Carnival vs royal Caribbean

[TwinPrincessMermaids]

With regard to offering the refunds, let's remember that JUST A WEEK AGO, the Intl Association just released a new Bill of Rights for passengers that details the trip be refunded. (although RCI is being very fair above and beyond, even with the ones who have upcoming trips cancelled).

 

However, that BOR wasn't in place with the other incidents happened (and I'm sure had a lot to do with it's creation!) For instance, the CCL Dream 1.5 weeks after we got of it had a secondary generator go out. It happened on the last few days of their trip, so they only refunded a partial refund and still cared for their accommodations and transportation back. I'm not defending them and not I'm saying people weren't major inconvenienced, as you expect to come BACK on your cruise ship. All I'm "Suggesting" is that it is possible that Carnival would have issued the refunds differently if THEY had been under a new BOR for passengers, and without it, it would have been up to RCI to determine how much to refund, so RCI might have done things differently as well if THEY hadn't just had a new BOR to adhere to...

 

I also believe from first hand reports that not everyone has been dealt with in such an organized and informed manner in terms of post-disaster. (Everyone agrees that the emergency was handled about as best as possibly have could have been! Kudos!)

 

But I didn't remember reading on here yet about the BOR coming in to play: It DEFINITELY does!

[Royals Carol]

I think if nothing else, the circumstances of the fire will make this incident look not as bad as what happened to the Triumph. This fire does not appear to have affected any of the critical areas that the Triumph fire did, so in this incident, the ship was still able to power itself, and "life support" systems (for lack of a better term :rolleyes:) were not affected, at least not nearly to the same extent. So to ask what did RCI do that Carnival did not do really might not be a fair question.

 

And from what was said immediately after the Triumph incident, the crew were amazing, as they have been reported to be for this incident.

 

I am due to cruise Royal Caribbean on Oct 20th. Now that Royal Caribbean has had a fire, non-cruisers have asked me if I am still going on my cruise. Well, the answer is, YES!! I would go on Royal Caribbean, or any other cruise line as long as I am on a cruise and not at work!! I think all the cruise lines have their individual uniqueness. I have cruised on Disney as well as Carnival. Both ships had things that the other ship did not have. I enjoyed all 3 cruises and can't wait to cruise on Royal Caribbean's FOS. I honestly feel that things happen and I can't sit around and judge any cruiseline that I have no control over..and that will never happen so I don't worry about those things.. Carnival has had a lot of bad luck recently but I would get right back on one of their ships in a second. Disney has had things happen recently. Who knows what is going to happen.. I can't wait to get on FOS..it will be like the first cruise ever..excitement!!!

[time4u2go]

I'd like to see documentation of Carnival handling maintenance less frequently or less "in depth" than Royal Caribbean. With strict USCG regulation, I seriously doubt the veracity of that claim.

 

Secondly, an objective analysis will show that the passengers in both incidents were treated similarly. In both cases the cruise lines handled the immediate emergency to get the passengers out of danger, and then got them ashore as quickly as possible. In both cases full refunds were issued as well as credits for future cruises and reimbursement for travel expenses. In both cases passengers were routed home as quickly as possible. In both cases, the CEO came aboard to address passengers as soon as it was feasible.

 

The only significant differences between the incidents were that the fire on Grandeur didn't occur in an engine room (and therefore did not take critical power systems offline) and it occurred while the ship was in close proximity to shore.

 

Like. :)

[Aquahound]

I'd like to see documentation of Carnival handling maintenance less frequently or less "in depth" than Royal Caribbean. With strict USCG regulation, I seriously doubt the veracity of that claim.

 

Please don't take this as a statement feeding the RCI/CCL, my line is better than yours, crap. This is just a statement of truth, answering your question.

 

In 1999, the Carnival Tropicale fire received great scrutiny and criticism from the USCG because the crew, who spoke poor English, had no trianing on certain, pertinent safety instructions and at the time of the fire, could not read them.

 

In the Carnival Splendor fire Marine Casualty investigation, the USCG said the fire could have been controlled and extinguished, "if not for numerous flaws in the training, maintenance, and operation of the Splendor's emergency automated fire control system." You can Google "Wrong Directions - Recipe For Failure" for a multitude of errors involved with that fire.

 

Now, let me repeat...this is not based on cruise line biased. These are facts. I am a professional mariner who has tremendous respect for the people running these ships, regardless of what name is on the side.

[CRUISEFAN0001]

I'd like to see documentation of Carnival handling maintenance less frequently or less "in depth" than Royal Caribbean. With strict USCG regulation, I seriously doubt the veracity of that claim.

Perhaps you might consider doing the simple Google work I did to find the supporting documentation online of both cruise lines and their maintenance/refurbish schedules for ships. How often ships are updated, as well as dry-docked can be found. I spent an afternoon cruising through Google's search results (pun intended).

 

There have also been news media reports on this topic - also available with a Google search.

 

Searches by "cruise line maintenance" and "cruiseship maintenance schedules" are good starting points among others...

 

Folks can have whatever view they want on this topic...but a little time and digging online reaps information that clarifies things based on facts, not just opinion alone. There are definitive differences...it's all there for the reading.

[guxu]

There have also been news media reports on this topic - also available with a Google search.

Media coverage about CCL vs RCL?:eek:

[kybluecruiser]

Perhaps you might consider doing the simple Google work I did to find the supporting documentation online of both cruise lines and their maintenance/refurbish schedules for ships. How often ships are updated, as well as dry-docked can be found. I spent an afternoon cruising through Google's search results (pun intended).

 

There have also been news media reports on this topic - also available with a Google search.

 

Searches by "cruise line maintenance" and "cruiseship maintenance schedules" are good starting points among others...

 

Folks can have whatever view they want on this topic...but a little time and digging online reaps information that clarifies things based on facts, not just opinion alone. There are definitive differences...it's all there for the reading.

 

Royal has had there fair share of issues too. They just haven't been publicized lie carnival has the past couple of years. Since everybody is saying google the info. Well google Royals mishaps including fires and mechanical issues. In fact google Grandeur of the Seas power loss. A few years ago the same ship that caught on fire had a power outage for over 5 hours and had to be towed to port. Each line has their issues.

[CRUISEFAN0001]

Royal has had there fair share of issues too. They just haven't been publicized lie carnival has the past couple of years. Since everybody is saying google the info. Well google Royals mishaps including fires and mechanical issues. In fact google Grandeur of the Seas power loss. A few years ago the same ship that caught on fire had a power outage for over 5 hours and had to be towed to port. Each line has their issues.

No doubt....but you missed the main point.

 

How each cruise line handles the situation, the passengers, and the aftermath differs significantly. RCI also simply has less catastrophic-type events.

[kybluecruiser]

No doubt....but you missed the main point.

 

How each cruise line handles the situation, the passengers, and the aftermath differs significantly. RCI also simply has less catastrophic-type events.

 

I commend RCI pr of this latest incident. However to say that carnival treated their passageners any less is wrong. In the early hours of the triumph incident before the media circus, the cruise director Jen Baxter was already announcing they would receive a full refund plus a future cruise certificate. I will admit carnival didn't work well with the media. (Lesson learned for them and all Cruise lines) They did do everything in their power to help the passageners out. I don't know what more they could have done in the situation. It was a bad situation but the safest for the pax was to stay on board. Again I commend Royal but to criticize carnival for their response is unfair. Their relationship with the media during that time yes can be questioned, but their response to the crisis itself IMHO is unquestionable.

[eggroll]

I'm glad people have been participating. This post has brought some "my cruise is better" but not much at all. I'm glad we have minimal bickering here.

 

I will say recently and factually they both have had issues. Carnival has had more on the plate and royal is not innocent themselves. But the the reason for the post is how the disasters were handled.

 

There are other business that had plane crashes, Ecoli burgers, and medicine with cyanide. The majority of these companies have pulled thru their disasters and have in fact grown their business since. They owned up to the issues and made sure the people were ok.

 

Many people have posted about price decrease as well.

 

These media black eyes kill the whole industry and I think they just make trips more costly.

 

Ex.

 

We live in the NASA area in Houston. Galveston is a fifteen min drive. We attempted to book an aft balcony room on the carnival magic for spring break 2014. This is not a suite. Myself and my daughter totaled 3200+.

 

We went on the exact same ship and had the exact same room (6472) available from the previous year. We paid just under 2600 then.

 

Sticker shocked, i called royal and we booked the allure of the seas for spring break. We have 11728 I think. The room is next to the secret aft balcony. We purchased airfare early and paid for the trip and still had cab money. We will have to pay for a hotel, but its a once in a lifetime for many families.

 

There are some topics that came out of this for me.

 

Who handles their business better?

 

Who's business is really affected?

 

I kept hearing about the fantastic deals offered for ships, but many of them were older, smaller, and no longer than 4 nights. I imagine the drinks costing a dollar or two more on all of these discounted offers.

 

The majority of the newer ships increased cost significantly. The dollar has to be made up somewhere.

 

With the negative press carnival hit themselves with, I feel (<---my opinion) they had to drive up the cost for newer, bigger, better, and SAFER ships. These ships were booking so they made up the loss by jacking up the prices. I'm a traveler, and you couldn't pay me to go in an older carnival ship.

 

The carnival mishaps were a disaster user's manual for other cruise lines. Don't do this, say this, don't say that, make sure the people get this, etc. royal caribbean had a horrible disaster. The luckiest thing to happen was lack of casualty and they were much closer to port. Royal was not lucky, but they are handling this well.

 

Thru this I hope these debacles get fixed quickly. It affects many travel plans and budgets.

 

Thx teddy

[Mikew0805]

Could you link the statement so others could read it? Thanks.

 

No, I cannot. It was a statement on CRUISE CRITIC by another poster... I said that statement was arrogant. This is really easy to follow if you just look at the one I originally responded to! THAT is the comment that I said.. "Yep that is arrogant" FTLOG

[Big_G]

No, I cannot. It was a statement on CRUISE CRITIC by another poster... I said that statement was arrogant. This is really easy to follow if you just look at the one I originally responded to! THAT is the comment that I said.. "Yep that is arrogant" FTLOG

 

Not sure why your underwear is in a bundle. I just wanted to read it. I wasn't aware that you hadn't read his statement yourself.

[Big_G]

CEO Richard Fain stating that he’d rather RCI sail with empty cabins than discount the prices.

 

Do you have a link to his statement? Thank you.

[fergusonvt]

We had a great time in Feb. on our CCL cruise on the Valor. I think DH and I would have a good time on just about any line because we aren't fussy people who expect 5 star service at 3 star prices. Our 7 day CCL cruise was pretty comparable in price to the 8 day we have booked on the Indy. Bad stuff can happen on any line and it really sucks if it happens when you are on the ship but the odds are in your favor it won't. We plan on cruising on CCL again in the future.

[Stags14]

RC and all other cruiselines learned from past incidents, every incident in the future should either be prevented, or handled better than the last during post incident reviews. Otherwise, it's pretty neglegant and irresponsible imo.

 

And no 2 incidents are the same. Sometimes homes burn down and you have a chimney standing and sometimes you contain it to a trash can... detection and suppression are key.

 

In general throughout the industry, these incidents are occurring WAY too often.

[CRUISEFAN0001]

I commend RCI pr of this latest incident. However to say that carnival treated their passengers any less is wrong. In the early hours of the triumph incident before the media circus, the cruise director Jen Baxter was already announcing they would receive a full refund plus a future cruise certificate. I will admit carnival didn't work well with the media.

All quite true regarding the Triumph...but there were hundreds of published reports about how poorly (and slowly) Carnival communicated with passengers on next steps, return travel, and for that matter...shoddy accommodations for some cruisers in Mobile who could not get out the next day. Also, it took more time for Carnival to pony up their offer - Royal addressed it immediately.

 

While my brother and several other close friends have cruised carnival - they all have made the exact same observations:

 

1) The ships are not maintained (onboard accommodation conditions and visible aging) as their RCI counterparts.

2) Many of the Carnival ships tout themselves proudly as "party boats", something experienced cruisers generally try to avoid.

3) Carnival is slow to respond to cruiser requests for information in general. For this point, I cite more than 20 examples shared by 5 cruisers I know.

 

No cruise line is perfect, nor can they avoid lapses in quality customer services. But what has been clearly demonstrated the past 6 months is that Carnival shows a culture of doing just enough to get by on multiple fronts (including maintenance), in comparison with other competitors.

[BecciBoo]

Thank you for so wonderfully exemplifying my point about so many cruisers being inexplicably defensive of their chosen cruise line. :D

 

I did not defend RCCL in any way in my post, if you may re-read my post, I even said "More power to you and your chosen line" :rolleyes: I guess you missed that.

I merely find it curious that strictly Carnival cruisers come here to an RCCL board, where, naturally, people support RCCL to post a comment. How did you even know there was a thread such as this one? I never know what people on the Carnival board are discussing. I don't rush over there hunting for controversy. In fact, I never go there, except once recently to show support for Triumph. That is the only point I was trying to make. And I also believe these yours and mine discussions are childish. But I do not understand getting involved in one on another board that has nothing to do with your cruise line of choice.

Perhaps you didn't notice that I have also sailed NCL and that I didn't mention a single critical thing about Royal Caribbean.

 

And I also didn't get pulled into the discussion and did not make any critical comments about Carnival either. I guess both these notions were over your head.