On-line dining reservations

[Ricky Chan]

First time RSSC cruiser.  Can someone help me, step by step as how to book specialty restaurants on-line under "my account". 

 

I could not find any link. Is it won't pop up until the day the reservation is open? 

 

Thanks in advance.

 

Ricky

[Avidtravler]

Reservations will open at 8:00PM Eastern time on the date indicated in your reservation online.Hope this helps.

[Ricky Chan]

Thanks for your reply. 

 

Opening date for reservation for me is 8:00 p.m., EST on Jan 1, 2024.  I assume the link won't pop up until then, am I right?

[-Lew-]

4 minutes ago, Ricky Chan said:

Thanks for your reply. 

 

Opening date for reservation for me is 8:00 p.m., EST on Jan 1, 2024.  I assume the link won't pop up until then, am I right?

 

You've assumed correctly.  It may be a minute or so after 8:00pm

[GMIAC]

Another tip: if Pacific Rim is on your list (and your ship), prioritize that one, especially if you want a two-top. PR is smaller than the other specialty venues, and has just a few two-tops. 

[Lonedaddy]

2 hours ago, GMIAC said:

Another tip: if Pacific Rim is on your list (and your ship), prioritize that one, especially if you want a two-top. PR is smaller than the other specialty venues, and has just a few two-tops. 

I found that PR is easiest to book.  I think because it is either loved or not.  P7 is my usual "book first" especially on a seaday.  I usually leave the first seaday open if it is the second or 3rd night as they have a nice menu in CR.  Also be aware some overnights will not have the Specialties open as the do the special poolside dinner on an Overnight.

[labonnevie]

We have found that booking a specialty restaurant the night of embarkation works well. Easier to get the time we desire and leaves the rest of the cruise available for a return dinner, if available. 
Also, agreeing to share always makes it easier to get the night you want. Plus you usually meet some great people!

[cAPS lOCK oN]

10 minutes ago, labonnevie said:

We have found that booking a specialty restaurant the night of embarkation works well. Easier to get the time we desire and leaves the rest of the cruise available for a return dinner, if available. 
 

Agreed. Related, on our last two cruises we stopped by the restaurant office on embarkation day to see if anything was available that evening. Both times we were offered Pacific Rim, which we happily took.

[Ricky Chan]

Thank you everyone for your responses,  I actually received an email this morning reminding me to book specialty restaurants tomorrow night at 8:00 p.m. EST.  We are taking a 14-day Transatlantic cruise on Splendor from Miami to Barcelona on March 31, 2024. 

[edgee]

On 12/31/2023 at 6:51 PM, Ricky Chan said:

Thank you everyone for your responses,  I actually received an email this morning reminding me to book specialty restaurants tomorrow night at 8:00 p.m. EST.  We are taking a 14-day Transatlantic cruise on Splendor from Miami to Barcelona on March 31, 2024. 

We are on same cruise. Signed in at 8 p.m. Had zero trouble getting 2 tops for all 3 specialty restaurants...early on a sea day...just the way we like it. Ship looks to be about 70% full and cruise is for 14 nights so that could be the reason it was so easy.

 

 

[mj_holiday]

Specialty Reservations.  I just finished our reservations for the Apr 1 - May 1 "Magic in the North Pacific"  and I encountered some of the things people have asked about.

It wasn't until Jan 2 that I got the link for dinner reservations.  And the link in My Account said how many reservations we were able to make.  For us it was 6 since this is a two segment sailing.

I got our reservations just fine.  When you select a date there will be an annotation regarding any shore excursions you have and what the times are.  After you make a time selection for the restaurant you will then see Reserved next to the time.  Below that you will see two links, one is for "New Reservation" and the other is for a "Cancellation"  I hit the Cancellation to see what happened.  I cancelled the second  Chartreuse reservation to see what would happen. I was able to cancel it and rebook it with no issues, or so I thought.  As I was leaving the site I noticed under My Account it stated I had made 5 or 6 reservations.  Further research showed that cancelling the second Chartreuse really cancelled both of them.  I quickly was able to get our reservations back the way I wanted them.

In summary:

Your will get a link for reservations when it is time for you to make them

When looking at a specific date you will get info about any excursion you have that day.

If you have 2 segments on the cruise, you will be able to make reservations for both.

You can cancel a reservation without calling Regent to cancel (as with excursions) and book what you want.

You will get an email for each reservation you make.

Edited January 3 by mj_holiday
correction

[pappy1022]

And be careful if you are adding other people to your dinner reservations. Only have 1 person make all of the group dinner reservations because the system gets confused and the results are not what you expected.

[douginct]

3 hours ago, pappy1022 said:

And be careful if you are adding other people to your dinner reservations. Only have 1 person make all of the group dinner reservations because the system gets confused and the results are not what you expected.

When we sailed with another couple last year, I volunteered to make the dining reservations and just got their booking number. Worked out well.  It made the reservation in my name, but for a party of four.

[pappy1022]

That is the better process, just 1 person making the reservations for all. Since there were 6 of us traveling (3 couples), we decided to split up the dining reservation process when it opened up. We each had 1 restaurant to make a reservation for all 6 of us and the system couldn’t handle it. We did receive emails saying all reservations were confirmed but when we went back into the reservation it didn’t show that we had reservations for all of us. Our TA called the next morning and Regent confirmed that the reservations were messed up and had to cancel whatever we had out there and start from scratch. We didn’t get the dates and times we originally wanted but found options to our satisfaction. Regent told our TA that the system couldn’t handle multiple people doing concurrent reservations for the same people even though each of us was making reservations for a different restaurant. This shouldn’t be a problem for modern databases and well designed applications. Lesson learned and just passing it along that only 1 person should make all the reservations for the entire group. That process works fine.

[GMIAC]

How many advance reservations are permitted on 14-night cruises? I know I got up to three on my recent 7-night. My booking window for April is coming up. 

[rcandkc]

48 minutes ago, GMIAC said:

How many advance reservations are permitted on 14-night cruises? I know I got up to three on my recent 7-night. My booking window for April is coming up. 

If it is booked as a single cruise (not back to back) you get 1 reservation at each of the speciality restaurants. Any others have to be made on the ship. 

[suzyluvs2cruise]

New Regent cruiser here. So if we're 2 couples who would like to dine together we should not make individual reservations? We're on Mariner for 16 nights. Is there somewhere that Compass Rose menus are posted? and for that length of cruise is it 1 reservation for each restaurant pre-cruise?  

[minotaur]

8 hours ago, suzyluvs2cruise said:

New Regent cruiser here. So if we're 2 couples who would like to dine together we should not make individual reservations? We're on Mariner for 16 nights. Is there somewhere that Compass Rose menus are posted? and for that length of cruise is it 1 reservation for each restaurant pre-cruise?  

If you want to dine with another couple, you can do that when you book online. Once you've booked your table this shows up:

 

ADD ANOTHER GUEST

Your guest's information

Booking Number:
First Name:
Last Name:

ADD GUEST

 

Share our table? Yes No

I've not done this, so others may have more tips. You get one reservation for each speciality restaurant, but can make other reservations on board - space permitting. There is a sample Compass Rose menu on the Regent website.

 

 

 

 

[papaflamingo]

12 hours ago, suzyluvs2cruise said:

New Regent cruiser here. So if we're 2 couples who would like to dine together we should not make individual reservations? We're on Mariner for 16 nights. Is there somewhere that Compass Rose menus are posted? and for that length of cruise is it 1 reservation for each restaurant pre-cruise?  

To add to what Minotaur said.... I just did this a few months ago for our Grandeur cruise that we completed on Jan. 24th.   When you get into Dining Reservations, you'll see the "add another guest" prompt as. Minotaur shows.  Select it, fill in the information for the other reservation, and select "NO" for "Share Table."  BE SURE TO SELECT THE "ADD GUEST" PROMPT!!!!  This will put you in a 4 top for the 4 of  you.  It will only. bring up times available for 4 top tables in each restaurant.  Simply select your time and confirm you reservation (you'll see the prompt).  It's also very important that the other couple doesn't try to make reservations.  That'll delete what you make.  You  should get an email confirmation showing a party of 4.  

[suzyluvs2cruise]

3 hours ago, papaflamingo said:

To add to what Minotaur said.... I just did this a few months ago for our Grandeur cruise that we completed on Jan. 24th.   When you get into Dining Reservations, you'll see the "add another guest" prompt as. Minotaur shows.  Select it, fill in the information for the other reservation, and select "NO" for "Share Table."  BE SURE TO SELECT THE "ADD GUEST" PROMPT!!!!  This will put you in a 4 top for the 4 of  you.  It will only. bring up times available for 4 top tables in each restaurant.  Simply select your time and confirm you reservation (you'll see the prompt).  It's also very important that the other couple doesn't try to make reservations.  That'll delete what you make.  You  should get an email confirmation showing a party of 4.  

 

7 hours ago, minotaur said:

If you want to dine with another couple, you can do that when you book online. Once you've booked your table this shows up:

 

ADD ANOTHER GUEST

Your guest's information

Booking Number:
First Name:
Last Name:

ADD GUEST

 

Share our table? Yes No

I've not done this, so others may have more tips. You get one reservation for each speciality restaurant, but can make other reservations on board - space permitting. There is a sample Compass Rose menu on the Regent website.

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks @papaflamingoand @minotaur. That's what we'll do. I did see the "sample" menu from Compass Rose on the Regent website but was hoping someone posted others in a review or blog. 

Edited February 4 by suzyluvs2cruise