CEOofVacation

We have experience with both ends of the spectrum.  First butler we had on Reflection was worse than useless.  I called him about ordering room service and if we could order from MDR menu and he asked me to dial room service line and room service line said just whatever was on TV.  Food was brought to us by whoever handled room service - kitchen staff presumably.  Our friend who had the same butler did not get his daily coffee which was repeated to the butler several times.  We had an great stateroom attendant who got both his and the butler's share of extra tips from us.  

Fast forward we had the best butler this past Dec on Millennium.  We were in S1 next to the penthouse and he also took care of the penthouse suites.  I asked how many suites he took care of and he said 10.  We had a shower issue which we reported to the stateroom attendant who promptly informed the butler who then also got the butler manager involved.  They were all over it.  He then asked if he could book us a complimentary dinner at a specialty restaurant.  We accepted the offer and the reservation was made.  We had 2 bags of laundry, all tops and pants came back ironed and hung - no extra charge!   He received a large extra tip from us.  Oh, we also picked up a bag of his favorite cashew nuts at Halong Bay.  We love this guy.  On disembarkation, he helped us with our luggages off the ship as we always take ours with us instead of leaving them out the night before.

In Luminae, we have not observed differential treatment of the guests due to the type of suites that they are in.  Service is always fabulous.

We had a wonderful butler on our last cruise.  Lots of clothes stuffed into the cloth bag.  Socks and loose items came back in a nice basket.  All shirts, blouses, shorts and pants came back ironed and on hangers!  Did it twice. No extra charges.  He got a tidy sum in additional tips.

First of all, tipping is personal but removing auto gratuities is taking away from all the staff who would have been paid the tips.  

Instead of removing auto grats, leave those alone and if you want to, tip more for those whom you feel have provided excellent service.  We always leave auto gratuities in place and then plan on tipping more.  We used to budget another 5% of our cruise cost but on our last cruise, we ended up giving another 10% or so in tips because we received incredible service by various staff.   We did not need to but we wanted to.  

On our last cruise, we paid $6400 including taxes, we got back $525 from our TA.  We booked 2 more upcoming cruises, one at $6600 and the other $6800, both including port fees and taxes, we are getting back $550 each from our TA.

We have done both and like both.  We first book Aqua, and then if the price is right for a sky suite after final payment, we pay to upgrade.  We find Blu and Luminae to be comparable, and the focus is on service.  To us food is good whether you are in MDR, Blu or Luminae.  Service is the differentiator between MDR and Blu/Luminae.  Our first cruise on Celebrity was in a balcony.  After that first cruise we only book Aqua or a (sky) suite.  

6 hours ago, NemoCrownie said:

An FYI about the $100 MLK OBC; I have a B2B cruise booked for 2021 and repriced it a couple weeks ago as the fare had gone down a little and the 2nd perk is being offered for refundable deposits.  I called today for a status update on errors to one of the bookings and asked about the $100 MLK OBC offer and it was added to both bookings without having to cancel and rebook.  Note: the price has not changed for either of my cruises but I was told that to receive the additional OBC the cruise would be repriced at current fare so this may only be beneficial to those that have recently booked and bookings for late 2020 and 2021 bookings.

Do you know if the $100 OBC is stackable with FCC OBC?  

We decided that maybe the puzzle of all this has to do with when we were actually leaving the country.  Day 1 check in was a procedure that treated like we were going to stay on the ship as our hotel.  On Day 1, the person at the counter collected our pre-printed seapass and credit card paper info.  We asked this person whether they were going to collect our immigration departure card and she said "Celebrity does not collect it." Day 2 was when we were treated as leaving Singapore where our immigration departure card was collected and we were finger printed.  It was a very cumbersome process and I believe both Celebrity and Singapore immigration were responsible for it.  We understand the rationale behind it and we are not sure how it could be streamlined.

I had a different situation but similar goofed by Celebrity.  We had $700 non-refundable OBC which we used ~$200 to book a shore excursion during a sale which was something like 20% off their regular price.  2 days before sailing I received an email indicating the shore excursion was cancelled due to non-payment and that $50 OBC was being refunded to the account.  When I logged into the account, it showed $50 OBC and no shore excursion booked.

I called Captains Club whose first response from a very inexperienced staff was that I did not pay for the shore excursion even though I had explained the situation to her.  I repeated the problem and she put me on hold.  She came back and said "The system automatically cancelled $650 of the OBC and no employee ID was associated with the cancellation".  She said she could not put back the OBC since it was during the 3-day freeze period and that she had sent a note to the ship to re-add the $700 OBC and also requested to rebook our shore excursion at the old rate.  She said it was up to the ship whether to price protect the rebooking.  It was not a good answer, talk about poor customer service.

I escalated to my travel agent who got hold of a supervisor.  The $700 was re-added plus a $25 goodwill for the hassle.  He also assured my TA that the shore excursion would be rebooked by the ship personnel at the old rate.  We got on the ship and sure enough, the shore excursion was rebooked and tickets were left in the cabin, and the acccount showed the correct amount of OBC.

The real kicker is that there were several pieces of letters left in our cabin, 2 of the correspondence had names of 2 sets of people who were also supposed to be in our cabin!  When we spoke with Michael's Club concierge, his system was showing one of the 2 couples.  He corrected it while we were there.   My guess is that their IT system retained names of everyone who had booked a cabin for that cruise and instead of making the cancelled names inactive, they were still showing as occupants.   

17 minutes ago, GarlicBread said:

 

Every ship, on the majority of cruises. 

 

Just rarely becomes an outbreak like this one. 

On a side note, I started feeling nauseated towards the end of dinner one evening on our Apr/May 2018 Greek isles cruise on Celebrity Reflection. That day, we ate lunch at a nice Greek restaurant in Athens, followed by a slice of watery gluten-free cake from Cafe Al Bacio and a scoop of gelato on our return to the ship.  That was my one indulgence on that cruise.  I threw up twice within an hour after dinner.  I called guest services and no one answered.  I called the emergency line and was scolded.  We headed down to medical center and they were closed and many of the crew members on that deck had no idea on how to get hold of them.  Someone finally got hold of a nurse and we saw her, followed by the doctor.  The doctor said I had food poisoning and they had ZERO reported case of norovirus onboard.  We were relieved to hear it.  He gave me a shot and said I should be able to sleep.  If I vomited again, to come back at 8am.  I slept well and was fine thereafter.

3 hours ago, hummy0605 said:

We were on rhapsody on 17th nov and over a third of our ship had it. People were quarantined and staff used to ring their cabins to check they were in there. If they weren't an announcement was put on asking them to return. If they 'escaped' again they were escorted back and their door was guarded. We didnt have it but kind of quarantined ourselves as our balcony on the back was a sun trap. When we did venture round the pool a poor lady vomited right by tge side of us so back to our cabin we went. Even with letters in cabins and announcements there were still people coming out of bathrooms without washing their hands. The whole ship was deep cleaned and sanitised when we arrived back

Are you sure that a third had it?  Anything more than 2% has to be reported to CDC.  There is nothing regarding the Rhapsody sailing on the CDC site.  Also, how did you know that people were coming out of bathrooms without washing their hands?  Norovirus is highly contagious and someone with good hygiene practice can still contract it.

We booked 2 new cruises onboard and both are eligible for the non-refundable 3rd perk.  We thought through on one which has a 50-50 chance of moving it a year out from 2020, and decided to stay put as moving it to non-refundable would end up with our losing $200 in booking/cancellation fees, $200 FCC OBC and $200 OBC compensation from a chartered cruise.

47 minutes ago, RDC1 said:

Yes, and turn your data off when on ship. Put it in airplane mode with wifi enabled

Thanks.  This is what we have been doing on our other cruises, so we will need to do the same for the Canada cruise.

Thanks for all replies.  In other words, I should get an internet package even on a Canada cruise. I was thinking about access to internet rather than making a call.

We are booked on a 12-night Celebrity Summit cruise to Canada, roundtrip from Boston in 2020 and we are wondering if we need to buy an internet package.  Verizon's service is free in Canada and Mexico but we are wondering if there is any cell reception when not in port.  It has 4 sea days.  Thank you!

2 hours ago, Italy52 said:

 

Does this also include the buffet?

Yes. Why?

On the first day of our most recent cruise in December, we were asked by our Luminae server, Luminae Maitre d' and Michael's bartender as to whether we would like to consider dining in a specialty restaurant.  We said no and we were not asked again.  We had a problem with our bathroom and reported on the 2nd day of the cruise to the stateroom attendant.  Our butler and butler manager were all over it.  Subsequently we were surprised by our butler as to whether we would like to have complimentary dining in Tuscan Grill or Qsine.  I think it was offered because of the bathroom issue.  We accepted to dine at Qsine.  Qsine was less than 10% full when we were there, which explained why the "push" for selling specialty dining.  

50 minutes ago, cruisestitch said:

Just to show the variability currently experienced, here’s what’s happening today on Reflection.  Note the unlimited drinks in Sky Lounge and the three drinks per SeaPass card.

Interesting that the verbiage left out dining, which makes it uncertain for both the sommeliers and guests.

2 hours ago, wrk2cruise said:

 

Sounds like jelayne was given the same runaround I was.  I added the B2B to another pair of cruises in Oct a couple of days ago.  They said it would take a couple of weeks to post the discount.  I have subsequently transferred those reservations to my TA.  I will have to keep a close eye to make sure to get the discount although it will only be on 1 leg as the other leg is 6 days.

 

 

 

You should still get a B2B discount on the 6 days, just a smaller amount.

8 hours ago, wrk2cruise said:

So are you saying that you have experience with getting the b2b discount with Goxxx and another promo?  I have a good agent who gives me great perks but I usually get the Celebrity stuff all lined up before I transfer to him.

Yes.  I booked a B2B, a transatlantic followed by another 10-night cruise, at Future Cruises.  Celebrity travel agent gave a $100 discount for each of the leg, in addition to the extra OBC for booking onboard.  I then transferred to my travel agent.

Wrong answer.  You need to call again or transfer your booking to a knowledgeable travel agent who will get the B2B discounts added plus their agency's perks.

I would bet that if you explain that it is a health requirement, they will change it for you.  I also have a medical requirement to eat early and we always have dinner at 5:30pm on Celebrity.

17 minutes ago, NukeIT said:

 

Interesting quandary, since Hawaii is neither part of North America, nor is it part of Oceania (Australia/New Zealand)

It is about US and state laws with regards to Hawaii, which are both 21.

We use Crystal Light to make flavored water at home.  I don't find good low carb drink alternatives on the ship so I generally stick to water or diet colas even though I have an alcoholic drinks perk with my bookings.

We just got off the Millennium and the crew said the entire ship will be rebuilt from "ground up" on the inside.  Every inch of space will be redone.

26 minutes ago, parrotfeathers said:

 

I, too, investigated the much sought after 6145/6146.  It also had negative views, mainly noise from the penthouse suite and no sliding doors to the balcony.  I decided to go to 8117 (8th deck).  Very centrally located, near the elevators, apple store, library, pool deck, etc.  I went down to 6th deck hoping to get a view but didn't see anyone I felt like imposing on (the might think it was a little forward of me).  I had also read some negative things about the lifeboats.  Very happy with my cabin so if there's nothing on the 6th deck try 8117.

Also meant to add the bathrooms on the Infinity and Summit are nowhere near as nice as the GS on RCL.  One sink.

We had zero noise from next door.  There are also no lifeboats in the back and hence no obstructions.  I think the "look down" lifeboats affect the S2 cabins on deck 6. You really cannot beat 6145/6146 when booking a sky suite on M class.  2 sinks, large separate walk in shower and bathtub. Oh, the storage below the sinks was amazing. Full shelves and very deep.  There are even medicine cabinets behind the bathroom mirrors.  There is so much room and the garbage can sits on the floor. LOL

One more thing, our butler was amazing.  He took care of all the large suites around us and had been a butler with Celebrity for many years.  He was very helpful, welcoming and cheerful.