Turn Down Service is going away - will daily room service be next?

[PACD_JG]

All I see now.

 

 

[jimmy2x]

A cruise is supposed to be a special event. We are booked for 21 days on the Rotterdam in February. I will be very disappointed if, barring a serious COVID return, the normal level of service has been compromised. 

[TiogaCruiser]

14 hours ago, RICHARD@SEA said:

 

I laugh when a store asks me to contribute to a  cause(whether I believe in that cause or not) when in reality I already purchased goods at the store which earned said store a profit...let the store make a donation out of their profits.

 

 

My sentiments exactly. I’m so sick of this. It’s a marketing scheme. And now some of the stores in our area are announcing donations on the loudspeaker, complete with canned applause and “woo hoos”.

 

 I make my donations privately and without fanfare, and know the total gets where I intended.

[VMax1700]

On our recent Rotterdam cruise we did the room service the opposite way round.

DW has in the past 12 months beaten breast cancer and is still recuperating from the various treatments so really likes a lazy morning.  This cruise, we asked our steward if it was possible to get the room serviced in the evening only.  It took a lot of discussion and persuasion to finally have him agree that he would do a full service in the evening and if we needed anything....anything....we were to hang out the 'Please service room' sign.

Now, just to be clear, he had no problem at all doing the evening full service, it was the lack of service during the day was a 'discomfort' to him.  

We found it great for us and will do it on future cruises.

[grouchomarx]

 I don't really need full turn down per se, but I do want my cabin checked while I'm out to dinner and towels refreshed as needed and any trash removed.  We are very neat, clean, organized travelers and present little extra work (if any) to a room steward.  But I want fresh towels every day and my bed made.  I don't want things like they are at home, I'm on vacation to not worry about towels, cleanliness or making the bed.  I do that every day and I want a break from it.  I don't need chocolates, animals or anything else just my papers for the next day, fresh towels, trash out and any quick cleaning needed.  

[Tampa Girl]

4 hours ago, Hlitner said:

It is a slippery slope to accept constant cut backs.  Consider that we are currently cruising on the MSC Seashore.  The ship is near full with about 4500 passengers.  Here in the Yacht Club (think Club Oranage on steroids with a small suite) we are paying less than $400 a day.  We have our own restaurant with no add ons.   Lobster is about an 8 ounce lobster which is broiled with lots of flavor.  Everyday items include a decent Fulet Mignon (better than what we get in the Pinnacle).  Our private sun deck has loungers with 4 inch thick cushions.  Stewards are in our suite three times a day.  New Production show every night.  Yacht Club Lounge (private enclave) has entertainment from 6:15 to midnight.  Yacht Club includes any drink up to $15 without daily limits.  And there are no movies or documentaries except on cabin TVs.  Nobody here talks about cutting back cabin service.  The OJ is still Fresh Squeezed, included Champagne actually French, etc.  And this is supposed to be a budget line.  For those who want cheap they can book inside cabins for less than $80 a a day (with a lot less amenities).

 

I post this because not every line is cutting back.  Perhaps this is why our ship is near full.

 

Hank

 

Off topic, sorry, but how big a problem is the language issue on MSC?

[Florida_gal_50]

6 hours ago, FlaMariner said:

 

Richstowe is correct.....

 

7 night Nieuw Amsterdam, 11/27.....price today from the online big TA.....Mariner rate is $384 for balcony.....so that is $55 a night. 

 

Go book a cruise everybody...it's go time!

I don't have that luxury.  I am still working and I have deadlines.  No way could I do this cruise with the deadlines I have.  If you can cherry pick and live in Florida it's pretty doable.  That is not everyone.  I live a LONG way from Florida.

[FlaMariner]

28 minutes ago, Florida_gal_50 said:

I live a LONG way from Florida.

 

That was our dilemma when we saw rock bottom prices for the Montreal to Boston cruises......We live a LONG way from Canada. Air fare killed the deal. 

 

Good luck to all hunting for deals.......

[WriterOnDeck]

14 hours ago, tunafish said:

I did not see the drastic difference in the quality of wines offered through their tiered wine packages. It is actually more about what type of wine you prefer and surprisingly I found lowest level had the best selection (2 french reds, sparkling asti and white that we liked). All their wines are $10-20 bottles so there is really nothing to talk about about them being exclusive in any stretch of imagination. we never had an issue getting a wine from a package up if the one that we wanted from ours is not available. You just have to refuse the offered substitution and ask which one you want.

 

Agree with all, and I did refuse the initial substitution. I was just adding specifics to my comments about the loss of the wine stewards in the MDR.

[jhsocal]

On our vacations, the hotel is basically a place to sleep, with most of our activities outside the hotel. Cruise is entirely different, the ship is a major part of the vacation experience.  cutbacks here are far less acceptable.

[FlaMariner]

16 hours ago, tunafish said:

I did not see the drastic difference in the quality of wines offered through their tiered wine packages.

 

Agree.

 

We are all about package #1 (the cheapest sommelier package) and we enjoy them.....As far as the price, I paid $258.42 (with tip) for the 8 bottle package and then a 25% Mariner discount got it to $203.67...So that is $25 a bottle.  That's very reasonable..IMO....Perhaps a little less than what we pay at a restaurant.  And I know the big mark up is there.

 

 

 

[richstowe]

2 hours ago, Florida_gal_50 said:

I don't have that luxury.  I am still working and I have deadlines.  No way could I do this cruise with the deadlines I have.  If you can cherry pick and live in Florida it's pretty doable.  That is not everyone.  I live a LONG way from Florida.

Well this cruise is instead of Florida over New Year's . Way cheaper cruise AND air .

YUL fairs are still way up.

2 hours ago, FlaMariner said:

 

That was our dilemma when we saw rock bottom prices for the Montreal to Boston cruises......We live a LONG way from Canada. Air fare killed the deal. 

 

Good luck to all hunting for deals.......

We did a lovely Princess cruise this summer from FLL to Quebec City . It seemed half the passengers were Floridians and half were eastern Canadians so everyone drove one way and flew the other .

[KKZ1923]

20 hours ago, The-Inside-Cabin said:

My concern would be - and I guess if you need to word your feedback correctly it should be OK - that Seattle would improperly categorize your displeasure with a lack of turndown service with dissatisfaction with the room steward vice the policy he was asked to implement.  

 

I suspect that Seattle takes feedback from the Hotel GM's - If they report that 60% of the guests are OK with no turndown, and then look at the surveys - if only 10% complain - then its goodbye turndown.   If 50% complain then it will probably stay around.     Another unknown to me is how far and you push the room stewards - there is a point they will not come back either.

 

One statistic I recall but can't find a good source is what percentage of cruisers are first time cruisers.   I heard it may be as high as 50%.    If they can keep those first timers happy - with usually higher on board spend - then that's another factor.    

Every time I cruise on HAL, some service related item has been cut.  It doesn't matter if it has been two months or two weeks since my previous cruise.  The changes are generally small, but over time they add up to a diminished cruise experience.  We still love HAL, but we are increasingly considering giving our business to a higher end line.  I dutifully fill out our post cruise surveys, but I wonder if there are more effective ways to communicate with HAL.  A direct letter to its CEO?  A petition?  

[lyndarra]

3 hours ago, Tampa Girl said:

 

Off topic, sorry, but how big a problem is the language issue on MSC?

Not really a problem but sometimes it's an minor annoyance. e.g. An announcement in German all the Germans go quiet to listen. The following announcement in English, for excample, all the Germans start up up talking again and drown out the English. When introductions are being made at the start of a show, same thing, but it seems to drag on when, IIRC, there are six languages to get through.

Other than public announcements it's not a problem.

[The-Inside-Cabin]

5 minutes ago, KKZ1923 said:

Every time I cruise on HAL, some service related item has been cut.  It doesn't matter if it has been two months or two weeks since my previous cruise.  The changes are generally small, but over time they add up to a diminished cruise experience.  We still love HAL, but we are increasingly considering giving our business to a higher end line.  I dutifully fill out our post cruise surveys, but I wonder if there are more effective ways to communicate with HAL.  A direct letter to its CEO?  A petition?  

I agree - I think we all have our own "tipping point"   Hopefully it won't happen, but there could come the day when you finish you latest cruise and decide - that's it -  Moving on.    Viking Ocean is very nice, but I can get a Sig Suite on HAL for the price of their small verandah - but they offer a very nice cruise experience on a Prinsendam size ship.  A few more cutbacks and that Viking Ocean will start to look better and better.  

 

I am a big HAL fan - but it's not unlimited.

[Beejay4016]

6 hours ago, jhsocal said:

On our vacations, the hotel is basically a place to sleep, with most of our activities outside the hotel. Cruise is entirely different, the ship is a major part of the vacation experience.  cutbacks here are far less acceptable.

That's a really interesting point, and a good way of looking at the difference between hotel and ship.

[richstowe]

6 hours ago, jhsocal said:

On our vacations, the hotel is basically a place to sleep, with most of our activities outside the hotel. Cruise is entirely different, the ship is a major part of the vacation experience.  Cutbacks here are far less acceptable.

Agreed but I've spent time at resort hotels and all-inclusive's where the hotel was the vacation . Also took a Mediterranean cruise (NCL) where we felt the ship was a floating hotel . So it depends . 

[tunafish]

7 hours ago, KKZ1923 said:

Every time I cruise on HAL, some service related item has been cut.  It doesn't matter if it has been two months or two weeks since my previous cruise.  The changes are generally small, but over time they add up to a diminished cruise experience.  We still love HAL, but we are increasingly considering giving our business to a higher end line.  I dutifully fill out our post cruise surveys, but I wonder if there are more effective ways to communicate with HAL.  A direct letter to its CEO?  A petition?  

We looked into these options. Problem is anything slightly "better" comes with a 3X-5X price tag comparing to HAL and looking at seaborn vlogs for instance I just couldn't see the added value. Slightly refined interior of the ship would not do it for me. Foodwise the improvements are small: lobster costs 10-15 bucks a pound and that lobster would still be frozen. I noticed that any mass cruise line has glass ceiling in F&B department. There is no open flame stoves and burners, no wood/coal grills for safety reasons and their cooks are indian/south asian, coming directly from there with very little if any European culinary training. There is only so much they can do, simply because they do not know what the end product should look like. It is true for any specialty restaurant. I have never had sushi on any ship that would taste even better than supermarket rolls. it is not even anywhere close to any semidecent Japanese restaurant.
Another HAL strong point is their itineraries. They have great port selections   

[Hlitner]

11 hours ago, Tampa Girl said:

 

Off topic, sorry, but how big a problem is the language issue on MSC?

Good question.  We have only cruised MSC on Caribbean cruises from Miami.  On all of our cruises we would estimate about half the passengers were from North American and the remainder from various countries primarily in Europe.  Many of the Europeans speak some English or are fluent.  But a fair number of passengers are not comfortable or speak any English.  The crew has really varied.  We always are in the Yacht Club where they have some of the best crew/service anywhere.  Most of the staff is either fluent or speaks a lot of English.  Outside the Yacht Club it is a mixed bag with a majority having a working knowledge of English and some who really struggle with anything but their native language.  For us, in the YC, we have never had a major language problem.

 

MSC is truly an International cruise line.  There entertainment is designed to deal with this fact so is mostly based around music, dancing, and acrobatics.  On our current cruise the cruise director is an American (Ohio) female who only speaks English when she is on stage.  Most announcements are done in multiple languages (English, French, Italian and German).

 

I have always drawn a big line between their Yacht Club (amazing) and anything outside the YC (varies).  We still consider the Yacht Club the best value in all of cruising.   Outside the YC you might draw a comparison to Carnival.

 

Hank

 

 

[MISTER 67]

We have been on 6 cruises since Thanksgiving, 2 on Princess, 3 on Celebrity and 1 on HAL, we have had twice a day service on all 6 cruises and never had to ask. Princess and HAL didn't give us chocolate mints on the pillow but who cares, we get enough chocolate with lunch and dinner. 

Edited October 13, 2022 by MISTER 67

[MISTER 67]

5 hours ago, Hlitner said:

Good question.  We have only cruised MSC on Caribbean cruises from Miami.  On all of our cruises we would estimate about half the passengers were from North American and the remainder from various countries primarily in Europe.  Many of the Europeans speak some English or are fluent.  But a fair number of passengers are not comfortable or speak any English.  The crew has really varied.  We always are in the Yacht Club where they have some of the best crew/service anywhere.  Most of the staff is either fluent or speaks a lot of English.  Outside the Yacht Club it is a mixed bag with a majority having a working knowledge of English and some who really struggle with anything but their native language.  For us, in the YC, we have never had a major language problem.

 

MSC is truly an International cruise line.  There entertainment is designed to deal with this fact so is mostly based around music, dancing, and acrobatics.  On our current cruise the cruise director is an American (Ohio) female who only speaks English when she is on stage.  Most announcements are done in multiple languages (English, French, Italian and German).

 

I have always drawn a big line between their Yacht Club (amazing) and anything outside the YC (varies).  We still consider the Yacht Club the best value in all of cruising.   Outside the YC you might draw a comparison to Carnival.

 

Hank

 

 

I disagree, we have been on 5 MSC cruises but never Yacht Club yet found the cruise product much better than Carnival, we've had one cruise on Carnival and it was our worst cruise ever out of the 68 we have been on. You can't beat the status match on MSC and they matched our Elite status with Princess and we had some nice perks.

The prices on MSC are hard to beat also, what we don't like is driving to and sailing out of Miami. 

Edited October 13, 2022 by MISTER 67

[richstowe]

1 hour ago, MISTER 67 said:

what we don't like is driving to and sailing out of Miami. 

Isn't Miami just a half hour more then Tampa or FLL ? What's the difference ?

[MISTER 67]

32 minutes ago, richstowe said:

Isn't Miami just a half hour more then Tampa or FLL ? What's the difference ?

That 30 extra miles between FLL and Miami is is a horror show on I-95, very dangerous with insane drivers. We like FLL the best with Tampa next and only 90 miles away but Tampa just doesn't have that many cruises, it's a small port and limited to smaller ships because of the height of the Sunshine Skyway bridge. Port Caneveral is just a bit too far for us as we live in southwest Florida.

Edited October 13, 2022 by MISTER 67

[BetsyS.]

22 hours ago, grouchomarx said:

 I don't really need full turn down per se, but I do want my cabin checked while I'm out to dinner and towels refreshed as needed and any trash removed.  We are very neat, clean, organized travelers and present little extra work (if any) to a room steward.  But I want fresh towels every day and my bed made.  I don't want things like they are at home, I'm on vacation to not worry about towels, cleanliness or making the bed.  I do that every day and I want a break from it.  I don't need chocolates, animals or anything else just my papers for the next day, fresh towels, trash out and any quick cleaning needed.  

I agree with you.  When my stepfather and I are on vacation, we want a break from

chores that we do at home.  When we boarded the Niew Statendam on 8/3 we told

our room steward that we would like him to give us service when we were at breakfast and dinner. We put the sign out when we were leaving our rooms. Sonny did an

excellent job - he went above and beyond!

[The-Inside-Cabin]

dup

Edited October 13, 2022 by The-Inside-Cabin