Premium Plus and half-consumed bottles of wine at dinner

[Mississippian]

I am traveling solo and have the Premium Plus drink package. The only reason I would order a bottle of wine at dinner rather than by the glass is because drink service in cruise ship dining rooms tends to be slow. In any event, if I start my meal with a glass of champagne there is no way I could drink more than half a bottle of wine. Will they store the wine for me overnight? I know Princess does this. I realize that since I am "entitled" to the bottle of wine I can just leave it, but I don't like waste.

 

Also, I've heard that if I am at a shared table I can offer a glass of my by-the-bottle wine to my tablemates. Is this correct?

[hawkeyetlse]

I have seen those reports about sharing a bottle with others at the table that don’t have the P+ package, but I would not be surprised if they are cracking down on that (which honestly would be fair enough). I get the sense that NCL are really kicking themselves for giving away too much with this bottle service offer and they are steadily clawing it back. Next maybe they will say that it’s one bottle for two people on the package, and solos can’t have bottles at all… (again this is just a maybe!)

 

Anyway we will soon see how it all works for solos on Breakaway. It’s usually an interesting dynamic with drinkers and non-drinkers (and then the drinkers who expect the rest of us to steal drinks for them for 16 days).

[KeithJenner]

You used to be able to take bottles away after your meal, but they have apparently stopped allowing this lately.

 

We have usually found that if you order champagne with your meal by the glass they do a very good job of keeping it filled. Often they have kept a bottle by our table anyway.

[9tee2Sea]

3 hours ago, Mississippian said:

I am traveling solo and have the Premium Plus drink package. The only reason I would order a bottle of wine at dinner rather than by the glass is because drink service in cruise ship dining rooms tends to be slow. In any event, if I start my meal with a glass of champagne there is no way I could drink more than half a bottle of wine. Will they store the wine for me overnight? I know Princess does this. I realize that since I am "entitled" to the bottle of wine I can just leave it, but I don't like waste.

 

Also, I've heard that if I am at a shared table I can offer a glass of my by-the-bottle wine to my tablemates. Is this correct?

I don't know about Champagne, but I do know what happens if you don't finish a bottle of wine.  The wine steward will seal the bottle, and put a tag on it with your room number and name. They will then give you a ticket ( TRY to hold on to that ticket).  If you want to drink from that bottle again, in any dining facility, give the ticket to the wine steward and they will get your unfinished bottle and bring it to your table.  It takes a bit longer, because they have to do a search for it, but you can then continue onto that bottle until finished.  

[KeithJenner]

23 minutes ago, 9tee2Sea said:

I don't know about Champagne, but I do know what happens if you don't finish a bottle of wine.  The wine steward will seal the bottle, and put a tag on it with your room number and name. They will then give you a ticket ( TRY to hold on to that ticket).  If you want to drink from that bottle again, in any dining facility, give the ticket to the wine steward and they will get your unfinished bottle and bring it to your table.  It takes a bit longer, because they have to do a search for it, but you can then continue onto that bottle until finished.  

Do they do that with wine you get from the premium plus package? They certainly do that with wine you bring yourself or buy a bottle of, but I’ve not heard of them doing so with premium plus.

[9tee2Sea]

6 minutes ago, KeithJenner said:

Do they do that with wine you get from the premium plus package? They certainly do that with wine you bring yourself or buy a bottle of, but I’ve not heard of them doing so with premium plus.

I had the regular drink package. and yes, they did that.  I dint finish the bottle. They sealed it, and brought the bottle back to me when asked.

[js]

Im still trying to get through the first post statement on not being able to finish a bottle of wine at dinner lol

 

Cheers! I hope you can save and get again the next evening. 

[KeithJenner]

49 minutes ago, 9tee2Sea said:

I had the regular drink package. and yes, they did that.  I dint finish the bottle. They sealed it, and brought the bottle back to me when asked.

You can't get a bottle of wine with the regular beverage package, just a discount off the purchase price. If you bought one with a discount then it is yours to do what you want with.

 

I'm not sure what happened in your instance, but if that was the case then it is different to what we are talking about here.

[Vagabond Knight]

Sealing a bottle of still wine is not that big a deal, but sealing a bubbly is a bit tricky, isn't it?  

[gmbhardy]

2 hours ago, Vagabond Knight said:

Sealing a bottle of still wine is not that big a deal, but sealing a bubbly is a bit tricky, isn't it?  

Not with a proper stopper.

[debenson0723]

4 hours ago, KeithJenner said:

You can't get a bottle of wine with the regular beverage package, just a discount off the purchase price. If you bought one with a discount then it is yours to do what you want with.

 

I'm not sure what happened in your instance, but if that was the case then it is different to what we are talking about here.

That is correct but with the bottle of wine I received with my Platinum voucher dinner, I was able to have it stored until the following evening. I have done that several times so not sure why you couldn't do it with the Premium Plus wine (would hate to see it wasted).

[Mississippian]

7 hours ago, js said:

Im still trying to get through the first post statement on not being able to finish a bottle of wine at dinner lol

Don't worry, I'm a lush. But after a full day of guzzling there is just so much I can handle at dinner.

[KeithJenner]

3 hours ago, debenson0723 said:

That is correct but with the bottle of wine I received with my Platinum voucher dinner, I was able to have it stored until the following evening. I have done that several times so not sure why you couldn't do it with the Premium Plus wine (would hate to see it wasted).

Yes, they are very flexible with the wine you get with the platinum meal. I never even open ours at the meal and take it back to the room and they would certainly store it as you say. It is basically yours to do with as you wish.

 

However they are clearly treating the free at sea wine a lot less flexibly. You can’t leave with the unfinished bottle and you can’t take an unopened one. I certainly wouldn’t assume that they will store your bottle (although I’m also not saying they won’t do so).

 

So far I’ve not heard of anyone being allowed to store their free at sea bottle of wine since they stopped letting people take them away. As you say, there is no obvious reason why they shouldn’t but this is NCL.

[hawkeyetlse]

12 hours ago, Vagabond Knight said:

Sealing a bottle of still wine is not that big a deal, but sealing a bubbly is a bit tricky, isn't it?  

It's not ideal. They throw out a lot of champagne/sparkling in the morning when people complain about being served flat wine from yesterday's bottle.