Crippled MSC Opera limps back to Southampton!

[4nlalaland]

sea2sky... I agree that is really poor handling.. I am also concerned about the handling of passengers who were suppose to board on May 17 and had already arrived in London by the time they were notified... some of these passengers have flown from other countries and have to make other arrangements for the week they planned on being on the cruise... to give passengers a voucher for a future cruise is unacceptable!! they should be offered a refund so they can make other arrangements for the week..

I realize that these situations sometime happen but the way they are resolved is what makes a huge difference...

We were considering the 8 night cruise on the Opera in July and just about to book when this happened. I am waiting to see how it all gets resolved before I consider booking.

[Girl_from_Ipanema]

I don't think MSC should be ashamed, they should be congratulated for trying to put right a wrong.

 

They tried to put right a wrong while preserving their revenue. At a minimum the cruisers should've been offered their choice of a refund or a credit towards a future cruise.

 

If I had been though that experience, I can assure you it be a very long time before I'd be ready to take another cruise, and I doubt I'd cruise with the same line.

 

Unfortunate for MSC, but the cost of doing business.

[Sea2Sky]

I don't think MSC should be ashamed, they should be congratulated for trying to put right a wrong.

 

ScrozUK

 

Kind of easy to say if you weren't there.

 

If you had been handled that way, especially the last 24 hours, you would certainly feel that MSC should be ashamed. I completely understand how these things can happen and they did do somethings right but unfortunately communication was extremely poor and the disembarkation process and repatriation was unnecessarily done very poorly.

 

We were pretty relaxed and not bothered until the last 24 hours of the experience. Even not having toilets or running water with a baby wasn't a big deal. I didn't even complain when all there were was buns and slices of cheese and cold meat for dinner.

[Worm61]

I feel sorry for the people who can't go on their cruise now that must be really disapointing at least the one's on the ship had a few days . . . . .hope it's ok for Sept ..well that's something else for me to worry about now :)

[adamsommer]

So I am on the May 17 Opera cruise. I arrived in Southampton with my wife and infant at 1:30am on the 16th to get a fax from reception that "our vacation has been cancelled" - no other info. They told us check-out was at 11am.

 

Couldn't sleep that night at all....next morning I went to the dock and MSC people were there. They were a bit disorganized, but were trying to help.

 

MSC has taken care of us quite well given the situation. We were put up in a Southampton hotel for 2 nights, and now 1 more night in a Gatrick hotel to fly out to Genoa tomorrow. They upgraded us from an inside Cat 4 room to a balcony Cat 9 room on a new cruise. Paid all hotels and meals, and well as private car transfers and the flights. They are returning us to LHR when the cruise is over. We also got a 30% credit voucher to use on a future cruise.

 

The replacement cruise is not what we wanted at all, and we have lost 3 days vacation, but given the situation I think they have done okay taking care of us. Anyway I'll post a full review of the new cruise (Fantasia) when we return.

 

Amazed this is not in the news more.....

[4nlalaland]

adamsommer.... So happy to hear that MSC is taking good care of the passengers that were suppose to be on the May 17th cruise :) Please let us know how it all went, when you get back.. Thanks

[scrozuk]

Kind of easy to say if you weren't there.

 

If you had been handled that way, especially the last 24 hours, you would certainly feel that MSC should be ashamed. I completely understand how these things can happen and they did do somethings right but unfortunately communication was extremely poor and the disembarkation process and repatriation was unnecessarily done very poorly.

 

We were pretty relaxed and not bothered until the last 24 hours of the experience. Even not having toilets or running water with a baby wasn't a big deal. I didn't even complain when all there were was buns and slices of cheese and cold meat for dinner.

 

Apologies that you had a bad experience been repatriated back to the uk, I just assumed that in this day and age if improved communications and experience that msc would have had a better recovery plan than they did.

 

What happened sounds totally awful, not what you would expect service wise. I had been wondering about trying an msc cruise but considering how badly they dealt with this after something went so badly wrong, I'll think twice.

 

My main point I was making before I learnt about the poor handling of pax by msc was that at the very least msc were offering a full credit voucher for a future cruise. In light of what did happen I'd be pushing for some extras, especially those wh fell ill while waiting at the airport and also famiies who have very young children as well.

 

I hope you have all recovered and that this hasn't put you off cruising. I'm sure by the time you go to go back on msc that they'll have the ship fully sorted.

 

Scrozuk

[edit01]

I will plan to write a more thorough and balanced review of the cruise once we return home.

 

Please do! We were on the Opera, too, and I think we saw you waiting in the lounge all that time with such a sweet baby! Unbelievable they left you there for such a long time. We were in the lilac group and were almost the last to leave the ship. We also had a horrendous journey home. It took 33 hours from the moment of actual disembarkation to opening the front door of our house (we live in the south of the Netherlands).

We haven't heard anything from MSC yet, but our TA (who also dealt quite inadequately with the situation) told us that they will inform us about some sort of compensation within four weeks.

I don't need the compensation so much, but I would like some sort of apology! Those queues and the chaos at the airport...unbelievable.

[adamsommer]

I am writing this from the Fantasia, which is the ship MSC sent us to from the UK when the Opera was canceled for the May 17 sailing.

 

I sure hope we get more compensation than they have indicated. Our perfectly planned 10 day cruise has ended up as maybe 5 decent days, 2 of which we had nothing to do. The other 5 were shuffled between hotels and airports.....MSC has been trying, but they need to give us more than a 30% credit voucher. We should get a full refund or at least 4 of the 10 days (4/10 of our original fare) refunded as we paid for a 10 day cruise and only got a 6 day cruise. Plus, had to deal with their lack of organization and all the moving from one hotel to another every night.

 

I will say the Fantasia is a nice ship, and I would give it an above average review if MSC would take care of us properly for all the trouble. I would cruise with them again, but only if they show proper management here at compensate all of us in a fair manner (to me that is a 40% refund of our fare since we lost 4 of 10 days, the promised 30% credit voucher, and a shipboard credit from the cruise they did send us on)....I think that is fair.

 

Anyway, I will post all the details when I get them as well as a full review when we return to the states next week.

[scrozuk]

I am writing this from the Fantasia, which is the ship MSC sent us to from the UK when the Opera was canceled for the May 17 sailing.

 

I sure hope we get more compensation than they have indicated. Our perfectly planned 10 day cruise has ended up as maybe 5 decent days, 2 of which we had nothing to do. The other 5 were shuffled between hotels and airports.....MSC has been trying, but they need to give us more than a 30% credit voucher. We should get a full refund or at least 4 of the 10 days (4/10 of our original fare) refunded as we paid for a 10 day cruise and only got a 6 day cruise. Plus, had to deal with their lack of organization and all the moving from one hotel to another every night.

 

I will say the Fantasia is a nice ship, and I would give it an above average review if MSC would take care of us properly for all the trouble. I would cruise with them again, but only if they show proper management here at compensate all of us in a fair manner (to me that is a 40% refund of our fare since we lost 4 of 10 days, the promised 30% credit voucher, and a shipboard credit from the cruise they did send us on)....I think that is fair.

 

Anyway, I will post all the details when I get them as well as a full review when we return to the states next week.

 

I think at the very least you should get 50% credit voucher seeing as you have only had half of your original intended cruise.

 

Am sure all cruise companies make their mistakes, the real judge of how good they are is how well they respond to it and how they correct it.

 

ScrozUK

[adamsommer]

I hope so too. I am having my agent push as much as possible.

 

They gave us a 450 euro shipboard credit, but did not tell us until the final night of the cruise, so we had 350 euro to spend in only 4 hours....it was "use it or lose it" so we bought a bunch of cheap jewlrey...would have been nice to know this at the start of the cruise so we could have used it for excursions.

 

MSC has serious communications issues. They have told us nothing. I think they are trying, but I agree a refund of some sort is in order. Ill post once I hear anything.

 

Does anyone know what those on the previous Opera cruise recieved (the ones that got off in Stockholm)?

[Misty1937]

I am just home after our nightmare holiday. We arrived in Southampton on the morning of Sunday 15th after travelling about 40 hours. In the afternoon we saw on the television that MSC Opera had broken down but was expected to be towed into Southampton and would be leaving as scheduled on the 17th. On the Monday we went into Winchester arriving home later in the afternoon. I received 2 emails from friends, one in Germany the other New Zealand. Both were saying how sorry they were we had had our cruise cancelled. We checked with reception to see if there was a message for us from MSC but nothing. We were in a group fly/cruise booking from Australia, 16 in total and not one of us had heard a word. Emails were sent and people were contacting MSC but not a word, it was a complete communication breakdown. Let me stress, we were well aware the electrical breakdown was a most unfortunate stroke of bad luck but here we were stranded and noone wanted to know us. Eventually after many irate phone calls on the morning of embarkation we had a 10am teleconference in the board room at the hotel with Lyn Clarke who I understand is the CEO of MSC in Australia. We were offered a 6 night cruise on Poesia and 4 nights full board at a London hotel plus 30% discount off the full price of another cruise to be taken by the end of 2012 or our money back. We had little option other than to take the offer, some with work committments and others personal committments. The cruise took us to Zee Brugge, Kiel, Oslo, Copenhagen then Kiel again. The only port out of these that I had researched was Copenhagen so we had no idea what there was to see in the other ports or how to get around to see them. In Kiel we had a mass embarkation of Germans who obviously take advantage of a long weekend cruise. I must state here I have nothing whatsoever against Germans, in fact I am married to one, but these were mostly young people who had come to party with little respect for people who may have been sleeping in the early hours of the morning. We only had half days in the ports so saw very little. We had no members cocktail party and the late dining changed from 8.15 to 9pm with the theatre show at 11pm.

 

On our 2nd visit to Kiel we disembarked and they put us on a bus to Hamburg airport, we only knew of this arrangement the night before. At this stage we had no idea where we would be staying in London and all our attempts to find out were met with "I don't know". As was the case in Southampton there was still a complete breakdown in communication. We were met at Heathrow airport and taken to our hotel 10 minutes away. Our "Home" for the next 4 nights was to be the Holiday Inn transit hotel, completely remote from any shops transport etc unless we were inclined to pay approx 40 pounds a day on buses and trains. Added to this we were told the ones who booked a twin room would have to have one sleep on a couch!, a problem we resolved with the hotel ourselves. After much complaint and negotiating by the wonderful Maggie Lee MSC agreed to foot the bill for transport to enable us to get into London etc and they said they would look into moving us to a hotel in central London. It seems the Chelsea Flower Show was responsible for every hotel being booked out which the locals found strange as they told us they have sufficient room for all the extras for the Olympic games next year.

 

The main complaint from our group was the unproffessional way it was handled. We were left up in the air until the last minute at each stage of our travels which we all found extremely stressful. It certainly turned out to be the holiday from hell and once I get over the jet lag I will be, along with the other 8 couples, airing my feelings in no uncertain manner to MSC. Some of you will know I have been a great fan of MSC and have recommended them to a lot of people. Purely because of the way they so rudely treated us I doubt if I will ever cruise with them again which is such a pity as their ships are so lovely. I am deeply offended by the offhanded treatment we received as are the others in our group.

[Scotswoman]

My commiserations to all of you who were treated so badly when your cruise was cancelled. The whole thing must have been a nightmare, especially for those who had flown in from Australia specifically to cruise the Baltic. Misty, I know how long you had been planning and looking forward to your time in St. Petersburg (and the other ports). I do hope MSC enables you to visit St.Petersburg and fulfill your dream - in my eyes that would be the only fair compensation.

I had been thinking of booking an MSC cruise to Africa - but at the moment I can not really imagine myself doing so. I´ll be waiting with my fingers crossed for all of you to see how MSC deals with compensation for this very unfortunate experience.

[fizafoz]

I was supposed to be on the May 17 cruise and believe me, it was not handled well by MSC. We had travelled from Australia and were never officially notified by MSC that the cruise had been cancelled. We were offered another cruise which turned out to be nothing at all like we had imagined. The lack of communication was appalling.

[adamsommer]

"Lack of communication" is a great summary of MSC.

 

I signed the paper accepting another cruise and a 30% voucher towards a future cruise, yet have heard nothing about the voucher. I hope they don't forget about this.....at the very least they better give us the voucher that we were promised when we signed the form accepting it as compensation along with a new cruise (that is a contract/legal obligation, correct?)...

 

I am also hoping for at least a 40% refund of our cruise fare, as we paid for a 10 day cruise and only got 6 days.

 

If anyone hears anything from MSC please let me know!

[monicajay]

I feel terrible for all those involved in this mess. Seems like MSC did a deplorable job of treating its passengers both those on the ship and those who were about to travel.

 

Makes me seriously consider if I would cruise with them again.

 

Keep fighting for fair and equitable compensation.

[robert9036]

"Lack of communication" is a great summary of MSC.

 

I signed the paper accepting another cruise and a 30% voucher towards a future cruise, yet have heard nothing about the voucher. I hope they don't forget about this.....at the very least they better give us the voucher that we were promised when we signed the form accepting it as compensation along with a new cruise (that is a contract/legal obligation, correct?)...

 

I am also hoping for at least a 40% refund of our cruise fare, as we paid for a 10 day cruise and only got 6 days.

 

If anyone hears anything from MSC please let me know!

Hey Adam Send me your E-mail and phone#s. I'm Bob the guy who set up the Rome excursion for us.How is Jack doing? I was one of the 60 or so people who took the replacement trip to the Med(6 days instead of 10)

 

I contacted Traveocity and they want me to send them a letter re what happened,I'll do that.They seemed to think we got replacement value with the Med trip and a 30% credit on another trip. NOT--we were under the gun to do something!

Also, can you get me info on who your TA talked to at MSC Ft Lauderdale? I tried calling them 3 times this Am but coudn't get thre!.Just another instance of how screwed up they are in communications! Contact me @---robertmbarbaraj@q.com or call me at 503-580-1688

[Misty1937]

We have finally had some communication with the Managing Director of MSC Australia. Although the matter is far from settled at least we have someone with a voice at last.

 

To date we have been offered 30% off another cruise, that is rather a slap in the face considering the number of 2 for the price of 1 deals they offer. When I went to school that calculated at 50% off:confused:.

 

It has not changed my view that we thoroughly enjoyed the cruises of our choice in the past and I would happily cruise with them again if my circumstances allowed it. The shorter cruise that we were offered would never have been our choice, in fact it was the last 3 days of one cruise followed by a wild 3 day weekend of German revellers.

 

Through CC roll calls I befriended quite a few people, my big regret is that we never got to meet face to face. Hopefully one day we can set that matter right. Adam, we certainly were in touch, I do hope your little one was not too affected by all the drama. Bob, I have taken the liberty to contact you direct.

 

I will keep you all informed of any new development.

 

Cheers, Judy

[the_pilots_wife]

Add me to your correspondence, Judy especially if anyone receives word from the company. My family was on the Opera May 7th as well. We have cruised more than 15 times with 4 different companies, and we will NEVER sail with MSC again. The treatment of the passengers was more than deplorable. We heard nothing but snarky comments from other passengers before the ship even broke down about how they thought this was their worst cruise ever, so you know it only got worse from there.

 

At disembarkation, we were told we would receive a free cruise with MSC for sailing within the next year, and of course we were given no paperwork to that effect, but I'm interested to hear you say that you are only being given 30% off your next cruise....hmmm. We were also told that all charges would be deducted from our stateroom account for the entire cruise unless you purchased something from the retail stores. All charges including spa, bar, excursions, service fees, etc would be waived. We only purchased a few drinks and had shipboard credit. We were surprised when we received a charge on our credit for $200, so we are concerned. I've written MSC about this matter and also a separate letter asking for a full refund. Of course, we've heard nothing even though we received an auto-response promising a response within 14 days. *holding my breath*

 

We contacted our travel agent, Vacations to Go about the refund and the $200 credit card charge. They say their hands are tied and we must take it up with MSC directly. They can't even tell us what the $200 charges are even for. I'm pretty disappointed in them. We've faithfully used them for our last four cruises.

 

Our biggest concern, when asking for the refund, was that when MSC was given a choice between passenger safety and cost, they chose the least cost possible. They made very poor decisions especially when deciding to travel over 900 miles on one working engine when Sweden was only 90 miles away (we had our GPS on board). Surprise, that engine failed, then the ship listed all day to within 1 mile of the Gotland Islands. We saw rocks sticking up out of the water! God forbid that it could have gotten much worse very quickly.

 

Then think about what a sham the disembarkation was sitting on board in the lobby for 5-6 hours only to get to the airport to stand in line for 5 hours (with NO MSC rep on site) only to sleep on the floor of the airport waiting for a charter plane that never showed up until the next day.

 

Captain? What Captain? Was anyone even running this ship?

 

Just a complete and utter mess all around. We travel all the time, and I have never felt like I was put in harms way like I did with MSC. I will not jeopardize my family again with this cruise company, and I encourage all others to do the same.

 

Feel free to contact me if you'd like more details.

 

Anne

anne at fab-studio dot com

[adamsommer]

Hey Adam Send me your E-mail and phone#s. I'm Bob the guy who set up the Rome excursion for us.How is Jack doing? I was one of the 60 or so people who took the replacement trip to the Med(6 days instead of 10)

 

I contacted Traveocity and they want me to send them a letter re what happened,I'll do that.They seemed to think we got replacement value with the Med trip and a 30% credit on another trip. NOT--we were under the gun to do something!

Also, can you get me info on who your TA talked to at MSC Ft Lauderdale? I tried calling them 3 times this Am but coudn't get thre!.Just another instance of how screwed up they are in communications! Contact me @---robertmbarbaraj@q.com or call me at 503-580-1688

 

Bob - sent an email. In case its lost, I am at adammichaelsommer@gmail.com

 

All the best,

 

Adam

[Zambini]

Add me to your correspondence, Judy especially if anyone receives word from the company. My family was on the Opera May 7th as well. We have cruised more than 15 times with 4 different companies, and we will NEVER sail with MSC again. The treatment of the passengers was more than deplorable. We heard nothing but snarky comments from other passengers before the ship even broke down about how they thought this was their worst cruise ever, so you know it only got worse from there.

 

At disembarkation, we were told we would receive a free cruise with MSC for sailing within the next year, and of course we were given no paperwork to that effect, but I'm interested to hear you say that you are only being given 30% off your next cruise....hmmm. We were also told that all charges would be deducted from our stateroom account for the entire cruise unless you purchased something from the retail stores. All charges including spa, bar, excursions, service fees, etc would be waived. We only purchased a few drinks and had shipboard credit. We were surprised when we received a charge on our credit for $200, so we are concerned. I've written MSC about this matter and also a separate letter asking for a full refund. Of course, we've heard nothing even though we received an auto-response promising a response within 14 days. *holding my breath*

 

We contacted our travel agent, Vacations to Go about the refund and the $200 credit card charge. They say their hands are tied and we must take it up with MSC directly. They can't even tell us what the $200 charges are even for. I'm pretty disappointed in them. We've faithfully used them for our last four cruises.

 

Our biggest concern, when asking for the refund, was that when MSC was given a choice between passenger safety and cost, they chose the least cost possible. They made very poor decisions especially when deciding to travel over 900 miles on one working engine when Sweden was only 90 miles away (we had our GPS on board). Surprise, that engine failed, then the ship listed all day to within 1 mile of the Gotland Islands. We saw rocks sticking up out of the water! God forbid that it could have gotten much worse very quickly.

 

Then think about what a sham the disembarkation was sitting on board in the lobby for 5-6 hours only to get to the airport to stand in line for 5 hours (with NO MSC rep on site) only to sleep on the floor of the airport waiting for a charter plane that never showed up until the next day.

 

Captain? What Captain? Was anyone even running this ship?

 

Just a complete and utter mess all around. We travel all the time, and I have never felt like I was put in harms way like I did with MSC. I will not jeopardize my family again with this cruise company, and I encourage all others to do the same.

 

Feel free to contact me if you'd like more details.

 

Anne

anne at fab-studio dot com

 

Sorry to hear of your bad customer service experience, those considering a cruise with MSC would be wise to heed yours and other reviewers advice.

 

In comparison, Carnival got absolute raves of approval for the way they handled the Splendor fire/situation.

[pmacher61]

Those who paid for their cruise with credit cards should consider making a demand for refund from the credit card company. I once had a problem with MSC and I received a partial refund from Mastercard after demonstrating that I was not given the goods/services for which I had contracted. I believe there is a 90 day time limit to make such a claim so those who do choose this option should not delay.

[babzi]

We are the aussis couple who did not embark on the southampton keil cruise with the other 14.

 

I can give you an update on our situation. please email me on bhopkins5@bigpond.com

 

cheers

 

Babzi