SusieQft

I have no definitive info but i thought someone posted on CC that Starlink was supposed to be active on all the ships by the end of 2024.  Is that not true?  Also, that the hardware is already in place, and they are waiting for the current provider contracts to run out before switching.

58 minutes ago, rallydave said:

Believe you are incorrect. Ticket contract clearly states regent is not responsible for third party bookings which include flights. It is true at times regent has been proactive with flight issues and provides a phone number for travel issues but cannot be aware of all flight changes and delays.

True enough, for airline initiated changes, but doesn't Regent step in an get you a new air itinerary if the ship is delayed or changes it's disembarcation port?  Of course, at that point it will not be your carefully chosen deviation, just whatever they can find.

I agree with the above advice about last minute availability.  But I would not just wait until you are onboard.  Availability might open up before then, especially around the time of final payment or before that.

A few months ago we were aboard Splendor when our excursions opened for booking the following year.  Due in large part to the lousy onboard wifi, which exacerbated the lousy Regent online excursion booking process, we were unable even to waitlist 2 of the excursions we most wanted, within an hour or two of the start of booking.  I mentioned this in passing to the GM, who made a note of it.  Later I was contacted by the excursion manager, who told me he would relay the issue to decision makers above him.  I told both of them I was only asking to be on a waiting list.  I never heard anything back from Regent after that. 

However, a couple of months later (still well before final payment), I happened to take another look at "My Account" online, and one of the excursions was then available and the other was available to waitlist.  I had to call to do both because mentioned above, you can't change your booking online.  And you can't get on the waitlist online if you already have something else booked.  But the phone rep easily did both.  I also later noticed in My Account that I had cleared the waitlist (for an extra cost excursion), although Regent never notified me of that.

There is a lot of room for improvement in this process. 

We received a notice from Regent that our scheduled 6/6/24 stop at Bar Harbor is moved to 6/5/24.  The scheduled 6/5/24 stop at at Portland is moved to 6/6/24.  This is "due to port traffic."

If you are looking to Regent for a kids-free experience, you are mistaken.  However, on our multiple Regent and old Crystal cruises, kids have been rare and well behaved, about the same on both.  We are excitedly looking forward to adding new Crystal to our experience in 2025, but can't report on them yet.

Regent also markets to families with children, with frequent "kids sail free" promotions.   It seems like these always pop up after final payment, including all 4 segments on our extended b2b with them this summer. Hopefully the onboard experience will not change because of this.  But it does illustrate that you cannot control what marketing effort will be made by either line, even after you are already into heavy cancellation penalties.

Perhaps the electric kettles that Regent will provide on request have an automatic shutoff so they know those are safe.  If you bring your own, they would not be sure, so it is easier for them to provide on request rather than allow yours.  But as jeb_bud pointed out, your Penthouse Suite should have a coffee maker that will dispense hot water.

3 hours ago, NCCruzQueen said:

Hi Crisy,

 

We took so many photos on safari, I haven’t taken the chance to go through them all and edit them. At the moment, the best thing about our four animal drives was observing animal behaviors.  
 

On our first drive, watching a pride of 13 lions follow their female pack leader to a water whole. Then seeing each separately move up towards the water, with the pack leader behind. There were three elephants on the other side of the water, spied the lions.  A male elephant walking through the area observed the female elephants and wanted to cross over to meet them but then saw the lions and stood his ground.  Slowly the female pack leader started to walk away from the large male elephant and the younger lions followed her.  Seeing those lions getting into attack mode was so interesting to see.  After their plan went bust, we could see a look of defeat in them.  The lions were thin and hadn’t eaten in awhile.  
 

On the other side, on our last morning ride, we saw large groups of herbivores all living peacefully together in a huge field.  Warthogs, wildebeest, giraffes, elephants and impalas all together enjoying their morning meal and playtime/exercise time before they take to the shade until the late afternoon’s meal.

 

We have so many stories to tell.  
 

PS.  We had DEET in different forms so we didn’t see any mosquitoes.  I took the offered gin and tonic to keep the malaria away.  😝llll]

I had this app loaded on my phone for my recent Dec/Jan Splendor cruise, and it did facilitate logging back on when the wifi periodically kicked me off.  But it did NOT work for Passages,  menus, or "more" as advertised on its home page.  I probably should have inquired about this at the IT desk, so I don't know if he could have helped.

Sounds great.  I sure would like to figure out how to make this happen for us.  We have 130 nights with Regent and it is still a major struggle to get our beverages of choice.

2 hours ago, DaveFr said:

We just got on the Grandeur today. There was diet caffeine free Coke in our suite. We did not order it pre-cruise but have ordered it in the past. 
 

Dave

We're the previous and current cruises in a butler level suite?

The shareholder OBC does not conflict with Amex.  Some of Regent's special offers do, though.  I think I lost an Amex credit with the Black Friday special.  Often my TA's consortium offers an OBC in the same amount as the Amex, and I can have one or the other, but not both.

17 minutes ago, rcandkc said:

I’m confused.  It says it cannot be combined with any other offer.  So, if you already have some obc, is it worthless?

I suggest that you go ahead and request it anyway, as soon as you have made the initial deposit.  I have never had it turned down.  I have "other offers" on most of my bookings, and also the shareholder benefit.  For some I have added the recent Black Friday offer after the shareholder benefit was in place, and the shareholder OBC did not go away.  I'm not sure if I could have added the shareholder benefit afterwards, because I have not tried that.

Where I have had difficulty is with the Amex OBC offer, which seems to be incompatible with other things more often than not:  consortium OBC offers (generally for the same amount), Regent offers, etc.  The Amex OBC will go away if you add an incompatible offer after the initial booking.

I agree that the laundry service is a major plus for sailing on Regent.  I just did not want people to expect it to always be back in less than 24 hours.  Realistic expectations will avoid disappointment.

32 minutes ago, GOARMY said:

Or, on ALL Regent ships we have been on:  In when leaving for Breakfast; back either before leaving for a pre-dinner cocktail, or upon return from dinner as part of the turn-down service. 

 

There have been a few exceptions, but never a time gap exceeding 24 hours.  

 

GOARMY!

This was not our experience recently on Splendor.  Laundry out before 6:30 pm was back sometime after 6:30 pm the next day.  Always more than 24 hours, usually by just a bit.  But laundry out ~9 pm was back sometime after 6:30 pm two days later, about 46 hours.  Maybe if we were not going to dinner at 6:30 it might have been back before dinner, but I doubt it.  It came back with our evening turndown service while we were at dinner.  I'm pretty sure we never put it out in the morning, but I don't think that would have gotten back any faster than the night before.

Good luck.  You can probably get some sort of sugar free Coke.  Diet Coke is very iffy, if that distinction matters,  depending on where in the world you are.  In my experience, getting it caffeine free is extremely difficult, even when requested in advance.

5 hours ago, GeorgiaPeach51 said:

Sorry to be confusing.  There are 4 elevators in the forward section on every deck.  There are two elevators aft on every deck except 5.  One bank of forward elevators only on deck 5, which leads to the logjam.  As you say, the theater is in the forward section, and this leads to the long waits.  Thanks for responding so I could hopefully clarify.

I presume you are talking about Vista.  Splendor (and I presume also Explorer and Grandeur) have the same issue.  The aft elevators do not go to Deck 4, so unless you sit in the balcony on Deck 5, you have to go up one flight of steps to avoid the congested forward elevators after any event in the Constellation Theater.

The weather in Alaska can be very unpredictable.  On our first Alaska cruise (late June and early July), it was very cold (with some rain but not constantly) and out of necessity we bought some fleece jackets at the first opportunity.  The next time (late May and early June) was sunny and much warmer, and Seabourn's jacket was really overkill and unneeded.  Our last Alaska cruise was in late September, and it was raining and foggy nearly every day, but not as cold as our first time in July. I would be prepared for rain and cold, but hope for better, regardless of when in the season you go.

What about on Regent's Grand Arctic Voyage?  I'm sure some of those ports will need a warm jacket!  I am tempted to bring the one Seabourn gave me on an Alaska cruise.

10 hours ago, mrlevin said:

Carol, thanks.  When I learned of the fine print that said applicable to cruises of less than 60 nights I knew this wouldn't help me as I have three GV booked.  There is also something in terms and conditions that says this doesn't apply with reduced deposits which I would think refers to the onboard booking reduced deposits.

That is pretty sneaky, IMO, since they promote the onboard bookings to have a lowest price guarantee.

On Splendor Buenos Aires to Rio this January, there were a number of truly awful excursions.  For example, starting an hour late, then a 2 hour bus ride, 20 minutes at a different less interesting museum than the one in the tour description, skip the cathedral because we were behind schedule, then 2 hours back to the ship.  We did a couple of other tours almost that bad in that segment as well.  Most of the tour guides were totally obsessed with getting us back to the ship at the scheduled time, even if it was long before all aboard.  That seemed to be far more important to them than the quality of the tour, and that emphasis came from Regent.  Several of the guides mentioned that they would be significantly penalized if they did not get us back on schedule.  Starting on time was not a high priority, though, resulting in some abbreviated tours.

For the first several ports of the next segment, Regent provided each tour guide with 2 evaluation forms to give to random guests, asking that we return them to destination services on the ship.  More forms were available on board if anyone else wanted to opine.  The tours we took that used these evaluation forms were all pretty good, so I am sure they got a lot of positive feedback.  My impression was that they got a lot of complaints during the previous segment, so they decided to actually ask for some feedback.  

I don't know how often destination services does this, but it is something that they have done on at least one segment.

3 hours ago, papaflamingo said:

Hmm.... what's happening in Nov.? 🤣

Cancellation penalties!  Final payment for the Voyager "Grand Spice Route Quest" is due on Oct. 26, 2024.  We were booked on it but recently decided to move our deposit to something else instead.  It looks like a great itinerary, but we did not like the uncertainties involved.

Lucky me, most of my losses were repaid by American Express.  The remaining $2,000 of very old admin penalties-->FCDs was paid by my travel insurance.  Of course then I was unable to carry that insurance policy forward to another trip, but we'll ignore that loss.

My travel insurance company insisted that I file a claim for the $2,000.  Their thinking at the time was that then Moecker would pay them back what they paid me.  I could not see that happening, but I did comply with their instructions because I wanted my $2,000.  The form included a spot for the name of my insurance company, and in due course my claim was appropriately rejected.  So in the end all this accomplished was some extra work for Moecker, me, and the insurance company.

It is good that Moecker is doing their due diligence, although unfortunately that can be very challenging in cases with multiple losses, and some partial reimbursements from credit cards and insurance.

The mid-cruise hand written surveys are easy to fill out and just drop in the box at reception.  I use those to mention names I want to recognize, and also for any specific issues that I know they can address quickly on the ship.  I know that the individual crew members hear about any positive or negative feedback. Complaints result in a large furor of apologies, meetings with managers, and occasionally an actual remedy of the situation.  (Sometimes the remedy is not possible when supplies are not on the ship.)

DH is more diligent than I in jumping through the hoops to complete the digital survey.  We collaborate to make sure we give recognition to all the crew members who have done a great job for us in some way, and it is always a long list.

I got disgusted with it after spending a lot of time on it, saving it to complete later, and then trying to finalize and submit it early in the morning before disembarkation.  That was too late, and all my work was wasted.  You have to submit it the day before disembarkation, not that morning even though you are still on the ship.

On Splendor this past Dec/Jan in F1 (no butler), if we got our laundry out before the evening turndown, it was always back the next evening with the turndown service.  If we got it out just after dinner (we usually ate at 6:30) or the next morning, it came back 2 nights later with evening turndown.  The only time it came back just under 24 hours was when DH had his sport coat dry cleaned.  Our room steward came rushing to our room with it at almost exactly 6:30, because he knew (without being told) that DH would want to wear it to dinner.  THAT is Regent service!!

I would like to know why they don't publish any information about the Crystal Society on their website.  That sounds to me like they have not decided on the milestone rewards, and they might not be the same as before???