Anytime/My Time Dining - Seating questions

Just curious....

Situation: Anytime/My Time Dining - Request by 2 people to be seated at large table

If a twosome is seated at a large table, does the waiter wait to start taking food orders from all until after table is full?

Are families with children seated with similar families?

Would a young couple's request to to be seated with other young couples be honored?

You might get a better response if you include the name of the cruise line. Sounds like you might be thinking of RC. If so, you might get more of a response on that board.

Some cruise line do better at open dining than others

With Oceania they ask if you want to share a table

they wait until the table is full before taking orders

On HAL for breakfast they set us at a large table, one couple that was about finished breakfast another couple had ordered then they took our order & a solo lady came & they took her order :eek:

very discombobulated IMO

Just curious....

 

Situation: Anytime/My Time Dining - Request by 2 people to be seated at large table

 

If a twosome is seated at a large table, does the waiter wait to start taking food orders from all until after table is full?

 

Are families with children seated with similar families?

 

Would a young couple's request to to be seated with other young couples be honored?

If our experience on our past two RCCL sailings is anything to go by, it will be very unlikely that they seat parties together. We requested to share every night and were always told that there was nobody to share with. :( We also found that the host(ess) will try extremely hard to pin you down to a standing reservation for each night and will then always seat you at the same table. Others have had different results with MyTime, but honestly - we hate it.

They wait until the table is full before taking orders, they also wait until everyone finished one course until serving next course.

The might seat you with other people that have children if you ask.

Most likely not. If you want this meet people and go to dinner together.

If it is Celebrity or Royal Caribbean, we have taken their versions of My Time Dining and never had a problem being seated with others. A good and effective manager will seat you with others who have just been seated and possibly have their menus. A good waiter will wait until the table is full before taking orders.

Contrary to what some members on these boards may say, there are a fair number of passengers who love dining with others and ask to be seated at a large table. Not everyone wants to sit "alone". ;) In our experience, it has run smoothly and we enjoy getting to know our table mates.

Depends on the cruiseline and the person doing the seating.

For dinner

On Carnival--Same ship, a month apart, first two cruises we were seated at our own table even though we said we'd share. Third cruise, different hostess, we sat with others. We've had it both ways on Princess.

Breakfast and lunch is always interesting. If a bunch of pax show up at the same time they'll probably share a table. But if you show up being the only one in line, you might get a 6 top to yourself.

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If you wish to be seated with others (we do!), then traditional seating is best. MTDer's really prefer eating with only their own party. Mind you..this only applies to dinner...other meals are "open" seating all the time.

Per the OP's signature, they will be sailing on Oasis OTS on 9-10-2016. :)

MTDer's really prefer eating with only their own party.

This is an inaccurate generalisation. We choose MT/Anytime options precisely because we like meeting other people, but we like meeting a whole range of people not just the same ones every night. Over the years, we've met many other cruisers who feel the same.

If you wish to be seated with others (we do!), then traditional seating is best. MTDer's really prefer eating with only their own party.

No! Not true. Gosh, I even pre-empted you and you still posted this misleading and untrue comment. *sigh*

Contrary to what some members on these boards may say, there are a fair number of passengers who love dining with others and ask to be seated at a large table. Not everyone wants to sit "alone". ;) In our experience, it has run smoothly and we enjoy getting to know our table mates.

If you wish to be seated with others (we do!), then traditional seating is best. MTDer's really prefer eating with only their own party. Mind you..this only applies to dinner...other meals are "open" seating all the time.

No...actually you can request a table for just two or how many are in your group at any seating...breakfast, lunch & dinner

^ Yes, DH and I have had a 2-top at lunch and it was no problem. :)

Just curious....

 

Situation: Anytime/My Time Dining - Request by 2 people to be seated at large table

 

If a twosome is seated at a large table, does the waiter wait to start taking food orders from all until after table is full?

 

Are families with children seated with similar families?

 

Would a young couple's request to to be seated with other young couples be honored?

generally speaking they will not fill a table until they have enough people to sit at the same time.. so there will not be any latecomers after heritable has started ordering or eating. they may leave one or 2 seats empty if there is not a party that can fit when you are seated.

they will not go out of their way to seat families with kids with other families with kids, or match ages on MTD.. they fill the tables with party sizes that will make it come out even. so you could be a family of 4 with 2 couples.

if you want to sit with people your own age you pretty much have to find them yourself and show up as a group( usually pretty easy to do)

if you do TRADITIONAL dining and request a large table they make more of an effort to seat you with others like you( your age, no kids) although you will find the age range could be early 20s through retirees. which can be awesome. ( old people have the best stories)

a couple of cruises ago, we got stuck with anytime (didn't clear the waitlist for traditional) and a couple of times, we were seated at a table at which others had their orders already taken. So the service was quite awkward. One of the many reasons (including feeling rushed) that we decided we didn't care for anytime dining.

If you wish to be seated with others (we do!), then traditional seating is best. MTDer's really prefer eating with only their own party. Mind you..this only applies to dinner...other meals are "open" seating all the time.

Ah, the queen of gross generalizations and inaccurate information has struck again! :D

If you wish to be seated with others (we do!), then traditional seating is best. MTDer's really prefer eating with only their own party. Mind you..this only applies to dinner...other meals are "open" seating all the time.

Where did you come up with this totally incorrect piece of information. You may prefer to dine alone w your significant other but to extrapolate from your sample size of one to the preferences for everyone else on the ship is hardly accurate.

We always ask to share a table when we do my time dining. Most of the time we get to share and have ended up dining with some very interesting people.

DON

Just curious....

 

Situation: Anytime/My Time Dining - Request by 2 people to be seated at large table

 

If a twosome is seated at a large table, does the waiter wait to start taking food orders from all until after table is full?

That's been our experience on both anytime and traditional.

 

Are families with children seated with similar families?

No, unless it works out easily that way. It's more to do with numbers.

 

Would a young couple's request to to be seated with other young couples be honored?

Cut & paste my last comment ;)

For anytime we do ask to be seated with folk who speak English.

And when we hook up with like-minded folk on the ship, or we're thrown together on a table with likeminded folk, we arrange to meet up ahead of next night's dinner & go to the dining room as a group.

JB :)

We love anytime dining, have done it for about 10 years now on 3 different cruise lines. We'll never go back to traditional dining. It's not true that "most MTD people (makes it sound like a dirty word!) prefer to dine alone" - there's a good mixture of both sharers and 'table for two' folks. If you want to share with a particular type of party (age group, language, kids), then it's better to find likely partners in advance and arrange to go together. The dining room host can't really be walking up and down the line looking for likely dining partners for you or waiting for someone to show up that meets your criteria. We've more than once gone to the dining room intending to eat alone, but started talking to another couple in line and ended up sharing a table.

We usually stop on the way out of the dining room after dinner and make reservations for the following night. If you want to be seated at the same table or with the same wait staff, then that's the time to mention it.

One thing that really helps make MTD go more smoothly is to recognize that the MTD host/hostess has a very difficult and usually thankless job. If they get it right a couple of nights in the row and, as often happens, remember your name, then a warm "Thank You" or even a small gratuity will likely make the rest of the dining room experience more enjoyable.

If you wish to be seated with others (we do!), then traditional seating is best. MTDer's really prefer eating with only their own party. Mind you..this only applies to dinner...other meals are "open" seating all the time.

Once again CB what makes you draw these conclusions - especially as you indicate you do not select MTD - how would you know? We opt for MTD as we like the flexibility but also enjoy the company of others during dinner. So at least in our case your stereotyped presumption is wrong. But no surprise there!

The only real difference between MTD and traditional is the flexibility with dining times and not having to be at a given seating each night. You can ask to sit alone or with others and yes families could be seated at larger tables with other couples or guests without children - just as could be the case with traditional dining.

DH and I chose anytime because there are days when we are famished at 5 and other days when we are famished at 8. But, we enjoy dining with other people and will always ask to be seated with others if they are willing.

I am not personally a morning person, and even though I ask to be seated alone at breakfast, I am usually plunked down at a table of other, "gee I need coffee before I talk" people, and we happily grunt at each other until the food arrives.

When I have cruised with just a girl friend, and not the DH, we were seated every night with the same, singles, all women except for one man, who actually was quite happy to be at a table of all women.

That being said, the wait for a table has gotten longer and longer, and after our Alaska cruise,( when we know we wont be ready to eat at 6, and we may be in port after 8,) Dh and I are opting to go back to early dining. It will be nice to be seated on time, have the same wait staff, and be pampered instead of pushed through dinner.

Have a great cruise.

[quote name=marshhawk;50580662

That being said' date=' the wait for a table has gotten longer and longer, and after our Alaska cruise,( when we know we wont be ready to eat at 6, and we may be in port after 8,) Dh and I are opting to go back to early dining. It will be nice to be seated on time, have the same wait staff, and be pampered instead of pushed through dinner.

Have a great cruise.[/quote]

One reason is that many fixed time diners figure that they can go to any time dining whenever it is convenient for them and the people at the any time dining room let them do it. Make sure that they are only allowed to eat where they are assigned and the lines will be much shorter.

DON