pappy1022

Tours by Locals is my go to company. Easy to read and understand their offerings, which are detailed and always customizable. The customer reviews are critical in choosing a specific itinerary and guide. The guides are very responsive to questions and you can cancel at no cost up until the time that your tour is scheduled to start. They also guarantee that they will get you back to your ship on time and if for some unlikely reason that doesn’t happen, they will get you to the next port stop to meet up with your ship. Thankfully, I have never had to test that guarantee. The cost of a tour is very reasonable if you can split it up amongst multiple people. In our case there are 3 couples so the cost for a full day tour turns out to be cheaper per person than many of the Regent offerings for a half day tour. Of course, you will be paying for a Regent excursion whether or not you use it, so when I cruise with Regent I wind up using Tours by Locals for 1-3 ports where I feel that I want to see and experience more than what Regent offers on a 4 hour bus tour.

Went back and looked at Regent 1/2 day and full day private vans in Belfast and the cost are $1,000 and $1,300. For the 8 hour tour almost 2X vs what I can get from a 5 star private guide.

Thank you for that clarification.

I don’t think that anyone expects a tour from Regent that is tailored to each individual. My point in comparing what I can get with a private tour if I get 2 other couples to go with us, is that it is a less per person cost vs what Regent is allocating with it’s excursion options, especially if you consider the small group tours. For example, I have a private 8 hour tour booked for our Belfast visit. It is fully customizable, and cost $700 total for 6 people. That is $116/person which is below the $129/person that Regent allocates for basic bus tours and it’s only a 4 hour tour from Regent. If you “upgrade” to the Regent small group tour, that is an additional $65/person or a total of $194/person. If you look at the price of Regent’s executive car or executive van, its cost is way more expensive than what I can get for a private tour for just myself. For example, in Belfast the cost of a Regent private car or van ranges from $1,000 - $1,300 per person. Looking at bus tours in Belfast on the internet, they range from $40-$75/person for full day tours. So say what you want, Regent is making money on these tours and we are paying for it with our base cruise fare. We should expect the same 5 star service from these excursions as we do (and get) from the other included (not free) services. I would certainly take the $129/person credit from Regent for shore excursions and plan and arrange my own tours. Other cruise lines, some within the same family as Regent, offer options to have all inclusive but don’t force you to pay for services that you don’t want or don’t see the value on them.

It would be great but I doubt they will do that. They have adopted the mass market cruise excursion model of large groups, hands off on assessing quality, ignoring feedback etc. So now you can get the same choices on Carnival and other mass market cruise companies. I would prefer that Regent lower their base rates and let customers pay for Regent contracted excursions if they choose and/or refund those of us who would prefer not to use this “service” from Regent. I have never had a bad tour that I researched and scheduled myself. When cruising with 2 other couples, it is actually very cost effective to schedule private tours, Often averaging $100-$150 per person. You get a lot more for your money then what Regent provides for either large group or small group tours.

None of this precludes Regent from getting feedback from their customers and sharing that feedback with people poking at tours.

Many business rely on 3rd party suppliers and Regent is no different. The companies that excel take responsibility for the entire supply chain and work with their suppliers to improve the end product to the customer. Those who don’t excel, wash their hands of things they don’t directly control and just blame it on the suppliers if things don’t go well. That is a cop out. Regent talks up their excursions and we have no choice but to pay for them even if we don’t use them. I understand that Regent doesn’t have total control over the excursions but when you completely wash your hands of responsibility you get whatever the supplier wants to give you and you get unhappy customers with no recourse. I will form my own opinions on the quality and value of included (paid by me) on my upcoming trip but it is disheartening to see Regent wash their hands of any responsibility.

Do what you think is best for you. I wouldn’t worry about the TA commission. Be honest with them and if they give you grief, I would look for another TA in the future.

Wow, Regent sure attracts a strange crowd 😀. I can’t believe that this thread is getting so much attention and contribution. I tried to resist commenting but oops I fell prey to the temptation.

I think it’s fair to review specific Regent excursions instead of going to a generic review of excursions on the Ports of Call board. If Regent isn’t monitoring the quality of both the itinerary and the tour provider for its own customers then how can they improve? It’s obvious through the Regent board on cruise critic that there are many people unsatisfied with Regent’s excursions. If Regent is just going along with the mass cruise lines and providing a less than 5 star experience then stop “including” these excursions in the rate or give us a refund for excursions we don’t want. I would much prefer to schedule my own excursions then have a cruise line do it for me and pack me on a bus. I know it’s an option but it doesn’t feel right to pay for something that I am not going to use.

Regent does say in the details of an excursion how much time to expect walking and at what level. It’s safe to assume that if an excursion is 4 hours with 1 hour of walking, you are probably going to have 3 hours on the bus and/or waiting for people to get back on the bus. At least that is how I interpret Regent’s information.

I would like Regent to do 2 things with shore excursions. #1, provide more options for those who want to do more active excursions. Sitting in a bus looking out the window and making a 15 minute stop to take a picture (it turns out to be 45 minutes by the time you unload and load the bus) offerings are way too many. #2, monitor the excursion providers and hold them accountable for not providing what’s in the description of the excursion that Regent provides. In other words, quality control. If Regent is going to provide a 5 Star experience, they need to up their game when it comes to shore excursions.

I understand that Regent doesn’t have total control over its “subcontractors” such as the airlines, tour operators, transfers, hotels, etc. but they are all part of the price we pay to travel with Regent. I also understand that “stuff” happens and when serious “stuff” happens and the product we paid for is not anywhere near what we received, then IMO Regent should compensate the customer. If it is a chronic issue that keeps coming up, e.g. poor excursions, then Regent needs to change providers and constantly improve the products they make us pay for as part of the contract. We expect a 5 star experience with everything we pay for because we are paying a lot to cruise with Regent.

I was on a Regent cruise back in the late 1980’s that didn’t show upon my profile. My TA called and got them added. They claimed some technical issue about converting older cruises but they still had the information somewhere so they could validate my claim.

Regent management, it’s time to step up, understand the facts and do what’s right for the customer(s). As importantly, make the necessary changes to fix the issues with Destination Services, because from a customer’s point of view, this seems to be a very weak link in the Regent experience. Over and over again, Destination Services pops up on these boards as a group that doesn’t care and doesn’t help. As they say, you are only as good as your weakest link and this group appears to be the weakest link and is tarnishing the overall impression of Regent as a luxury cruise line. It is rare on these Regent boards that the vast majority of people agree with a weakness or a concern about anything related to Regent. There are always some supporters that will counter any negative comments about Regent. This isn’t the case on this issue, so please take this serious and fix a problem that is obvious to most of your customers.

Maybe some people stop reading the rules after the first sentence. 😀

The rumblings about Regent excursions keeps getting louder and louder and I hope that Regent looks at this area and improves upon it. To place the entire blame on the tour providers is a cop out. Regent needs to take part of the blame and understand that for many of us, the destination is as important as any on ship service or accommodation. I for one won’t make Regent my top choice if I find that the excursions aren’t to my satisfaction. We are paying for this service although it is advertised as being “free”. Since we tend to travel with other couples, it is easy to justify private tours and be at a reasonable cost per tour per person.

We’ve had multiple special offers after we booked our cruise months ago and only 1 of the 4 special offers would have been slightly less expensive on paper but we would have lost a “free” pre cruise hotel. Sure we could have paid for the hotel out of pocket but it came within a few dollars of break even, so we didn’t pursue it. Usually, Regent jacks up the base rate for the cabin when they have these offers so it is wise to do the math and look at the entire picture (as papa flamingo said). Having said that, I still look at each new offer to see if it makes sense. It doesn’t hurt to ask your TA to look as well. Some people on these boards have received a better offer, so it can happen.

I will have my fingers crossed for good excursions. I hope that the fact that we will be the only ship in port on 8 of our 10 stops means that Regent doesn’t have any competition for guides and they can get good ones. I will report back after our trip in September.

I would like to think that Regent would care about the quality of excursions they offer and make continuous improvements to the tours and guides that they use. After all it is part of the quality experience that they advertise. Reading these boards, it seems like it’s a crapshoot, even before COVID and the excuses, and we will probably experience a mixed bag of good and bad excursions. I am particularly concerned about some of the comments where the buses or vans are overloaded and people wind up sitting on the floor. This seems like a safety issue and Regent should never compromise on safety. I for one do a lot of research on private tours and I have never had a dud. With Regent, it seems a shame not to use their excursions since you are already paying for them. The destination is the number 1 priority for me and my family. We travel to see and experience things and cultures. I would be very disappointed if our Regent excursions are duds. If Regent cancels an excursion or the excursion isn’t what it was advertised to be, will they refund your shipboard credits or money that you paid for small group or other extra cost excursions?

We are the only ship in port for eight of the 10 ports I will be visiting in the British Isles in September. Regent won’t have any excursion competition excuses for scheduling tour companies. At some point, the COVID excuses have to go away. Hopefully that is in 2023.

Agree with you Mr Levin on the ESG and DEI programs that are costing private, public and government institutions a ridiculous amount of money and that adds to the cost of everything we purchase. I personally see no value in the elaborate and expensive non service related items such as some of the artwork, the entry to restaurants like the Pacific Rim and other fixtures. The slogan that Regent likes to tout about the most “expensive ship ever built” seems misdirected and is a turnoff to many people. Instead they should focus more on the client facing services that people interact with every day. Of course, I realize that some people find value in extravagant art and decorations and maybe I am in the minority. Regent provides a great cruise experience but there are some places in the customer service areas where they need to improve upon and their focus should be in those places.

Certainly the cruise industry is bouncing back after the COVID years but all cruise lines took on enormous debt to stay afloat and now those loans and the interest associated with those loans need to be paid. This is a financial burden they didn’t have before COVID so they need to increase revenue and cut cost to make up for this additional financial burden. Add the negative impact of inflation and supply chain issues and it all adds up to a very challenging environment. The bottom line is that Regent is part of a company that needs to be profitable to stay in business and to satisfy its stockholders. You can only increase prices so much. The only other lever to pull is to cut costs and become more efficient.

I am reading an increasing number of complaints about Regent included shore excursions, especially around the packed buses, for both regular and small group tours. These complaints seem mostly targeted to the post COVID shore excursions and often times people have said it’s due to the diminished supply of tour company options and availability. I thought I was smart to book several small group tours with shipboard credits, but I am reading that the small group tours are packing people in so tight that it sounds like the experience isn’t worth the additional cost. Certainly, it is less expensive to pack the tour buses vs adding another tour bus and spreading people out, so maybe this is all part of the belt tightening that cruise lines are experiencing. I also see that almost every available excursion on my specific cruise is sold out. So, I am interested in people’s comments about their post COVID only shore experiences no matter the destination. I am also interested in recent British Isle specific experiences since that is the itinerary I will be on and some people have surmised that the issues are possibly region specific. A lot has changed post COVID and I understand that the cruise lines have experienced the same issues as everyone else when it comes to hiring and training people and supply chain issues. I am asking for honest post COVID experiences only because I want to be sure that I have properly set my expectations for these “free” shore excursions.

How far in advance can you make SPA reservations? I am in a concierge suite, does that give me early booking like it does for shore excursions?