Shouldn't NCL get Embarkation right in Miami?

No, we weren't involved in the wet luggage issue on the 17th November but that issue may have been symptomatic of a bad day embarking for that cruise and it was probably our worst ever with NCL.

We travelled to MIA the day before, stayed overnight in the airport hotel and booked the port shuttle before we left home. The airport end was pretty slick and we said goodbye to our luggage and it was taken to a truck in the car park across the street prior to our boarding the first shuttle at about 1045.

We are Platinum Latitudes and were also booked in a suite, so once at the port we headed straight for Priority Boarding line. We had travelled out of Miami a couple of years ago for a trip on the Pearl and were really well looked after when boarding, but either this time was a bad day at the office or things have gone downhill in the customer service area since then. This time we were booked into the computer and given our ship's cards. After a short wait in this pretty small bland room we were taken into the terminal and basically dumped in a quiet area of the building for well over an hour. No further official contact, no drinks (not even water) and no snacks while the group of us just sat in blissful ignorance waiting to board the ship.

We were finally taken aboard and we managed to get to Cagney’s before they closed and after lunch went to our suite but our priority labelled luggage was nowhere to be seen. When we went into our suite, we found that some the things we had asked for beforehand had not been done properly. Once we met our suite staff, things got sorted out quite quickly. By the time we came back from the emergency briefing and the Star sailed out, the suite issues were well sorted but still no luggage and so the cabin steward went searching for our four cases. The cases finally began arriving a little past six o’clock and so we spent the best part of our first night getting unpacked plus a quick trip to the Market Café for a snack.

From then on, once we were in the hands of the Star’s excellent crew, things were great and we had a very good cruise indeed. The suite butler was superb and quickly understood our needs so that he usually did things we were about to ask for before we even asked for them. He was very professional and always kept us with everything we wanted without being obtrusive in any way at all – absolutely superb at his job.

Funnily enough when we got to LA, although we had been expecting a few issues from previous CC postings, things went without a hitch. Immigration staff and procedures were very quick and we got our luggage immediately and were outside the terminal good to go by 9:30 - more or less when we expected.

I still can’t understand how NCL could have initially got things so wrong right there in their own back yard. Surely with the number of ships they handle in Miami and almost in sight of the top brass it should go like clockwork every time. Amazingly we have experienced better embarkations in Rome and Venice than the shambles we had loading up for this cruise. The incompetence at Miami got things off to a poor start and if it had not been for the crew on the Star the whole thing could have been ruined from the very beginning – fortunately it wasn't, so thanks a lot to you all for renewing our faith in the company by getting things so right and giving us such a wonderful cruise from then on.:)

Life isn't perfect and s***t happens. There are numerous reasons for this to happen starting with customs and the debarking of guests getting off before you. You got your suite suite set up, your luggage arrived. All this is no big deal considering u have the health and are able to cruise unlike many others.

Seems like much ado about nothing.

If this was the same cruise as the one with the luggage going into the water, then I am sure most luggage was delayed. I would guess the whole luggage process was pushed way back as they attemtpted to get the stuff out of the water. Those delays then push everything back.

We have done suites a few times and do not bother to ask for anything in advance. We just wait until we board. Much easier that way, at least for us.

As to making you wait before boarding and almost missing lunch at Cagneys, that just sounds crazy. Not right.

Embarked from MIA with 3700 getaway passengers last week. No suite, just a regular room. Took 5 minutes to get checked in, onboard at 11:30, cases delivered at 2. Your experience isn't typical.

The cases finally began arriving a little past six o’clock and so we spent the best part of our first night getting unpacked plus a quick trip to the Market Café for a snack.

How much luggage did you have? The longest I've ever taken to unpack was about 45 minutes and this involved me unpacking all of my make-up, shampoo, etc. I've often received luggage later than 6pm and still manged to enjoy sail off, eat dinner in the MDR and enjoy an evening activity.

1 large suitcase, 1 medium case and 2 carry.......30 minutes max to get unpacked and clothes put away and 25 minutes of that is my wife I'm done in about 5:D

Getting luggage closer to dinner time isn't unusual at all - if one hasn't received luggage still when returning from dinner, then something might have gone wrong.

All in all I have to agree, much ado about nothing.

To the OP: I am sorry things did not live up to your expectations. I am not making light of your experience but since I have cruised several times out of Miami in a suite.....I can tell you there is a logical explanation to everything you have mentioned.

If you arrive early at the port you will get priority check in at the suite VIP lounge. But if the ship is not ready to board or it is too early to board you will be placed in a sterile area to wait for the boarding process. This sounds like what happened to you.

Embarkation day is completely nuts with 4200 passengers getting off and on again in just a few hours. Some things will not be ready by early afternoon. My last cruise the manager of the clean crew stopped by our cabin before sail away to check on things. Things were fine but we had not received the flowers for the suite yet. He explained that sometimes the florist arrives late after 3pm and flowers can get to the suite at sail away or even after sail away. And fridge mishaps can also be straightened out around that time too. We had that happened to us too. Last cruise we boarded early and the cruise ship photographer was not even in place and we missed the boarding photo. No biggie but we had a large family together and I wanted the photo.

The VIP "priority"luggage tags mean nothing. I have sailed in suites and regular cabins. I can assure you that suite luggage does not arrive any sooner. It is common to receive a late piece of luggage after sail away. Funny because I just took a flight where I was offered to bump to first class (but it was not explained to me that way) and the airline agent wanted to change my seat to the front. I declined but she insisted on putting a "PRIORITY" tag on my luggage. I was confused why she did that. When I landed, my luggage arrived on the carrousel with everyone else's at the same time. So even with airports the priority luggage tags mean nothing. It can make people feel "special" and I think that is what NCL tries to do with suite boarding. Its more of a "feeling" than anything else. I have been bogged down with tons of kids and families in the suite lounge while regular passengers just whiz on by in the boarding process. Don't sweat the small stuff ;)

I was on this cruise and I have to agree with the OP - embarkation seemed to be really disorganized.

We stayed at the Intercontinental the night before, took a cab to the port and arrived about 10.45am. We scooted through security and walked in the priority check-in room, which was full of people*. We checked in, but since the room was full we hung around outside the doorway along with another family.

When the guy showed up to take all the priority check-in people away, he made us feel like he was escorting us on the ship. But he had no idea where he was going. The entire group of us followed this guy while he wandered around aimlessly. One or two POM people guided OUR guide to where we needed to go, which was in a quiet corner away from everything else. Then our guide left. There was no water or juice or coffee or anything like that, and the area was very small. This was apparently the VIP/priority check-in lounge.

We hung around there for an hour with no contact from an NCL rep, when finally a ships representative came and got us around noon and took us onboard to Cagneys.

2/3 of our luggage arrived shortly after muster drill, if I remember correctly. Our sons didn't arrive until about 5pm or so.

All in all, it wasn't the most pleasant embarkation I've done. It was just okay. It wasn't terrible, and it could have been worse. But it appeared to be very disorganized.

( * - This reminded me of something...here's a bit of a rant. The priority check-in room just LOOKED full. It probably could have fit twice as many people in the room if the people who were already there weren't afraid of one another. Seriously, a couch can seat THREE people. Not two people and your carry-on in the middle. A love seat can seat TWO people, not ONE fat-ass sitting in the middle with her arms spread out over the back and her purse and carry-on on each side of her. I don't know where these people were from, but where I'm from when you see people looking around for a place to sit, you scoot your butt over and make room, or you move your carry-on to the floor and motion that there is an open seat. You don't sit there with a dumb look on your face wondering what you should do. There was about 5 people in that room who needed their heads clunked together Three Stooges style.)

I was on this cruise and I have to agree with the OP - embarkation seemed to be really disorganized.

 

We stayed at the Intercontinental the night before, took a cab to the port and arrived about 10.45am. We scooted through security and walked in the priority check-in room, which was full of people*. We checked in, but since the room was full we hung around outside the doorway along with another family.

 

When the guy showed up to take all the priority check-in people away, he made us feel like he was escorting us on the ship. But he had no idea where he was going. The entire group of us followed this guy while he wandered around aimlessly. One or two POM people guided OUR guide to where we needed to go, which was in a quiet corner away from everything else. Then our guide left. There was no water or juice or coffee or anything like that, and the area was very small. This was apparently the VIP/priority check-in lounge.

 

We hung around there for an hour with no contact from an NCL rep, when finally a ships representative came and got us around noon and took us onboard to Cagneys.

 

2/3 of our luggage arrived shortly after muster drill, if I remember correctly. Our sons didn't arrive until about 5pm or so.

 

All in all, it wasn't the most pleasant embarkation I've done. It was just okay. It wasn't terrible, and it could have been worse. But it appeared to be very disorganized.

 

( * - This reminded me of something...here's a bit of a rant. The priority check-in room just LOOKED full. It probably could have fit twice as many people in the room if the people who were already there weren't afraid of one another. Seriously, a couch can seat THREE people. Not two people and your carry-on in the middle. A love seat can seat TWO people, not ONE fat-ass sitting in the middle with her arms spread out over the back and her purse and carry-on on each side of her. I don't know where these people were from, but where I'm from when you see people looking around for a place to sit, you scoot your butt over and make room, or you move your carry-on to the floor and motion that there is an open seat. You don't sit there with a dumb look on your face wondering what you should do. There was about 5 people in that room who needed their heads clunked together Three Stooges style.)[/QUOT

 

So why didn't you ask them to move over. I'm from Scotland and we don't dilly dally when some eejit like this takes up more than one seat. Do something about it for Gods sake, especially when there are so many seniors travelling all at once.

The VIP room in Miami is very small. It has all the snacks etc. When it starts to fill up, they usually take all the people in the room upstairs to sit in another area, freeing up the VIP room. The area upstairs isn't a room or VIP, just a place to park you until they are ready to escort you on the ship.

The non-NCL people working in the terminal really do seem dazed and confused with the VIP customers. More than once we have wandered aimlessly while they try to figure out where we are going next. Earlier this year they tried to take us on the Sky when we were supposed to board the Sun.

OP, sorry you felt slighted or whatver but to us, the most important thing about a cruise is having a great time after wse board. We usually do get VIP treatment, but when something goes wrong, it isn't going to uspet us or cause us to not enjoy every minute of our cruise. We get to our cabin when we get there, we get VIP treatment but if not or we are overlooked, oh well, we get our luggage within a few hours unless there is a problem and it takes about 15 min to 1/2 hour to unpack.

OP said she took the first shuttle from the hotel and her luggage went into a truck. That indicates to me that there was more than one shuttle. Those handling the truck are going to wait for other shuttle passenger luggage before going to the port, so who knows when that luggage actually made it to the port? They surely didn't make a special trip to the port to deliver the priority luggage. Could be why it was late getting to the cabin.

What does it mean when she said "this time" they were booked into a computer and given the ship card?

What does it mean when she said "this time" they were booked into a computer and given the ship card?

Just to clarify a few discussion points, we had sailed out of POM a couple of years ago and I recall there being a small priority boarding sort of holding room with the snacks and cool drinks before we were taken to another place to do the computer booking-in and issue the cards with the credit card transfers and have our face ID photos. This time there were a couple of laptops on the table with two staff doing the check-in, - no snacks no cool drinks. The reason we took so much time unpacking was because the three of us were in a two-bed suite and we packed stuff from each of us in each case so we would still have some of most things if some of the cases went walkabout which meant a lot of to-ing and fro-ing to get some order in drawers and cupboards.

I did not feel slighted at all by the chaos, I was upset that we had paid a lot of money to have various perks and they were not provided during embarkation to a reasonable standard on this occasion. After all, I doubt any of us would sit in the casino putting money in the machines and not getting any pulls for long, or in the shops or bars and let staff charge and not provide.

Just for interest we had priority luggage on our Virgin flight from LAX to London. Our bags went in early and all four arrived on the carousel in the first few so it can be done by some airlines.:)

WOW!! No drinks or snacks for over an hour!!!

The horror

Anyone who expects cruise ship embarkation or any other process in Miami to "go like clockwork" will often be disappointed. There are many stories on Cruise Critic about embarkation delays in Miami and not just NCL.

Blame customs, blame the baggage handlers, blame the terminal staff ......... but I doubt that the ship is normally at fault unless there is an unforeseen event (such as a noro outbreak).

In 2011, I sat on the floor in the terminal at Miami for 2 hours waiting to embark the Liberty of the Seas. It's not an accident that Royal Caribbean (whose top brass ARE in sight of the terminal) moved all their big ships to Port Everglades. Only the Majesty of the Seas is based in Miami (and not for much longer).