How would YOU speed up hone arrival port enbarkation?

[SmoothFlying]

Thank you.

Yes, that is correct.

Last year I caused a lot of trouble in an Alaska port by carrying the bags of a very ill passenger who had to be medically disembarked. The local stevedores saw me carrying the bags and threatened a state- wide strike against cruise ships unless they were paid $60 per hour for carrying the bags down the gangway. That included 2 stevedores and their supervisor, for carrying 2 suitcases. The cruise line paid them, to avoid any further trouble.

 

Leave to Uncle Sam to make a bad situation even WORSE. But, that always seems to happen when you get politicians involved in anything. What a BIG surprise !!

 

Mac

[Cro_and_Swan]

I'm a first timer so my opinion may change with more experience ... but I'd say ... don't be in a huge rush ... be polite ... be prepared for some lines. No biggie.

 

We packed EVERYTHING we could possibly do without the night before and 'checked' our luggage ... only had to walk out with one bag about the size of a large purse to carry the (very minimal) clothes we slept in and a few personal items.

 

We enjoyed a leisurely breakfast in the main dining room, not the buffet, and relaxed and chatted with a few other 'not in a hurry' folks. (Side note ... NO SODA available at breakfast on RC on debarkment day ... coffee/tea/juice/water only ... not a biggie for most folks, but my travel partner wanted Diet Coke badly :mad: )

 

We were in one of the last groups to leave, but I think even if we aren't officially near the end "next time" we'll just wait ... let the herd thin ... stroll off carrying our one little bag with our cruise card, ID and customs document in hand and ready to go. :D

 

Finding our luggage was simple ... wheeling it through the line wasnt too horrible ... chatting with the friendly happy folks around us in line passed the time. I think the only 'down' side for me was that I feel HORRIBLE for forgetting to give the shuttle driver the tip that was in my pocket when we arrived at our parking lot. :rolleyes: I really hate that!

Edited December 20, 2016 by Cro_and_Swan

[cruzeluver]

A lot (ok almost all) of the fault is with the passengers. If folks would pay attention and follow instructions that would go a long way. If you are called to disembark at 8:30, don't try to leave earlier or later. Leave at 8:30. What a concept! :p

[sail7seas]

Lots of us do post cruise hotel stays after our cruises so we are not rushing to get off gto get home. We know we hvve a fun chapter of more vacation go enjoy, often friends to see and good timestto enjoy. We are fine getting off the ship ASAP to get to our hotel. When our cruise is over, it is over and we are onward to the next part of our vacation.

[LocoLoco1]

We all (either silently OR loudly) complain about the snail's pace it usually takes for final embarkation upon arrival at home port. But no ones seems to have a realistic cure. If, YOU were 'king for a day' what steps would you implement to speed up the process (of course not breaking any laws, either federal or state or nature, of course). Or, is this impossible,something out man's grasp? Any reasonable thoughts from readers would be appreciated

 

Mac

Miracles happen if one has NO luggage and agrees to 'Self-disembark'. A small shoulder bag and money belt for Documents Medicines and 1 change of clothes. Presto!! Gone. I've seen it more than a few times. Let's say you gotta a pile of junk clothes that's worth $40bucks. Airline gonna charge you $25 to check that bag. Donate them. Hardly worth dragging home. LocoLoco1

[stealthy]

They have to take me off kicking and screaming, I never want to leave. I make it my challenge to be one of the last off. [emoji4]. Enjoy it to the fullest especially when the embarkation is late in the day and that's counted as a day.

[NMLady]

The times when we've experienced long lines and delays for DISembarkation it has been because the custom/immigration officials have not shown up on time or there has been only two of them. No fault of the cruise line.

[tip]

Back before we retired, we often had to catch a same day flight to return home because we had to be at work the next day. Thus I can certainly empathize with those who find themselves in that position.

 

Now that we are retired, we check the "independent arrangements" box and are in no rush as we are going to a hotel or renting a condo which may not be ready until later in the day anyhow.

 

That being said, the real jam-ups occur with customs and immigration. Often there are just not sufficient officials to get the job done efficiently. Maybe rather than complaining about it on these boards, we might all be better off contacting our Senators and Congressional Representatives asking them to provide better funding for Homeland Security which includes customs and immigration agents.

[euro cruiser]

We disembarked yesterday in Ft Lauderdale and I was amazed at how fast and efficient the process was.

 

One thing that would help is if passengers would follow simple directions. Wait until your group is called, don't congregate in the hallways and lobbies. What is with this need to be first in everything? What are these folks afraid they are going to miss?

 

We went up to the Crows Nest to wait for our time slot since we figured that the elevator starts there and we'd be able to get in it empty. That worked well for us.

[Beachdude]

It may be impossible to do .........3) not enough Customs/Immigration officials to clear the lines quickly

 

Bingo! The speed of debarkation is set by Customs, not the ships procedures. The best way to get out early is to get in line early. But the line isn't any faster because Customs sets the pace. Anyone who has cruised out of Puerto Rico knows exactly what I'm saying. Early or late, it's a two hour wait through customs.

 

Burt

Edited December 21, 2016 by Beachdude

[SmoothFlying]

Bingo! The speed of debarkation is set by Customs, not the ships procedures. The best way to get out early is to get in line early. But the line isn't any faster because Customs sets the pace. Anyone who has cruised out of Puerto Rico knows exactly what I'm saying. Early or late, it's a two hour wait through customs.

 

Burt

 

I guess I'd better shut up! I though an hour (off the Oasis OTS after our deck was called) was long !! I'm not familiar with just how tough Customs/INS job can be, I was an uniformed CSI deputy for the county for ten years, but that may be apples/oranges in the job comparison dept. And like any public job you DO have some who are snobs/idiots who tend to look down their noses at anyone who takes a blue collar job. :( So, this above remark may be the reason why it takes debarkation so long, but if you think our elected officials give a hoot about OUR needs..?? NOPE, as long as they don't have to stand in line or sit in coach, their needs will always come first. Just MHO.

 

Mac

[MrsPete]

We drive to the port, so we like to disembark quickly on the last day (nothing fun about hanging around the ship while everyone's leaving and no services are available to you. Plus we have a fairly lengthy drive, so we like to get started early. We're always QUICK through the disembarkation /getting on the road process. It's all about good planning:

 

- Night before boarding the ship, we fill the car with gas so that as soon we arrive on solid ground again, we're ready to hit the interstate.

- During the cruise we use a suitcase (in the bottom of our closet) as a suitcase. When it's full, we just zip it up ... and that portion of our luggage is packed.

- On the last night of the cruise, we pack everything except one driving-home outfit.

- On our last morning, my husband forces us to get up ... and we dress quickly and go eat one last breakfast. We refuse to hurry our breakfast. By being up early, we are able to walk straight off the ship without lines.

- We pack lightly so that we can manage our own luggage. This is a huge time saver because we don't have to waste time searching through a sea of black bags. Instead we're able to go straight to Customs.

- We put one adult first in line ... the kids in the middle ... and the other adult at the back. The first adult has everyone's passport and all necessary paperwork. We always breeze through quickly.

[Beachdude]

I( So, this above remark may be the reason why it takes debarkation so long, but if you think our elected officials give a hoot about OUR needs..?? NOPE, as long as they don't have to stand in line or sit in coach, their needs will always come first. Just MHO.

 

Mac

 

My post does not say or imply that Customs is being purposeful in controlling the pace of debarkation. When a ship load of passengers are debarking together in a relative small period of time are required to pass through a check point manned by a very small number agents, the pace by nature will choked down.

 

My only point was that passengers have little power to speed up a process that is out of their control. That's all.

 

Burt

[SmoothFlying]

My post does not say or imply that Customs is being purposeful in controlling the pace of debarkation. When a ship load of passengers are debarking together in a relative small period of time are required to pass through a check point manned by a very small number agents, the pace by nature will choked down.

 

My only point was that passengers have little power to speed up a process that is out of their control. That's all.

 

Burt

 

I see what you mean. And it's true. You can only work so fast.

 

Mac

[sail7seas]

Th

Thank you.

Yes, that is correct.

Last year I caused a lot of trouble in an Alaska port by carrying the bags of a very ill passenger who had to be medically disembarked. The local stevedores saw me carrying the bags and threatened a state- wide strike against cruise ships unless they were paid $60 per hour for carrying the bags down the gangway. That included 2 stevedores and their supervisor, for carrying 2 suitcases. The cruise line paid them, to avoid any further trouble.

 

Such a to do out of a kind hand of assistance by a nice person. but based on personal expeience, I well picture it.

 

We were on a cruise that ended days early because of threat of a hurricane. The ship reeturned to Boston sooner than we had expected. We llve in Boston and chose to leaeve the ship sndf s go to our home. Our cabin stggewards brought our luggage to the gangway. doorway and not one step pawst the cut. a kind Hotel MaNAGER had someone arrange a taxi be waiting for us at the bottom of the gangway. We took off ourr carryons, rf course, and when the taxxi driver attempted ro come up the gqangway, to get our suitcases the stevedeoreswere tripping all over themwselves to hurry up the gangway and ort our luggage from inwside the cut for gangeway entrance. The suicasess were immediately inside the door way. They graberd them and carried them down to the taxi. O f course, , to keep the peace, my very experienced DH had a generous tip in his hand and it kept everyone happy. then off we went. We were the only guests to permanenetly leave the ship that night. The ship remained tied up to ride out the storm (unusual ?) however, the storm veered off c ourse and never hit Boston. We were told thatship's staff could handle the lugggqage inside the ship but not a single step outside the ship.

Edited December 23, 2016 by sail7seas

[GottaKnowWhen]

We all (either silently OR loudly) complain about the snail's pace it usually takes for final embarkation upon arrival at home port. But no ones seems to have a realistic cure. If, YOU were 'king for a day' what steps would you implement to speed up the process (of course not breaking any laws, either federal or state or nature, of course). Or, is this impossible,something out man's grasp? Any reasonable thoughts from readers would be appreciated

 

 

 

Mac

 

 

Our cruises so far have been very pleasant and we have had no desire to speed the process to leave the ship earlier. The one time we had a schedule, we were to met a car @9:00am for transfer to the local airport in Buenos Aires to fly to Iguazu. Got a low number for disembarkation, minimal hassle getting off, finding our luggage, going through the customs/immigration process, and finding a cafe to have a coffee while sitting and waiting for our car.

 

If you plan well and allow a time-cushion (no super tight schedules) and have a back-up plan, then there is no reason to fret, no reason to feel rushed, no need to "fix" the system. Whatever happens will, and every day is a new opportunity to meet unexpected challenges.

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums

[Pierlesscruisers]

On your next cruise, pay attention to how many show up at Muster Drill with an alcoholic beverage in hand when they've been given instructions NOT to.

 

That instruction must vary between cruise lines. I've never heard that on Princess. Maybe the lines that hold their muster drills outside do that. That would be understandable, Princess holds their muster drills inside though.

 

Tom

[Pierlesscruisers]

The ship could help things by using more than one exit for debarkation. Perhaps self-debark people at one exit and zone people at the other, alternating when most of the self-d people are off. However, this does not solve the problem of customs and immigration, and timing of the luggage. On recent ships they tell you they do not call your zone until your luggage is ready in the hall. Hard to speed that up. EM

 

And the ship has absolutely no control over the breaks that the CBP agents take. They get up from their chair and go. The last time I went through a processing at Seattle, 4 of the 6 agents went on break within 5 minutes with no prior notice to anybody. That slowed up things quite a bit for awhile!

 

Tom

[Pierlesscruisers]

They generally refuse to touch any suitcases before 8am. They also refuse to let anyone else touch those suitcases. If the cruise line is able to convince them to start earlier, they require a much higher pay.

 

I don't believe that is the case at Seattle. I find it hard to believe that Princess, Holland-America, and Carnival all pay extra to start unloading prior to 8am but it might be the case even in these times of cutting costs and corners. At Seattle, the first bags are ready to go by 7:30am at the latest on most occasions.

 

 

Stevedores get paid by the hour. The slower they work, the more money they earn. Why would they want to offload your suitcases quickly? After 8am, the stevedores VERY SLOWLY move your suitcases from the ship to the terminal.

 

Again, I don't believe that's the case at Seattle as the longshoremen there seem to work at a pretty rapid pace from start of debarkation to the end. It might slow down, but I don't believe so.

 

Again, all of this might vary from port to port so you may be correct at any or all other ports.

 

Tom

Edited December 25, 2016 by Pierlesscruisers

[SmoothFlying]

I don't believe that is the case at Seattle. I find it hard to believe that Princess, Holland-America, and Carnival all pay extra to start unloading prior to 8am but it might be the case even in these times of cutting costs and corners. At Seattle, the first bags are ready to go by 7:30am at the latest on most occasions.

 

 

 

 

Again, I don't believe that's the case at Seattle as the longshoremen there seem to work at a pretty rapid pace from start of debarkation to the end. It might slow down, but I don't believe so.

 

Again, all of this might vary from port to port so you may be correct at any or all other ports.

 

Tom

 

We did a cruise out of Seattle to Alaska in June 2012 and when we returned back, from the time they called our deck, we got an almost empty elevator (we did the self assist) walked down and got in line and fifteen or twenty minutes, tops, we were outside and found our shuttle to the airport. I still tell my wife, for us, that's got to be a record!

 

Mac

[whogo]

Stevedores get paid by the hour. The slower they work, the more money they earn. Why would they want to offload your suitcases quickly? After 8am, the stevedores VERY SLOWLY move your suitcases from the ship to the terminal.

I watched a forklift driver work as slowly and inefficiently as possible in San Diego in February 2015. He got off his forklift to have a semi-driver pull ahead 18". He parked 40 feet away from a load so he'd have a longer walk to adjust the load that needed no adjustment. He continually moved loads a few feet one way or the other just to move them back again. It was quite a show.

[ontheweb]

Have not seen any chaos during disembarkation in all of my cruises.

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums

 

I wish I could say that. We had a hurricane once change our return date from the Saturday of Labor Day weekend to Labor Day. Basically just about everyone had to change to the earliest disembarkation in order to get to the airport to get standby flights. And there were extra ships causing there to be not enough customs agents. By the time we were allowed to start to disembark, they had called the first 3 colors. It was so crowded that it was getting hard to breathe. Some folks who were on their very first cruise were asking if it was always like this.

 

Oh, and to make things worse, at one point there was an announcement. We were all hoping it was to say that the disembarkation process was about to start. Instead it was Royal Caribbean telling us we had one last chance to buy pictures. There was a collective groan of disappointment.

[GottaKnowWhen]

I wish I could say that. We had a hurricane once change our return date from the Saturday of Labor Day weekend to Labor Day. Basically just about everyone had to change to the earliest disembarkation in order to get to the airport to get standby flights. And there were extra ships causing there to be not enough customs agents. By the time we were allowed to start to disembark, they had called the first 3 colors. It was so crowded that it was getting hard to breathe. Some folks who were on their very first cruise were asking if it was always like this.

 

Oh, and to make things worse, at one point there was an announcement. We were all hoping it was to say that the disembarkation process was about to start. Instead it was Royal Caribbean telling us we had one last chance to buy pictures. There was a collective groan of disappointment.

 

So, you had some weather-related excitement to liven up your cruise, an extra day onboard, and then you had an extra chance to buy pictures... Sounds pretty good to me!

[ontheweb]

So, you had some weather-related excitement to liven up your cruise, an extra day onboard, and then you had an extra chance to buy pictures... Sounds pretty good to me!

 

Actually, we had two extra days onboard. (One of the assistant cruise directors renamed the ship from Enchantment of the Seas to Entrapment of the Seas.) And that part up to disembarkation was in fact very good. But, the airport afterwards with everyone needing flights home was a hellish experience. We were lucky enough to make the first of the three flights that we were put on standby. (IIRC, we were the last two to make that one.) But, I did hear others arguing with the Delta customer service representatives when they were told that they did not have a chance at a flight until the next day.

[Lakesregion]

We all (either silently OR loudly) complain about the snail's pace it usually takes for final embarkation upon arrival at home port. But no ones seems to have a realistic cure. If, YOU were 'king for a day' what steps would you implement to speed up the process (of course not breaking any laws, either federal or state or nature, of course). Or, is this impossible,something out man's grasp? Any reasonable thoughts from readers would be appreciated

 

Mac

 

Suggestions"

1. Do not plan to be off the ship within ten minutes of docking to catch an 8:30 am flight. Plan to stay in the city of arrival an extra day, enjoy the departure at your leisure and eliminate the stress.

2. Once off the ship, locate your luggage and then find a porter who will whisk you and your bags through a special immigration line and out to the taxi line and to the special "Porter-taxi" line. A tip of $5-10 and you are on the way

3. Write to our incoming president (USA) and tell him howl incompetent the immigration staff is and he may put it on his list of agencies that need a shake up- After all time is money and he knows how to make such things work.