Question on Black Card dinner on Seaside

Hello MSC experts!

This will be my husband and my first cruise on MSC.

Husband is Black (thru status match) and I am only Gold (mistake on my part).

We will be in YC and now that I have seen some of the menus, they look pretty good however we will want to take advantage of the Black Card dinner option one night for the two of us.

Can you advise what Specialty restaurants this benefit can be used in?

I read online, "Privilege and speciality restaurants may not be available on all ship classes."

Is it good in any of the Roy eateries (Teppanyaki, Asian Market Kitchen, Sushi) as well as Ocean Cay restaurant?

We will probably also purchase one dinner in addition to this before we board so trying to plan which to do the free option in and which to buy ahead of time.

Thanks again to all the experts here for your insight!

Patti

Hello MSC experts!

This will be my husband and my first cruise on MSC.

Husband is Black (thru status match) and I am only Gold (mistake on my part).

We will be in YC and now that I have seen some of the menus, they look pretty good however we will want to take advantage of the Black Card dinner option one night for the two of us.

Can you advise what Specialty restaurants this benefit can be used in?

I read online, "Privilege and speciality restaurants may not be available on all ship classes."

Is it good in any of the Roy eateries (Teppanyaki, Asian Market Kitchen, Sushi) as well as Ocean Cay restaurant?

We will probably also purchase one dinner in addition to this before we board so trying to plan which to do the free option in and which to buy ahead of time.

 

Thanks again to all the experts here for your insight!

Patti[/

 

It will be good for all but the Teppanyaki. We enjoyed the Ocean Cay and paid to go to the Butchers Cut. You can't book in advance of sailing but I would book the night you want as soon as possible. Enjoy.

Not Teppanaki?

We used our 2 in Butchers Cut and Tepanyaki.

We used our 2 in Butchers Cut and Teppanyaki.

They will no longer let the black card meal be at Teppanyaki. We did Butcher's Cut and (hopefully) Roy's asian fusion tonight.

Thanks to all for your replies. I think we will purchase Teppanyaki before we board and then use the free black card dinner at Ocean Cay. Love oysters!

Boschmann ... Have they said why they refuse to allow people to use Tepanyaki now ? also did you get a 2nd free meal.

Wife & I are on the Seaside in the YC in May.Similar questions....

1. Both of us are Black Card status.....do we get two specialty dinners ?

2. Are the menus then “ limited “

3. We have been frequent NCL Haven guests and have used the Haven pre-Concierge to book specially dinning in advance . Does MSC YC have ability to prebook specialty dinning ?

Hi Sidari......I hope you enjoyed your cruise!! Can you please confirm the black card dinner specialty benefit. Both husband and I are black card members. Do we receive ONE specialty restaurant for the cabin or ONE specialty restaurant for two per black card member. Thank you so much!

We used our 2 in Butchers Cut and Tepanyaki.

We received two, it seems that they, MSC, appear to be enforcing one per cabin.

Hoping that Boschmann comes back to let us know if they got a second meal.

The cruise was great by the way.

Hopefully our April one will be just as good.

Hi sidari......thanks for your response. Is there a reason your received two specialty restaurants when as you said MSC seems to be enforcing one per cabin? I sure wish there was a definitive answer to this question. Glad you got two ....... is there something we should do to insure we get two?? Thanks :)

We received two, it seems that they, MSC, appear to be enforcing one per cabin.

Hoping that Boschmann comes back to let us know if they got a second meal.

 

The cruise was great by the way.

Hopefully our April one will be just as good.

Not sure why we received two but it may have been due to complaining to the VC rep about it, and showing her an email I have from the UK office 2 days before sailing saying that each card member was entitled to a meal along with a guest. We also made her aware that we had reached Black by previous sailings with them.

But we really have no idea as to why.

Valentina did however show us paperwork dated the 15th December saying 1 meal per cabin despite the Black card benefits being per person.

They have removed Tepanyaki from the meal list as well in recent weeks, there still appears to be a case of the Left hand not telling the Right hand what is the actual system.

Dave, I think you meant 'November' on the paperwork (I can't post the wink emoji, but it's there in spirit).

On some ships I wouldn't be too bothered about the dinner for 2 per person; we didn't even consider going a second time on our last cruise.

However, the Speciality Restaurant is now Butcher's Cut on Splendida which we'll be on soon. I'll certainly be making a case with the Cruise Consultant for getting 2 evenings to enjoy in that venue. We'll be in YC so I'll take advantage of that if I'm not successful with the CC and will be having a word with the YC Hotel Director.

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Bea ... Good spot there ... ;p LoL. I think we will be asking once again and hope Valentina is still onboard.

It's really going to come down to how flexible the CC is onboard. Valentina sounds like she's one of the rare breed. I've known 2 really terrific ones, including the guy on our last cruise, who offered us a second invite for the Speciality Restaurant as even he disagreed with the new policy.

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It's really going to come down to how flexible the CC is onboard. Valentina sounds like she's one of the rare breed. I've known 2 really terrific ones, including the guy on our last cruise, who offered us a second invite for the Speciality Restaurant as even he disagreed with the new policy.

 

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Both DW and I have Black cards and I would love to partake in 2 meals. However, in the Terms and Conditions of the Voyageur Club, it is very clear, one meal in speciality restaurant per Black card holder per cabin. I suspect there has been different interpretation by staff (without knowing the rules for one free speciality restaurant meal) on ships and the cruise lines is just bringing it around to what it should be. I would suggest there is no new policy.

Both DW and I have Black cards and I would love to partake in 2 meals. However, in the Terms and Conditions of the Voyageur Club, it is very clear, one meal in speciality restaurant per Black card holder per cabin. I suspect there has been different interpretation by staff (without knowing the rules for one free speciality restaurant meal) on ships and the cruise lines is just bringing it around to what it should be. I would suggest there is no new policy.

It is most definitely a new policy. They just added the verbiage to say "one per cabin"

And beyond that are the discounts for the laundry, mealtime wines, discount on photo packages....etc.

Black card benefits per person ! Not per cabin.

This has clearly been done due to the stupid number of Black card matches and nothing else.

Both DW and I have Black cards and I would love to partake in 2 meals. However, in the Terms and Conditions of the Voyageur Club, it is very clear, one meal in speciality restaurant per Black card holder per cabin. I suspect there has been different interpretation by staff (without knowing the rules for one free speciality restaurant meal) on ships and the cruise lines is just bringing it around to what it should be. I would suggest there is no new policy.

You're obviously ill-informed and haven't been following this discussion very closely. Otherwise you wouldn't have posted this.

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Both DW and I have Black cards and I would love to partake in 2 meals. However, in the Terms and Conditions of the Voyageur Club, it is very clear, one meal in speciality restaurant per Black card holder per cabin. I suspect there has been different interpretation by staff (without knowing the rules for one free speciality restaurant meal) on ships and the cruise lines is just bringing it around to what it should be. I would suggest there is no new policy.

The new policy was published about two months ago. I have copies of before an after and it definitely used to be per member, not per cabin.

Well, it sounds like it is just one specialty restaurant per cabin. We will go t the VC to see if we could possible get two but we are probably wasting our time. Last February 2017 on the Divina we definitely got 2 specialty restaurants as well as two of all the other perks...... thanks everyone for your responses...

The new policy was published about two months ago. I have copies of before an after and it definitely used to be per member, not per cabin.

Correct!

Well, it sounds like it is just one specialty restaurant per cabin. We will go t the VC to see if we could possible get two but we are probably wasting our time. Last February 2017 on the Divina we definitely got 2 specialty restaurants as well as two of all the other perks...... thanks everyone for your responses...

GOS ... You've nothing to lose by seeing the VC rep about the issue. At the very least, it should be communicated back to HQ that this is totally unfair and discriminatory - Black Card benefits *should* be per person. Each one has had to earn their points individually.

Last year, we had 2 evenings in Speciality Restaurants on Fantasia, Meraviglia and Magnifica. It would have been very embarrassing for me had we been turned away from the one on Orchestra in December (or, worse still, being charged for a second evening) had I not read on here that it had now become one per cabin. It just so happened that I had internet access. Funny thing about it was, I had picked up a benefits chart while onboard and it didn't mention the new *per cabin* policy!

It is not acceptable to find these things out onboard - without any notice beforehand. What's next for the chop as more and more people status-match, being incentivised by MSC as they push for market share in the US (which seems to be where the highest rate is matching)?

It's very noticeable that some of those on the forum who've status-matched to Black tend to be the ones to tell those of us who *earned* the points to attain the level to basically suck it up and stop fetching and moaning. What some people don't understand is that MSC offered incentives via a *Loyalty Club* to people to sail regularly with them. Some of us did and, as soon as we got to the top tier, a lot of the benefits disappeared to facilitate them getting the very benefits they enjoy.

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Bea ... Well said, I have been having the same discussion on the face of books, where some people seem to believe they have an entitlement to a Black card with MSC because they have sailed X number of nights elsewhere and believe the 3 year sailing rule should stay so there will be a cull (their words) of Black cards!

At least a few people there see that the previous privileges should have been kept by those who earned their status with MSC via cruises.

Still confusing... is it per person or per cabin? Thx

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