uktog

Bear in mind many coach drivers will not allow you to wear ice shoes or trax on the bus and it’s very tricky to put them on outside when standing on snow and ice. It’s a lovely cruise we enjoyed it but it’s a real challenge if you have mobility or balance concerns

When you are on the No 20 up to Old Aberdeen you will be on the student nostalgia route. The Union Bar and some of our classes used to be downtown but the others and our Residences were in Old Aberdeen. Union closed at 11 last no 20 1130 the party bus ….

Starting a new thread as others requested though this is a latest news from Explora Or should I say lack of if. Whilst it’s lovely to read that travel agents had such fun last week on short cruises put on for them, the first paying passengers are onboard today and the ship looks lovely it’s leaving a sour taste in our mouth. Over three weeks ago we were notified of the very last minute cancellation of our 17 July cruise. Promises of immediate refunds and an albeit rather poor “compensation” offer compared to what was given to those with notification of 2024 cancellations a few weeks earlier were given. Our agent immediately provided information requested including my bank details. We rushed booked and paid for something else expecting this refund to be immediate as promised. Three weeks on, no refund has been received and the Explora account manager at my agent (a major UK agency) appears to be getting nowhere with Explora to chase it along. So be aware the back office of this new venture doesn’t match its PR. In the UK we pay our travel agents so raising a card dispute now, tempting though it is, only hits the travel agency though they understand if I do not have the funds soon (it’s a five figure sum) I will have to go down that route. Unfortunately we have two more cruises booked and fully paid with Explora.

If you can work it in, try and do both Old Aberdeen and Footdee (remembering you pronounce it Fitty). Uber works well in Aberdeen but it’s not a city where you hail cabs. Footdee is pretty unique Scottish fishing village as it used to be now morphed into Aberdeen. Now a much more fashionable address than in my student days. Others looking for ideas for Aberdeen Duthie Park is lovely gardens - if the weather is off the Winter Gardens there are perfect again I’d use Uber to get there from the shuttle drop off (bit expensive to do it from the cruise terminal)

You can access the form without the WiFi but would need WiFi to submit it. We gave feedback onboard in November on two counts 1. The reference to the QR code in the Insider was so small many would miss it. There was no comment made say at the end of the shows each night about using it 2. Although paper attention to detail/feedback forms were available from Guest relations, no one highlighted this, therefore many guests were completely unaware that they could use this paper process Whilst some Azamara guests are comfortable using feedback codes, and leaving out blank forms in every room might not be environmentally friendly in the future, the current Azamara guest profile is now awash with QR code tech savvy guests so its kind of a millennial solution for the wrong audience. It felt like they did not want any feedback!

Thanks @federalexpress Everyone has equally important views I believe. Given the disappointment I’ve expressed here, it may surprise people to hear I’ve spent the last two weeks defending Azamara to others. The context is that I was on a river cruise. Actually I hadn’t meant to be on a river cruise. It was a late substitution for a cruise cancelled by another cruise line and in fact we did try and go with Azamara in our time window but they couldn’t help though we later found out they could have as there were lots of available rooms but that’s another saga. It was an excellent River Cruise, and I will do a review on the river cruises board in due course. Most of the guests on the river cruise where typical Azamara target market indeed many had sailed on Azamara up to 10 to 15 times. What was so sad was without prompting by us or expressing any of the concerns we have, virtually all of them spoke extremely negatively about recent on-board or shoreside experiences on Azamara some even believed the line had already started to fold in financially (tried to counter that but we kept getting the no smoke without fire response or from some travel agents comments that they and colleagues no longer work with them so it’s only a matter of time) - see how the communication vacuum creates pressure! Most did not plan to return to Azamara. None of them used cruise critic so they are perhaps the silent vanishing group. People had spotted we cruise with Azamara because we were using one of the blue Azamara bags which are go to for day-to-day moving around ports. Typically the conversation would be do you still cruise with Azamara, we would say yes and then they would launch in to telling us their tales of woe and service issues both shoreside and onboard. We would try and defend Azamara but would try and be empathetic rather than cheerleaders. This was with people who we got to know over 10 days on a cruise where everyone used included tours and we found even when there were little issues all were very very balanced. We never heard them being unreasonably negative about the river cruise experience, so they did not strike us as people looking out for reasons to complain. However our defence of Azamara failed and most of the passengers we met who had once been with Azamara are heading elsewhere. It’s a very small sample but it worried us.

The call agents just add the cost to your account. Then your travel agent gets an updated higher bill and asks you for the money. I had a similar experience when I booked an excursion online with Explora who use the same Seaware software. They too had trouble accepting any instructions until after final payment but that got quickly fixed. It’s unbelievable that the cruise lines did not know about this limitation before selecting the software. If they did, they show no understanding of cruiser buying and planning behaviours or the impact of their delayed payment programs with travel agents in the UK on guests

Larry Pimintel is a cruise industry veteran and the previous CEO of Azamara. @babykayis absolutely correct it’s very hard to imagine the current situation re communications happening under his watch. He managed to maintain that open channel sometimes in pretty challenging situations despite the big parental handcuffs. Some of the entertainment changes were started when he was in charge but the speed of change as is happening everywhere has hastened. Some of the changes have led to good new hires, some of the legacy staff are out of their depth and I think Larry would have addressed that (or not made the deployment decisions in the first place). I have seen all the onboard behaviours @babykaymentions including being directed to the clipboard but never all on the same ship. - the imperfect storm We do have to recognise English is not the first language of all the entertainers and even when it is, some have accents and use dialects others not unreasonably cannot follow. However I do think in the case of trivia new materials are needed, staff should prepare better for the quiz (eg make sure they can read the questions in advance!!) and stop playing the dummy clown when acting as question master. Some staff get that, others lack or have forgotten the professionalism of old. The foot soldiers do try hard, many are very tired they are being asked to do more and more but keep trying to respond because they want to keep their jobs. The quality of supervision and support they receive from middle management in particular is not up to scratch - it lets the hard working front line serving staff down from what we observed. It’s only going to take one or two of the long serving junior staff to jump ship to another line and many will follow - they are a big family many came en bloc to Azamara and could equally leave that way. So far inertia has saved this from happening. I hope someone wakes up and smells the coffee at Azamara very soon!!

In Scotland, langoustines are often marketed as Scottish lobsters Looks like langoustines -were they? Makes me hungry what ever they we're!

In 2017 they had to suspend the operations again just as everyone was trying to get back. It was an absolute nightmare not Azamaras fault standing forever ashore and then such a dreadful ride back - and it took six crew including the staff captain and captain taking turns on the tender dock to physically lift everyone off the tender. Never been so glad to be back onboard even though I’d some interesting thumb print bruises the next few days. Honestly @babykay be thankful about the change

There were also issues on both practice day and race day in 2017 and the swell from all the fast boats going in and out made it bumpy also for those staying onboard. Nice is a far better option

So sad - my university town - so much to see and do there but you need the right research pre cruise and tour etc. Give me the history and buildings of Old Aberdeen any day 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿. Sounds like the cruise line and port tourism folks need to do a bit more work on this one

Likewise our experience onboard there - didn't want to hear any feedback - not looking for a refund just wanted future experiences to be better than ours but all we had was the defensive stonewall

That’s so wrong- which ship?

I hope the “new scheme” replaces the “free nights mystique” - its a mystique not a scam though I can see how some might interpret the marketing that way - with something more genuine and meaningful, note I’m not saying generous. For example an extra x% off the advertised price of a future cruise. Transparent understandable and might encourage even more bookings

Hmm is this a subtle attempt to reduce demand for room service breakfast? Hope new cruisers are fully aware they can enjoy this every day apart from disembarkation day if they wish

November Onward they got it wrong order wrong time every time so gave up. They’ve got systemic issues on that ship (or they had). Shouldn’t have to request cards steward is supposed to set one on the bed every night during turn down

Whilst I accept outsourcing, previously guests especially more regular cruisers had access to staff dedicated to handling queries promptly. During this IT debacle such a route would have been even more useful to have helped smooth guests through the problems. The value of the tangible benefits were debatable depending on what type of room you had, whether you wanted to drink alcohol beyond the included drink etc. The one benefit that was of huge value was that “intangible” the named contact in a department sufficiently resourced to respond to issues. That one is what’s needed most. OK the good old days - Bill Leiber here in CC - a role way beyond what Bonnie did - and the unbelievably efficient and well connected Nicole shoreside. I miss them. We became even more loyal to Azamara in 2014 when our cruise was cancelled 72 hours before we got on the plane to fly to Shanghai due to a mechanical failure. The service recovery was minimal financially other than the refund but the personal engagement by Bill, communicating updates every few hours on cruise critic, the CEO Larry writing personal emails to everyone tailored to our situation and Nicole working through her contacts to get us an alternative holiday last minute is where Azamara really scored. That’s what we truly miss today

Isn’t this the sort of information that the travel agent should have already eg we’ve changed the process here’s how we do things now. No wonder some agents are beyond frustrated

I’m not voting because my answer very much depends on what I think my friends tolerance is for being able to ride out precruise IT and website issues. I’d also be influenced by their past precruise experience with other lines. Previously I would have answered yes to a poll like this now it certainly wouldn’t be an automatic yes and could even be a no on balance

As I understand they did. Their call they say was not returned

Our circular nightmare continues regarding changing a booking due for payment agent calls in my presence call handler advises I not TA should email in Email 1 sent - no reply Email 2 sent 14 days later - auto reply saying if it’s urgent to call Call made advised it’s a TA booking the agent has to call Agent calls - I was not present this time but I believe the outcome was I have to email in I will be shortly and rather than reworking the booking this will be to cancel 25 days onboard. I will lose the deposits, it leaves a bad taste as this is not how Azamara used to be but we move on. In the meantime the TA is confirming a new booking around the rework we needed with an alternative cruise line. We could not wait. After this weekend my cancellation penalty would have been far higher.

No, it’s called supply and demand in old school language a basic economic principle that’s been around since the Stone Age

It’s called dynamic pricing. Stop stressing move on

I agree with looking forward there should certainly be new threads covering onboard experiences. However let’s not be only allowing the positive experiences of all sorts have to be covered and the experience of those subjected to the late cancellation is not entirely positive. Perhaps when I get my money back I will feel differently