Cancelled Dining Reservations

[PugM0m]

I am hoping someone can answer some questions or give me some advice. My husband and I are booked on the Rhapsody of the Seas on 2/25/2024. The latest snafu on this cursed cruise is Royal just cancelled all dining reservation, stating they are doing an "upgrade" to the reservation system. I had reserved MTD for all 6 nights and purchased lunches for our two sea days during the Black Friday sales. They refunded all we paid and gave us $25 each for the "inconvenience". Of course, now the lunches I purchased on sale are not near the deal they were, but whatever. My worry now, the website will not let me do a MTD reservation, so I called the dining area to try to get my reservations put back on just for the MTD. The Rep told me there was nothing they could do because they were doing the upgrade and said I would need to wait until I get on board, go to the dining room and they are supposed have something that shows we originally had 6:45pm MTD  reservations and they will be honored. I have my doubts. Again any advice or suggestions on what to do, would be greatly appreciated. Thank you

[c-leg5]

5 minutes ago, PugM0m said:

I am hoping someone can answer some questions or give me some advice. My husband and I are booked on the Rhapsody of the Seas on 2/25/2024. The latest snafu on this cursed cruise is Royal just cancelled all dining reservation, stating they are doing an "upgrade" to the reservation system. I had reserved MTD for all 6 nights and purchased lunches for our two sea days during the Black Friday sales. They refunded all we paid and gave us $25 each for the "inconvenience". Of course, now the lunches I purchased on sale are not near the deal they were, but whatever. My worry now, the website will not let me do a MTD reservation, so I called the dining area to try to get my reservations put back on just for the MTD. The Rep told me there was nothing they could do because they were doing the upgrade and said I would need to wait until I get on board, go to the dining room and they are supposed have something that shows we originally had 6:45pm MTD  reservations and they will be honored. I have my doubts. Again any advice or suggestions on what to do, would be greatly appreciated. Thank you

Don’t you have your original email confirmations which showed what you booked?

[SilkySal]

I don't mean to upset you by saying don't let this ruin your "cursed?" cruise. Try a few times to pre-reserve your MTD and, if unable, do, as was suggested, go to the MTD room to confirm your 6:45pm dining time. Breathe, and deal with problems as they happen and try not to worry/stress about the small stuff. System upgrades seem to be occurring more often and glitches do happen but don't let it ruin your cruise.

 

By the way, I pulled up our future cruises (quite a few) and the site said that all of them have been paid off!! Haha! Yes, it's a glitch! I'll be checking my cruises daily to make sure that our upcoming cruises that we did actually pay off, remain paid off! Enjoy your cruise, hope everything works out for you, and cheers!

[PugM0m]

37 minutes ago, c-leg5 said:

Don’t you have your original email confirmations which showed what you booked?

Yes, I have them, and they show on the app, but as cancelled. Don't know if that will make a bit of difference I kind of expected to see someone else from my cruise would have already started a thread on this.

[Engineroom Snipe]

3 minutes ago, PugM0m said:

Yes, I have them, and they show on the app, but as cancelled. Don't know if that will make a bit of difference I kind of expected to see someone else from my cruise would have already started a thread on this.

This is a bit of normal with RCI. Try to listen to @SilkySal and take a breath. I know this is not what you want to hear but you have to work around these things as they happen.

 

Reset, make your new plan to correct their hurdles, and get on with your cruise: otherwise, if you think it is "cursed", abandon your voyage before you have to abandon ship (trying for humor but you might not be in the mood for it).

 

We feel your stress and want to help.

[PugM0m]

41 minutes ago, SilkySal said:

I don't mean to upset you by saying don't let this ruin your "cursed?" cruise. Try a few times to pre-reserve your MTD and, if unable, do, as was suggested, go to the MTD room to confirm your 6:45pm dining time. Breathe, and deal with problems as they happen and try not to worry/stress about the small stuff. System upgrades seem to be occurring more often and glitches do happen but don't let it ruin your cruise.

 

By the way, I pulled up our future cruises (quite a few) and the site said that all of them have been paid off!! Haha! Yes, it's a glitch! I'll be checking my cruises daily to make sure that our upcoming cruises that we did actually pay off, remain paid off! Enjoy your cruise, hope everything works out for you, and cheers!

No I am not upset, I supposed it sounded a little "over dramatic" out of context, to say it was "cursed". We booked this in May 2023, it was a 7 night full transit Panama Canal cruise for our 40th wedding anniversary. In August, Royal sent an email they were "enhancing" our cruise experience by removing the Canal Transit and lowering it from 7 nights to 6 nights and ports changed from Costa Rico to Aruba and Curacao. It took forever before they even opened MTD for reservations. We have never done the MTD, so I was worried until I could finally make those reservation. Then to get the really good deals on lunch reservations on Black Friday, I thought everything was good to go. Then to have them cancel everything and not be able to re-book the MTD. Just really frustrated that 50 days out Royal keeps causing issues. We will enjoy it, just can't help but to feel very disappointed in Royal at this point.

[c-leg5]

11 minutes ago, PugM0m said:

Yes, I have them, and they show on the app, but as cancelled. Don't know if that will make a bit of difference I kind of expected to see someone else from my cruise would have already started a thread on this.

In that case I would echo the other posters and say, relax take a copy if your confirmation to the podium for MTD when you board and deal with it then, if the reservations don’t re-open before you sail.

 

MTD was once a very efficient system. We have been big MTD fans in the past but it has certainly has its issues recently. One can only hope they are making upgrades for the better and not making the problems any worse.

[micruiser2002]

I really would not be that concerned about your MTD.  I would be more upset if they cancelled purchased dining that was on sale and is now more.  Unless the $25 covers the new increase in price I would escalate this.  That is total BS.

 

[PugM0m]

2 minutes ago, micruiser2002 said:

I really would not be that concerned about your MTD.  I would be more upset if they cancelled purchased dining that was on sale and is now more.  Unless the $25 covers the new increase in price I would escalate this.  That is total BS.

 

The $25 would have covered the new prices. I went a head and rebooked one of the lunches, and Royal managed to get more money out of me, because now they have the Sip, Brunch, Tour available so took the cancellation as a sign to reserve that instead of what I had. Oddly enough it let me do that, so the whole reservation system is obviously not down. 

[Engineroom Snipe]

7 minutes ago, PugM0m said:

The $25 would have covered the new prices. I went a head and rebooked one of the lunches, and Royal managed to get more money out of me, because now they have the Sip, Brunch, Tour available so took the cancellation as a sign to reserve that instead of what I had. Oddly enough it let me do that, so the whole reservation system is obviously not down. 

So sorry you have to deal with this. Over the years, my wife and I stopped doing any type of advanced purchases because we have gone through trials and tribulations similar to your story.

 

We have gone "native" and do an MDR fixed time. If the first meal is not up to snuff, we go to Windjammer and wing it. Our time onboard is so limited and I just work around snafus as needed.

 

We are on hiatus from cruising right now but I do not want to discourage you from enjoying yours.

 

I love cruising but the last three years have been not special and that is the time to take a breath like @SilkySal said and regroup.

 

In a year or two, I hope to be complaining about my next cruise!

[PugM0m]

4 hours ago, Engineroom Snipe said:

So sorry you have to deal with this. Over the years, my wife and I stopped doing any type of advanced purchases because we have gone through trials and tribulations similar to your story.

 

We have gone "native" and do an MDR fixed time. If the first meal is not up to snuff, we go to Windjammer and wing it. Our time onboard is so limited and I just work around snafus as needed.

 

We are on hiatus from cruising right now but I do not want to discourage you from enjoying yours.

 

I love cruising but the last three years have been not special and that is the time to take a breath like @SilkySal said and regroup.

 

In a year or two, I hope to be complaining about my next cruise!

In the past we always did the late MDR seating, but this time since it is just my husband and I, we decided to try the MTD. I am sure it will be fine, just frustrating.

[Mum2Mercury]

6 hours ago, PugM0m said:

 and purchased lunches for our two sea days during the Black Friday sales. They refunded all we paid and gave us $25 each for the "inconvenience". Of course, now the lunches I purchased on sale are not near the deal they were

I'm zeroing in on this detail because something similar happened to us:  

 

We reserved a ship's excursion (not something we often do) during the BF sales; the discount was fairly significant.  In December I received an email saying, "Excursion's cancelled.  Money refunded."  The excursion in question was available in three versions ... and (wouldn't you know it!) I chose the one that they cancelled.  The one I chose came with a lunch, and I suspect their caterer fell through?  

 

Anyway, I called and told them I wanted the same excursion ... one of the other two versions.  No problem!  I insisted that I wanted it for the BF sale price, even though that was over.  Given that Royal cancelled on me, I thought that was totally fair.  I only had to go up one level to get the BF sale price.  

 

Anyway, if you really want those lunches, you should do the same.  

[c-leg5]

50 minutes ago, PugM0m said:

In the past we always did the late MDR seating, but this time since it is just my husband and I, we decided to try the MTD. I am sure it will be fine, just frustrating.

From the US you wont have a problem with later MTD or even changing to late MDR. It sounded like you wanted earlier dining which is always more difficult. 

[Engineroom Snipe]

38 minutes ago, Mum2Mercury said:

I'm zeroing in on this detail because something similar happened to us:  

 

We reserved a ship's excursion (not something we often do) during the BF sales; the discount was fairly significant.  In December I received an email saying, "Excursion's cancelled.  Money refunded."  The excursion in question was available in three versions ... and (wouldn't you know it!) I chose the one that they cancelled.  The one I chose came with a lunch, and I suspect their caterer fell through?  

 

Anyway, I called and told them I wanted the same excursion ... one of the other two versions.  No problem!  I insisted that I wanted it for the BF sale price, even though that was over.  Given that Royal cancelled on me, I thought that was totally fair.  I only had to go up one level to get the BF sale price.  

 

Anyway, if you really want those lunches, you should do the same.  

You are unique that you had a goal and a plan to achieve that goal. For instance, if I am customer service representative and a customer calls to resolve a problem, what will satisfy the customer?

 

So many customers are angry and venting about their perceived injustice that they do not even know what will solve their problem or satisfy what they consider a fair resolution. In general, most businesses will try to avoid bad impressions which do not lead to more business.

 

Your presented a reasonable offer to satisfy your problem but it took someone with an open mind to say it was achievable within the parameters of their purview. The first layer did not have the authority to attain your solution and you had the patience to take it to a level that could.

 

Nice.