Disembarked QM2, but never got the chance to give feedback.

[BlueRiband]

Unless I'm misreading your post, Cunard wasn't aware that you were bringing a scooter and that you needed a shower seat until after you boarded the ship. 

 

Were you using a TravelScoot?  I'm personally know how these disassemble because I do it for a family member.   In one minute it's folded and in the trunk of the car.   You are right in that Cunard doesn't want scooter users in non-adapatable rooms - just because a scooter can be collapsed doesn't mean that the passenger will do it.   But rather than do that you complained about having to park it up against the door.   You chose to travel despite no HC rooms being available - and knowing the scooter policy - but now complain about how hard it was. 

 

Then you state, "...the key with Cunard: it seems to me that they divert staff resources to the better class of people upstairs so that prices are competitive for the riff-raff like us..."  Surely you are aware that almost every ship has suite classes and most mainstream hotel chains have conceirge floors.  Yes, those who pay more do get more in terms of service.  Have your flown in recent years?  Perhaps you have noticed that passengers in Business and First also get resources diverted to them. 

 

I'm sorry that this was such a bad experience for you but from what you've told us it was a problem of your own making.  You didn't make your needs known and then got mad when you had to cope with the cabin you had booked and didn't get your stool immediately.  You've told us how determined you are to not let your mobility limitations impact your travel so I'm a bit puzzled why your or your TA didn't make these arrangements in advance - especially since you are not a cruse newbie.  It would have made things so much smoother for you. 

[orchestrapal]

6 hours ago, Seenie said:

Yes, saw this, but not until after we had booked and made all of our other arrangements.  Naive of me, but had no idea that any cruise line would do this, although I do now.

 

Good point that you made, though Hattie: we didn't book through a Cunard website, but through an agent that we have used for many years.

 

Yet another reason not to hurry back to Cunard: clearly they don't want passengers with special needs.  (And indeed, there weren't very many of us onboard.)  And that's OK, we've got the message, it's obviously working well for them.

 

1 hour ago, Seenie said:

Port Royal, 

Sadly, that address no longer works.

Meanwhile, my TA gave me the guest relations email address,  guestrelations@cunard.com  and we will see what comes of that.

 

Thanks again.

 

I do agree with you about the service problems on Cunard  it was Not much better in a PH Suite.

However, you should be aware of other lines having similar restrictions in order not to clog the ship with mechanical chairs and such as they would be very hard and dangerous in an emergency evacuation.

Don’t even consider booking Viking Ocean as they do not allow them at all on any of their ships.

Hope you find a more hospitable line on which to cruise.

[socialdancer]

It seems to me that this comes down to you not emphasising your needs to your TA, or he/she not passing them on to Cunard. A lot of it could have been avoided if there had been better communication. As someone who travels in the “cheap seats” on Cunard I have never been made to feel any less for not paying huge money. Also, I have always noted how kind the staff are to people with mobility issues. How hard would it have been to pre order a shower stool or let them know about your wheelchair? 

[Glenndale]

11 hours ago, orchestrapal said:

 

 

I do agree with you about the service problems on Cunard  it was Not much better in a PH Suite.

.....

Are you not confusing Cunard with Oceania?

No PH suites on Cunard.

[orchestrapal]

2 hours ago, Glenndale said:

Are you not confusing Cunard with Oceania?

No PH suites on Cunard.

 

Sorry, you must have missed the Penthouse Suites on QM2 decks 9 and 10. Other than they are not two rooms but rather one very large room they dO exist!

We have never been in a PH on Oceania but rather the Owners Suite no confusion there.

[Glenndale]

Yes, misunderstood I would just have referred to them as Q3 or some such. 😀

Not stayed in QG on QM2 but have been in Q3 on QV.

Edited June 11, 2019 by Glenndale

[Ray66]

I've been home just over a week now and have not received a questionnaire by email, although I did receive a general one a few weeks before the cruise. I thought they had stopped doing the paper ones left in your cabin a while ago.

 

It's particulary annoying because there's a couple of points I wanted to raise with them. One of them being who are the big drawers at the end of the beds on the QE and QV meant for? I thought it was for passengers. But our steward had used them to store extra bedding. On other cruises these drawers have mostly been empty for our use.

[Host Hattie]

We had both a paper copy and an email sent the day we disembarked after our September cruise.

[BklynBoy8]

We always fill out the questionnaire on board towards the end of the sailing.

 

We got an email one once in awhile.

[Ray66]

So it sounds like it differs from ship to ship regards the one received on board. We were on the QE.

Very surprised though I didn't get one by email.

[TheOldBear]

I have not received a questionnaire for this September’s round trip crossing.

[JT1101]

I got both paper and by email. 

 

I have never traveled in Grills, just Britannia in a balcony room. I have so far found the service to be exceptional. My stewards have been on top of everything and so have the other staff. The staff even went above and beyond when I crossed Westbound on QM2 last December (the trip with all the storms).

 

I like to do laps daily on the Promenade and on this particular trip on several days the Gales made that not possible. However, I was able one morning after breakfast and set out to do three laps in my leather jacket and such. 

 

Well, it was pretty windy out there and between that and my constant wanting to look over the sides/stern by the end of lap two I was drenched to the bone and shivering. I went inside to King’s Court to draw a hot tea and warm my core back up. One of the staff there saw me come in, directed me to a seat, got the tea for me and made sure I was fine. While talking to her I decided I needed to get into dry clothes and to return to my stateroom to do so. 

 

Here’s the best part.

 

I get to my stateroom and my steward is waiting for me. The staff person had called housekeeping and they notified my steward I had clothes all drenched in seawater. She knew my name from our discussion and housekeeping apparently looked me up and paged my steward. The steward collected my drenched stuff after I changed and got it right down to laundry for cleaning (and for the jacket treatment as leather and seawater don’t always agree). The next morning I had it all back and the jacket looked better than it did before it got drenched. The laundry cost was essentially what I would have paid at home to a dry cleaner. 

 

Needless to say both the steward and the staffer got mentioned by me in very favorable terms to Cunard in my surveys and I also wrote a note to Cunard about it. That was smart, proactive service where one staff person saw a situation and with quick thinking did something really nice. 

[IB2]

19 hours ago, Ray66 said:

I've been home just over a week now and have not received a questionnaire by email, although I did receive a general one a few weeks before the cruise. I thought they had stopped doing the paper ones left in your cabin a while ago.

 

It's particulary annoying because there's a couple of points I wanted to raise with them. One of them being who are the big drawers at the end of the beds on the QE and QV meant for? I thought it was for passengers. But our steward had used them to store extra bedding. On other cruises these drawers have mostly been empty for our use.

Even had you received the questionnaire, its not an effective way to get an answer to a question (indeed I doubt you'd get one).  Why not just send an email to their customer enquiry address?

[Bell Boy]

21 hours ago, Ray66 said:

I've been home just over a week now and have not received a questionnaire by email, although I did receive a general one a few weeks before the cruise. I thought they had stopped doing the paper ones left in your cabin a while ago.

 

It's particulary annoying because there's a couple of points I wanted to raise with them. One of them being who are the big drawers at the end of the beds on the QE and QV meant for? I thought it was for passengers. But our steward had used them to store extra bedding. On other cruises these drawers have mostly been empty for our use.

When did you discover the drawers under the bed were being used for additional storage ? If  you noticed this at the beginning of your voyage, I would politely have asked the steward to remove them, or spoken with the housekeeping deck supervisor.  

 

Occasionally  ( a day or two before disembarkation) one often finds  the room stewards will stow additional bed linen/bath towels etc under the bed in preparation for turn around day.  The evening before I disembarked QM2 a couple of months ago, I noticed that the steward had stowed two clean Towelling Robes in the wardrobe in readiness for the next day.        

Edited November 12, 2019 by Bell Boy

[Ray66]

On the day we embarked. I opened the drawers to put an emptied holdall in. Both drawers had bedding in so I emptied one and crammed it all in the other one. The day before disembarkation he put the new bedding on top of our bag.

 

The drawers had got all sorts of bedding in such as a pillow and about three of those navy bed covers and other stuff as well.  There was also something stored under the bed when we came to put our cases under.

 

Other cruises I've been on, the drawers have been empty apart from once a few years ago.

 

Yesterday I emailed Cunard about the lack of questionnaires and they said it's too late to send one now 'as all the data from the surveys is collected and collated within 7 days of the ships return, we wouldn't be able to send a new link in this instance.'

But they did give me an email address for feedback.

[Bedruthen]

We returned from a cruise on QE2 earlier this month and we did not receive a post cruise questionnaire. Our cabin steward also used the under bed storage bins for bedding, although it wasn’t a problem for us as we travel light. I actually thought that they were for the steward to use to put the blue covers in at nighttime, we never expect them to be empty.

[Ray66]

" We returned from a cruise on QE2 earlier this month " 

 

Is that the QM2 or the QE? The QE and QV have large drawers at the end of the bed. They were initially put there on the QV after complaints from passengers that the ship didn't have any drawers - apart from one in the bedside cabinet I think.

 

I've just received a post-cruise questionnaire email from Cunard so I'd better fill that in tonight.

[BigMac1953]

We disembarked on 1 November. Half an hour ago I received the questionaire by email and duly completed it.

[Victoria2]

We had both, the onboard questionnaire and the online one, each time this year.  I've had a couple of online surveys to fill in too. 

 

Always happy to give of my opinion. Yes, keep the formality and yes, I love the product!

[Bedruthen]

The power of the internet, our cruise questionnaire for QE just arrived by email. We returned on 1 November.

[BigMac1953]

1 hour ago, Bedruthen said:

The power of the internet, our cruise questionnaire for QE just arrived by email. We returned on 1 November.

 

Snap! (see above)

[Tangoqueen]

Returned home from QV on the 16/11 and no questionnaires onboard and as yet no questionnaire emailed.  We would usually get the email within a day of getting home.  I spoke to Cunard rep today and was told it’s done from the ship not Southampton office. Didn’t sound quite right to me but I didn’t question it any further.

[Host Hattie]

I disembarked from QM2 this morning and had the email to complete the questionnaire this afternoon.

[Clipper Chick]

I disembarked QM2 on Sunday and received email questionnaire.  Found ship unfriendliest ever. Captain & Officers went out of their way to avoid contact with passengers.  Cruise director monotone and condescending will not be looking to sail on Cunard again such a stark contrast to the friendly atmosphere and perfect service on Marella Explorer.

[Tigrou]

20 hours ago, Clipper Chick said:

I disembarked QM2 on Sunday and received email questionnaire.  Found ship unfriendliest ever. Captain & Officers went out of their way to avoid contact with passengers.  Cruise director monotone and condescending will not be looking to sail on Cunard again such a stark contrast to the friendly atmosphere and perfect service on Marella Explorer.

 

I also disembarked QM2 on Sunday and have not received a questionnaire.  

 

Certainly agree about the atmosphere on board.  No idea what's happened since earlier this year but right from the start my overwhelming thought was, I hope the crew are happier behind the scenes than they are front of house.  Trying to even make eye contact was like pulling teeth, and apart from a very few exceptions it was consistent across the ranks.

 

If it is true that the questionnaires are sent by the ship then I suspect I may have deliberately been omitted as a result of the letter I wrote to the Hotel Services Manager on the subject.