordering. Hopefully the computer systems have caught up now, and the waiter should know who is dining in a specialty restaurant - but not the buffet.

[Russell21]

I can only assume that the people with hearing aids who are having a problem with background noise in the dining rooms, or elsewhere for that matter, have a cheap hearing aid. I wear hearing aids in both ears and my hearing aids have 5 programs easily accessible by the press of a button or from my relevant smart phone app, one of which reduces the background noise by a considerable amount by only using the microphones pointing forward to speakers and filtering down the residual noise. Can honestly recommend Hearing Australia, which has been and still is a Government run company since the end of the second world war.  

[Aus Traveller]

17 minutes ago, Russell21 said:

I can only assume that the people with hearing aids who are having a problem with background noise in the dining rooms, or elsewhere for that matter, have a cheap hearing aid. I wear hearing aids in both ears and my hearing aids have 5 programs easily accessible by the press of a button or from my relevant smart phone app, one of which reduces the background noise by a considerable amount by only using the microphones pointing forward to speakers and filtering down the residual noise. Can honestly recommend Hearing Australia, which has been and still is a Government run company since the end of the second world war.  

Agreed. My hearing aids are similar. Mine are from Amplifon.

[arxcards]

47 minutes ago, Russell21 said:

I can only assume that the people with hearing aids who are having a problem with background noise in the dining rooms, or elsewhere for that matter, have a cheap hearing aid. I wear hearing aids in both ears and my hearing aids have 5 programs easily accessible by the press of a button or from my relevant smart phone app, one of which reduces the background noise by a considerable amount by only using the microphones pointing forward to speakers and filtering down the residual noise. Can honestly recommend Hearing Australia, which has been and still is a Government run company since the end of the second world war.  

Sorry, wrong assumption. My wife's has similar functions. It doesn't help that she only has one hearing aid, and clinically deaf in the other ear. Tuning anything down in the functions leaves a void of sound on her right side. She has an external mic that she wears on her right side, but that is difficult to tune to mixed noise when it comes and goes. It mostly works well enough, but some days she hates having to be so alert to everything.

[cheznandy]

1 hour ago, arxcards said:

Sorry, wrong assumption. My wife's has similar functions. It doesn't help that she only has one hearing aid, and clinically deaf in the other ear. Tuning anything down in the functions leaves a void of sound on her right side. She has an external mic that she wears on her right side, but that is difficult to tune to mixed noise when it comes and goes. It mostly works well enough, but some days she hates having to be so alert to everything.

Same here.....deaf in one ear, ok hearing in the other. Wore a hearing aid in one ear for a few years, sound is all over the place, I lose balance etc. Since we haven't been cruising I just stopped wearing it, but am looking at getting one of the latest ones and possibly may need one for the left ear to even things up.....$$$$!

 

We haven't dined on large tables for years mostly for this reason, if we have friends onboard we may dine with them now and then and I sit accordingly so I can hear.

Thankfully Andy and I love dining alone, breakfast lunch and dinner.