Family Group with some with Any Time Dinning & Others Fixed Time - HELP

[sjhanksaz]

So our family booked 4 cabins and some of us ended up with the any time dining option while others of us ended up with fixed time.

 

We linked our reservations together in hopes that we could all get the any time but we were told that was not possible because of our different classes of tickets......

 

They said when we get on the ship we may be able to request to eat together at the non fixed time.  We really don't want to have to rush back to the ship to eat early every night or too late.........

 

Has anyone had any experience with this and how willing they are on the ship to accommodate us eating all together with the anytime parties?

[Essiesmom]

What ship?  What itinerary?  Those with anytime would be Aurea, and on some ships they are in a separate dining room.  They might allow those from Aurea to dine with you in your dining venue at your fixed time.  It’s something your group needs to consider when booking.  EM

[JT1962]

The best option is probably to go to the dining room once on board and see the maître d’ at the dining rooms assigned and see if they can seat everyone together. If you call, you are likely to get a different answer from each person you talk to and those on the ship who need to make this happen may still never be notified. 

[CruisingFox27]

Please let us know if you're successful. I'd love to find a way of having anytime dining without paying the increased fare for Aurea experience 🙄

[carlmm]

8 hours ago, Essiesmom said:

  They might allow those from Aurea to dine with you in your dining venue at your fixed time.  

That's the only way: Kindly ask if those in Aurea (or is it even YC?) might dine with the rest of the group at a fixed time.

Do not try to get something you did not pay for. 

[mairead224]

We are in the same position with one family in our group having to book the Aurea package as the cabin could accommodate their family size of 6.  The other 3 cabins booked are the fantastica class.  We are boarding June 30th so if you are before us please let us know.  We are worried about this

[sjhanksaz]

its on the World Europa in November of this year out of Rome

 

One member of the family booked a suite and the rest of us did ocean view rooms on a black friday sale

 

I booked early dining -- does that mean I have to eat at 5:30 or are they flexible.  I think my dad booked a set time dinning.  

 

Never cruised MSC so a little confused here.

[MM42]

6 hours ago, mairead224 said:

We are in the same position with one family in our group having to book the Aurea package as the cabin could accommodate their family size of 6.  The other 3 cabins booked are the fantastica class.  We are boarding June 30th so if you are before us please let us know.  We are worried about this

I just got back from another cruise with the Aurea experience. Do not expect to have non Aurea guests enter the designated Aurea restaurant. The designated Aurea restaurant is for Aurea guests only. Everytime you enter the restaurant for dinner, there are people at the door that will scan your cruise card to make sure that you have the Aurea experience and they know who is in the cabin. They do it everynight. The family of 6 will have to go to the main dining room if they want to have dinner with the other persons. 

[Tierun]

1 hour ago, sjhanksaz said:

its on the World Europa in November of this year out of Rome

 

One member of the family booked a suite and the rest of us did ocean view rooms on a black friday sale

 

I booked early dining -- does that mean I have to eat at 5:30 or are they flexible.  I think my dad booked a set time dinning.  

 

Never cruised MSC so a little confused here.

MSC is very strict about the dining times. The set times is why we have never booked Bella or fantastica. Either dine as scheduled, or you’ll have to eat at the buffet or specialty restaurants

[Morgsmom]

8 hours ago, mairead224 said:

We are in the same position with one family in our group having to book the Aurea package as the cabin could accommodate their family size of 6.  The other 3 cabins booked are the fantastica class.  We are boarding June 30th so if you are before us please let us know.  We are worried about this

The only option would be for the family of 6 to move to "fixed" seating with you, if that is even possible.  It will be at maitre d' discretion.

[Morgsmom]

11 hours ago, CruisingFox27 said:

Please let us know if you're successful. I'd love to find a way of having anytime dining without paying the increased fare for Aurea experience 🙄

Yes you can, it's called the BUFFET 🙂  (kidding, just kidding), but can you IMAGINE the chaos?

It's already hard enough to move the herds of 1000's of guests through dining rooms at fixed times when folks show up 10/15/30 minutes late (not understanding the concept of table turns).   

[sjhanksaz]

So does early dining on MSC have a specific time.  I saw on Mediterranean cruises there seems to be at 7 PM which is not that bad since most days the ship sails at 6 PM. 

 

Does that mean we have to show up at 7?

or is there a time range?

 

We were not trying to get into a special dining spot with my brother, just were wanting a little flexibility in our eating times.

 

Does the dinning place for the suite members have better food or something?  Different menu?

Edited March 11, 2023 by sjhanksaz

[CruisingFox27]

28 minutes ago, sjhanksaz said:

So does early dining on MSC have a specific time.  I saw on Mediterranean cruises there seems to be at 7 PM which is not that bad since most days the ship sails at 6 PM. 

 

Does that mean we have to show up at 7?

or is there a time range?

 

We were not trying to get into a special dining spot with my brother, just were wanting a little flexibility in our eating times.

 

Does the dinning place for the suite members have better food or something?  Different menu?

If you've booked Bella or Fantastica experience, you'll have a set, fixed dining time. You have to arrive at that fixed time, it's not a time range. The set times depend on the ship and the region you're sailing in. 

 

If you've booked the Aurea experience, you have Anytime dining, where you attend a separate section of the dining room or a separate dining room, depending on the ship. As an Anytime diner you have a fully flexible window to dine, during the restaurant opening times. Same applies to Yacht Club. 

 

If someone in your party has Aurea (likely with a suite) and you've booked Fantastica, you can't join them in their area. To dine together, your options are the buffet or specialty restaurant. 

[Até]

I was able to give up my Aurea dining room and flexibility so I could join family booked in Fantastica cabins with set dining.  I had to arrange this with their restaurant maitre d' as soon as we boarded.  Meraviglia from US.

 

ETA: Also did this on Divina in US.

Edited March 12, 2023 by Até

[Homosassa]

15 hours ago, sjhanksaz said:

So does early dining on MSC have a specific time.  I saw on Mediterranean cruises there seems to be at 7 PM which is not that bad since most days the ship sails at 6 PM. 

 

Does that mean we have to show up at 7?

or is there a time range?

 

 

Cruise etiquette (and is many times enforced by the MDR) is that if you are assigned a fixed time, you show up at that time (may be given a limited amount of leeway on arrivals measured in minutes; usually around fifteen minutes).

 

Sailing time is different than back on board time.  Everyone needs to be back on board approximately a half hour before sailing and that can be earlier at times.

[sjhanksaz]

2 hours ago, Homosassa said:

Cruise etiquette (and is many times enforced by the MDR) is that if you are assigned a fixed time, you show up at that time (may be given a limited amount of leeway on arrivals measured in minutes; usually around fifteen minutes).

 

Sailing time is different than back on board time.  Everyone needs to be back on board approximately a half hour before sailing and that can be earlier at times.

 

Thanks 

 

Found that for a Mediterranean cruise the early time is 7PM which is just fine with our group.  I was just not wanting to have to eat at 5PM as the ship sails most days at 6PM

 

[sjhanksaz]

So this our MSC experience has not been so great.

 

We all decided to do early dining and I called and we had that updated and got and email confirming it.

 

I found after getting the MSC APP that our dinner time was not on there so I called MSC and they said our dining was changed to the late option.  I said we can't do that medically for some things my wife deals with after eating.  The best they could do for us is tell us to talk to the crew when we got on the ship.  They said that there was no way to change us in the system.

 

Just found this answer really hard to take and that they changed us after confirming us on an early dining.

 

I sure hope they can change us when we get on the ship or we will have to eat at the buffet every night.

 

We have 4 rooms for 7 people.  We all have different check in times that are spread apart over three hours.  So we are getting a van to take us to the port from Rome and MSC will not change us all to a similar time.  I called and they said if they are not busy you may get in early but be prepared to not.  So I guess I will just sit out and look at the ship for three hours while tending my luggage.

 

 

Edited September 1, 2023 by sjhanksaz

[JamieLogical]

I am not sure how it works for European cruises, but for cruises out of the US, MSC does not enforce the embarkation times listed on your tickets, so I don't think that will actually be a problem for you. Also, even post-COVID when I sailed multiple cruise lines that WERE very strict about embarkation times on tickets, they would let everyone in the party board together, even if they were in different rooms with different boarding times as long as at least one stateroom in the party had that boarding time.

[sjhanksaz]

5 minutes ago, JamieLogical said:

I am not sure how it works for European cruises, but for cruises out of the US, MSC does not enforce the embarkation times listed on your tickets, so I don't think that will actually be a problem for you. Also, even post-COVID when I sailed multiple cruise lines that WERE very strict about embarkation times on tickets, they would let everyone in the party board together, even if they were in different rooms with different boarding times as long as at least one stateroom in the party had that boarding time.

Thanks!!

[sverigecruiser]

On 9/1/2023 at 5:12 PM, sjhanksaz said:

our dining was changed to the late option.  I said we can't do that medically for some things my wife deals with after eating.  

 

I'm sorry for you but under those circumstances you shouldn't book an experience without anytime dining. It's not fair to expect early dining when booking the experience you booked.

[shipgeeks]

I just came across this thread, eventually realized it started a number of months ago, and that individual issues may have been resolved by now.  However, I do have some observations that could be relevant to someone now or in the days to come.

First, most or all lines have some sort of "class" system, with different privileges, possibly different dining rooms, etc., and restrictions on who can use those areas.  Perhaps MSC's is not so obvious; the levels are called "experiences" rather than first class, spa level, etc.  

If booking a Bella or Fantastica cabin, you will most likely be asked to choose early or late dining time. But, depending on the ship and itinerary, there are times within that.  Early could mean 5/5:30, or 7:30; it would not be assigned until boarding.  Late might be more like 9:30.  If the assigned time is not suitable, one can go to the dining room, or other stated venue, and request a change.  Nothing is guaranteed; it certainly depends on availability, but one can ask (politely, of course).

 

[perakcruiser]

On 9/1/2023 at 11:12 PM, sjhanksaz said:

Just found this answer really hard to take and that they changed us after confirming us on an early dining.

But it is the truth. The other option would be that they lie to you "yes, yes, all fixed the way you want" and then you realize on the ship that certainly it is not. At the beginning of my MSC "career" I also dealt with the hotline about the dinner times, was pretty useless On board it is easily solved at the restaurant. 

On 9/1/2023 at 11:12 PM, sjhanksaz said:

I called and they said if they are not busy you may get in early but be prepared to not.  So I guess I will just sit out and look at the ship for three hours while tending my luggage.

Also this is just the way it goes. But good news for you, in Civita the boarding time slot is usually not enforced. Only in Genoa I had this not so happy experience.

[sjhanksaz]

On 9/3/2023 at 10:12 PM, perakcruiser said:

But it is the truth. The other option would be that they lie to you "yes, yes, all fixed the way you want" and then you realize on the ship that certainly it is not. At the beginning of my MSC "career" I also dealt with the hotline about the dinner times, was pretty useless On board it is easily solved at the restaurant. 

 

Sounds like you are pretty sure they will accommodate the earlier dining time after we board.  Is there another route to take to try and fix this prior to the sailing?

 

 

[sjhanksaz]

On 9/2/2023 at 5:08 PM, shipgeeks said:

I just came across this thread, eventually realized it started a number of months ago, and that individual issues may have been resolved by now.  However, I do have some observations that could be relevant to someone now or in the days to come.

First, most or all lines have some sort of "class" system, with different privileges, possibly different dining rooms, etc., and restrictions on who can use those areas.  Perhaps MSC's is not so obvious; the levels are called "experiences" rather than first class, spa level, etc.  

If booking a Bella or Fantastica cabin, you will most likely be asked to choose early or late dining time. But, depending on the ship and itinerary, there are times within that.  Early could mean 5/5:30, or 7:30; it would not be assigned until boarding.  Late might be more like 9:30.  If the assigned time is not suitable, one can go to the dining room, or other stated venue, and request a change.  Nothing is guaranteed; it certainly depends on availability, but one can ask (politely, of course).

 

Thanks -- Do you think a note from the Doctor would help for us to have when we talk with them?

[Mark_T]

13 hours ago, sjhanksaz said:

Thanks -- Do you think a note from the Doctor would help for us to have when we talk with them?

It can't hurt, but if there is a medical need to eat early then it was very unwise to book an experience that doesn't offer that certainty...

 

Be prepared to accept that they may be able to accommodate you and your wife at an early sitting but not the entire party...

 

If they can accommodate you all that would be great, but it is not something you are all entitled to insist on, so flexibility is going to be key to enjoy what you have paid for.

Edited September 10, 2023 by Mark_T