UKstages

i've never sailed the haven on the prima. i know the sun decks typically have hot tubs, but so do the pool areas in the havens i've been in. i was responding to the poster who said the kids were running amok and the "the rule" no longer existed. he in turn was responding to the poster who asked if sun deck access was restricted to those 16 and above. so i assumed he was talking about the sun deck. as access to the pool area in the haven is not restricted to adults only. for what it's worth, the prima's web pages on NCL.com still say the sun deck is restricted to 16+.

wow. that would be a major departure for the haven... to allow kids on the sun deck. i'm sure that's exactly what they told you, but it sounds to me more like staff on the prima going rouge than an official policy. (there's a lot of that going around on the prima.) i just can't imagine NCL making this an official change to haven sun deck rules.

my understanding is that the syd's show can only appear in the venue built for it. contractually, they can't elevate t to a theatre setting. if memory serves, the syd norman concept was created by the people who brought you "rock of ages," which had an almost decade long run on NCL. same creative team and producers. syd's was an attempt to try to capture some of that same energy. in any case, it is licensed to be performed in the specific venue which bears its name..

the most popular sodas (coke, diet coke) are on tap. cans exist for some flavors, including those, depending on the venue. whether or not they pour it out in a glass or give you a can is largely at the bartender's discretion. they're not supposed to give you a can, but they often will if you ask. having a regular go-to bartender, having the premium plus package and tipping are all factors that can influence getting a can. in most cases, if you ask for the can, you can get it... but it's not part of any package and it's not guaranteed.

you're welcome to bring along whatever you like, including noise canceling headphones, and i wish you the best of luck. but if you have one of these rooms, they will not do any good. this noise is LOUD, disruptive and pervasive. if a white noise machine masks the noise in your room, you likely do not have one of these rooms.

"splash academy" is a name and a concept. it's not really about swimming or getting wet. it's NCL's youth activities program for those 3 - 12 years old. they do have a "guppies" program for infants, but it's not a drop off program... it's supervised activities for parents to play with their babies and toddlers, as well as others.

yes, it's in that thread. i used noise canceling headphones and could still hear the noise. this was not the ordinary creaking of a normal cabin. i know what that sounds like. i had that in my next cabin. this was like nothing i've heard before. i posted a post-cruise audio clip of the sound in that thread. you can listen and decide for yourself. the thing is that there are a number of cabins on the prima that have this problem, including haven cabins. they are noted in the internal database. you book the prima, run into high seas, and it's a crap shoot as to whether you will have a problem or not. i am a gambling man, but not to that extent. there is no way of knowing how many cabins... could be 7 or 70. could be 125 or 250. NCL knows which cabins they are and they continue to sell them.

cover charge is for "fixed price" venues like teppanyaki or moderno. use a dining credit at those and your meal is covered. at "al a carte" restaurants, you generally get one from each category of items, although this could vary depending on a server's whim or how generous or attentive to policy the staff is.

not enough information to know for sure, but sixty minutes is technically a "legal" connection at CDG for connecting within the same terminal. ninety minutes is a "legal" connection if changing terminals. both of those times assume you are traveling on one ticket on one airline. i personally would recommend ninety minutes within the same terminal and two hours if changing terminals. and even that would be kind of rushed and does not account for the possibility that your first flight is delayed.

we used the floating walkway. (the gangway extends out from the ship and connects to the port's floating, foldable walkway.) i assume that another ship in port on the same day would tender, as they only seem to have one of those floating walkway thingies. so, there's no guarantee... i'm just here to report that gerainger has a relatively new floating walkway that can be floated out to make access much easier... no tendering required. nailed it! the bit about passing it off as a surprise... they did that week after week, cruise after cruise. they may still be doing it; we'll have to wait for more CC reports of what's going on. at least in my reports and posts, when i say that there were several different versions of what actually happened and why the port was canceled, those statements came from crew members, not passengers. official NCL reps who communicate with guests shouldn't deal in rumor or conjecture. i will say this about the port cancellations... despite some reports to the contrary, NCL did schedule additional activities for the extra sea days. you know how the daily is often double spaced and quite thin on port days? the extra sea days were chock-a-block full of added activities. very few were of interest to me, but an attempt was made! two of the three comedians onboard actually did extra shows (all highly improvisational new material), apparently at the request of the captain. (this was on the 5/14 sailing. on the 5/25 sailing, there were no comedians, as NCL doesn't believe comedy "translates" on international itineraries that don't begin in the USA.) agreed. i will add this. i didn't embark in reykjavik, but i went out to explore. and i saw 2,000 or 3,000 people standing in line, outside in the cold, waiting to board. it seems like a most inhospitable port for those embarking. i would advise arriving much later in the day, if you don't want to stand around. there doesn't appear to be many services in the terminal, either. this is absolutely true. i am proud to say that i am equally as passionate about the good things on the prima as the bad. and my written pieces on the indulge food hall and the comedy concerts are proof of that: they are two of the longest passages in the review. this is where i'll have to disagree. cabin noise - so disruptive that three nights of sleep were lost (in my case) - is very hard to recover from, both physically and psychologically. tru 'dat. i was walking around like a zombie for days. and yet, if you read that thread, you'll see that i returned to say that the rest of the cruise, particularly the second leg of the B2B, was - more or less - lovely. so, i agree with you on cabin noise, especially when you are informed that NCL continues to sell these cabins, even though they are marked in their database as being "problematic." with regard to casino losses, i completely disagree. i play exactly the same way when i win as when when i lose. and my demeanor does not change. oh, sure, it's more fun when you win! but i don't mope or sulk or become angry or despondent because i lost. i lose most of the time when playing in cruise ship casinos! (but if i walk around the indulge food hall for thirty minutes without being able to get a seat... that is frustrating and mood altering. having shorex reps lie to you, that's frustrating and mood altering. having your order at the local not print out in the kitchen so that your food never gets delivered, that is frustrating and mood altering. not being able to get into syd's... that's frustrating and mood altering. when an officer on the ship misrepresents their position, that is frustrating and mood altering.) anybody whose personality alters negatively when they lose in a casino - whether it's $500 or $5000 or $15,000 - likely has a gambling problem and should not be playing.

respectfully, i’d ask you to reread your post. there are lots of numbers in it. and you speak of sample size… that’s math! you also now refer to good and bad “reviews” outside of the sample that won’t affect the overall rating of 2.8. just for the record, i have two threads out there… they are the ONLY two discussions I have ever initiated on cruise critic. one recounts a specific incident involving horrific cabin noise. the other is a review that encompasses many aspects of the ship, from food to entertainment to public spaces and signage. you will find that many things on the ship receive high praise from me. i look forward to sailing on the viva myself. apart from fundamental design flaws, a large reason the prima doesn’t work is because of the apathy of many of the senior officers. that’s kind of the point. many have preceded you and they’ve come back saying something hella bad went down. and they feel so passionately about it that they go online to warn others. believe them. many are NCL fans who are providing honest feedback. i myself felt just like you before i sailed the prima. i thought all the naysaying was BS. turns out, it didn’t even begin to describe the depth or complexity of the problems on the prima. i’ve said many times that it is possible to go on the prima and have a lovely time. you may not encounter the worst of the ship’s problems. but if you do, your vacation, or a significant portion of it, has a high probability of being ruined. many of the prima’s physical problems can only be fixed in dry dock.

it certainly is. all the rest of your post, honestly, is fuzzy math. what your post doesn't take into account is "reviews" like mine, that aren't posted in the review section of cruise critic because their review format does not accommodate long form content. ditto this thread which is, in essence, a negative review of the prima... not counted in the score! also, 189 reviews for the length of time the prima has been sailing is a very good and accurate barometer. the epic has been sailing for 13 years or more. and many of those recent reviews, i'm willing to bet, reflect the age of the ship and people's disappointment at sailing a refurbished ship that doesn't meet their current expectations of what a modern cruise ship should be. go back in time to the first ten months of the epic's life and i would be willing to bet that the reviews were better than the prima's current 2.8. as for those 50K people who may have loved the prima... where are they? they are awfully silent. surely, some of those who adore the ship would write passionate love letters online to the prima... they are scarce. no, what we have is people saying they enjoyed this and that, cagney's was good, onda was great, we loved the food at indulge... and then they go on to say all the same things the negative reviews say. the prima is a brand new ship... it's not going to get any better than this... and it has only a 2.8 rating? that's remarkable.

believe the reviews, particularly if they offer a mix of praise and harsh criticism. i always find those more believable.

thanks... trip definitely got better even if the weather didn't cooperate until the final three days. and i had a great london theatre holiday, as well. i agree with you that reviewing an NCL invoice it does make you feel cheated and, perhaps, disillusioned. the problem with reconciling the bill is that charges and credits often appear on different days from when the charge was made or the credit awarded.

true, gerainger is listed as a tender. however... good news! the port has invested in one of those folding floating gangway dock thingies... so it is no longer a true tender port. they will float the walkway out to the ship and you just get off as if it were a regular port, with, albeit, a very long walkway. now, they only have one of these as far as i know, so if there is more than one ship in port, only one can use this floating walkway and the others will have to tender.

thanks for the support. yes, a letter to VP of guest services in miami was written while onboard. i first mention this in post #11 on page one of this thread. i sent the email on a friday, if memory serves and received a response on monday. it resulted in a $500 credit (sort of), as you can see from the most recent posts above. but it also became clear that what the ship's team told corporate was very different than what they were telling me. and it pointed out that the folks in corporate don't really understand how to compensate casino customers. $500 is a lot for a free cruise that only cost me about 1K in out of pocket pre-cruise fees and taxes. but it is very small compensation when you look at my overall spend on this B2B.

these would normally be easy things to fix… but nobody at NCL is focused on such things. they are all running around trying to fix problems as they occur, whether they be a noisy cabin, a steep gangway, or a closure of a public space for a private event. but they never stop to regroup and rethink and figure out how to fix the underlying problem so that it never happens again and doesn’t inconvenience future guests and waste more senior officers’ time. that’s the biggest problem with NCL… very little forward thinking.

so, the $500 corporate offered me as a “make good” for service recovery and which was described as a “credit to my bill” was really only worth $300 or so in real value. that’s one thing. the other, perhaps more important thing is this: NCL’s invoice system sucks… my bill was four pages long and you need an advanced degree in mathematics and psychology to figure it out. who divides a credit into refundable and nonrefundable OBC without telling the customer? who enters a $500 credit in two separate transactions on two different days? NCL, that’s who. it’s easy to see why the average bear couldn’t find that $500 credit on the invoice, especially since that bear had a large number of other OBC deposits to his account. this bear was not looking for a $300 or $200 credit! that’s not all… the DSC or OSC as it is now known was applied correctly, in the sense that the correct number of charges were made… but some days there were no charges at all. on other days there were two or three “service charges.” who bills like that? NCL does. again, if you count them all up… the charges are correct. but can you imagine the dozens or hundreds of inquiries guest services has to handle from people asking why they were charged two or three times on one day for what is supposed to be a daily service charge? if they would make that one change to their invoice system they could eliminate thousands of visits to guest services over the course of a year, tens of thousands, fleet-wide. they also use questionable designations and euphemisms on the bill. the fee for charging money to your account in the casino is not listed as a “casino convenience fee” but as an “entertainment convenience fee.” the deposit to your account is an “entertainment charge.” they’re charging for entertainment now on NCL ships? do tell. a liquor purchase is listed as “gift shop.” and so are jewelry purchases and cosmetic purchases and purchases from the actual gift shop. i suspect that’s because all those shops may be run by the same concessionaire, so it makes sense from an accounting perspective, but it’s confusing when you try to reconcile your bill if you know you haven’t purchased anything in a “gift shop.” most confusingly, the $50 FAS excursion benefit is listed as a “reversal of free at sea credit.” say what? they’re reversing a credit? no they are not… they are applying a credit. the “reversal” of a credit is a charge! it makes no sense. and it makes it very difficult to reconcile the bill, particularly since the charge for the excursion is posted on a different day than the $50 "credit." the problem may be that these charges were coded and labeled by engineers or programmers who set up the system years ago. the designations and descriptions make sense from a programmer’s or accountant’s perspective. everybody at NCL understands what these words mean… but they are not customer friendly and cause confusion and invariably drive traffic to the guest services desk. who would ever think that a “reversal of a credit” was in fact a credit?

as for that $500 credit that they promised me… interesting story there. i was told i would have a $500 credit. i asked whether it would be FCC or OBC. and i was told, “no, it’s a direct credit toward your bill.” that suggested to me that i would get a $500 cash credit to pay down my bill. not so fast. i didn’t get any such $500 credit. they said it was coming from corporate so it would take at least 24 hours. after three days, i went to guest services and they confirmed there was no $500 credit. they basically said, “this is a corporate thing, we can’t help you.” it wasn’t until a day or so before the cruise ended that i figured out what had happened. it is customary at the end of a comped casino cruise to “settle up” your account. you see a host, who credits the convenience charges you may have incurred for transferring money to your account (that’s an elite status player perk). he or she will also look at your play and give you some sort of comp in the form of nonrefundable OBC… it’s like a small percentage loss rebate and it’s meant for you to go shopping in the onboard retail outlets and get something indulgent. you’ll often see casino players running around in the late hours of the last day at sea buying liquor and jewelry and making other indiscriminate purchases. if you have charges like shore excursions or specialty dining or whatnot, they can zero those out and consume your OBC against that balance. it’s all based on your play or actual loss and it could be anywhere from a hundred bucks to a couple of thousand dollars (or more) for serious players. my problem, if you can call it that, is that i already had a considerable amount of OBC on my account… $800 from casino status perks (two cruises X $400 each cruise), plus some bank of america credit card OBC which i had ordered. (prior to the cruise, i had figured out how much my excursions would cost and i made sure i would have enough to cover it. NCL excursions are expensive, but with the latitudes 15% discount, plus the $50 off, plus the fact that i’d be using “monopoly money” to pay for them, they become viable.) after i shopped… i bought some tee shirts and hoodies as gifts, a bottle of liquor, a camera and some accessories from the photo gallery, a few more tchotchkes… i checked my bill and the host had not credited out all my purchases. i went back and told her she had made a mistake. and she explained, no, that was all she could take off because i had so much nonrefundable OBC. say what? earlier in the cruise, because of port cancellations, i had about $300 in nonrefundable OBC returned to me because those excursions never took place. i knew that and went and purchased a $321 bottle of mccallan enigma whiskey to make up the difference. what was this about additional nonrefundable credit? when i looked closely, i did see a line item on my bill for nonrefundable OBC of $300. and an additional line item on the next day for refundable OBC of $200. i guess that was supposed to be the $500 “cash” credit. there was no description of what these OBC deposits to my account were for… none. it just said “refundable OBC” and “nonrefundable OBC.” now in the general scheme of things, you might be thinking… what’s the difference? you got your damn $500 credit. well, the difference is that OBC is not “cash” and nonrefundable OBC is one step removed from that. so, i had to scramble on the last night to get three hundred bucks worth of overpriced doodads and trinkets and tchotchkes, most of which held little actual value, few of which i actually wanted or needed.

for what it’s worth, i never heard from the assistant GM again and i never heard from the GM at all. so much for the suggestion of getting together for a cup of coffee or a drink or a meal to learn my perspective on all that is right and wrong with the prima. i was told that it wouldn’t be possible on the first cruise, as they were busy preparing for visiting ports the ship had never been to before, but, for sure, on the second cruise when all the excitement had died down and they both had time, the assistant GM said they would be very interested in doing that. well, it never happened, for whatever reason. i don’t think it’s because of any malicious intent… that she consciously avoided me. i just think it’s because nobody pays any attention to details or follow-up on the prima and they only handle problems in the here and now… at this very moment… they are never interested in examining underlying causes or fixing things for the long term. they’re always moving on to the next disaster and never doing a post mortem on how to make things better on an ongoing basis. it’s crisis management all day long on the prima, with no long term planning.

i’m sure there will be some who will say “that’s nothing! that’s just normal cabin noise. you’re just a cantankerous curmudgeon who likes to complain.” and there will be others who will finally see how disruptive and sleep depriving this was… to have to listen to this for hours and days on end. bear in mind, that the actual noise is much louder than the recording, but the recording gives you a good idea of how annoying it is. the recording is just under two minutes; please listen to the whole thing so you get an idea for how persistent, yet random, the noise is. and imagine that there are a number of cabins on the prima inflicted with this problem… so many that they are documented in their database… and yet these cabins continue to be sold. and NCL has no executable plan for what to do when somebody reports this noise, even on a ship that’s not sold out and that has vacant cabins. that ain’t no way to run a railroad, er, i mean cruise ship line.

first off, i can now reveal, as i promised i would upthread, that the room with the horrible disruptive noise at high seas is cabin 11344. avoid this room at all costs! here is a recording of the noise, made on the second night this problem presented itself... 11344_prima.m4a

hey, hi there… it’s me again… the OP. i’m back with a few more posts and an update in which i tie up loose ends and tell you how the rest of the trip went. it was lovely… certainly, there were no sleep disruptions. and while the weather did not cooperate till the very end of the cruise (amsterdam, zeebrugge and southampton), a good time was had by most. and the scenery (mountains, fjords, waterfalls) was truly spectacular in several ports. i had a five-night land-based holiday in london following the end of this cruise, so i’m only just now getting around to checking in with cruise critic and tending to more mundane tasks. i can tell you one thing, for sure. after 21 days at sea, i was in for a rude awakening. if you learn anything from me, it should be this… don’t try to use your cruise card for payment at any of the restaurants or bars in london. turns out, they won’t accept it… it’s no good off the ship. who knew? they expected me to pay for everything i ordered… both food and beverage. what is wrong with these people? (i asked to speak with a manager.) i’ve published a rather comprehensive review of my B2B on the prima and that can be found here… https://boards.cruisecritic.com/topic/2944111-i-spent-21-days-onboard-ncl-prima-here-is-my-prima-facie-case-for-the-good-the-bad-and-the-fugly/

you know, it's funny... i just remembered... when i boarded the prima in NYC on 5/14, the people in the elevator with me at the manhattan cruise terminal had just disembarked from their bermuda cruise. and they were saying to the driver who picked them up and was assisting them with their luggage that "it was the worst cruise we've ever been on. long lines for everything. and then when you go to complain you gotta wait in other long lines. never again. horrible ship." and i heard a lot of this type of thing from those on excursion busses and from nearby tables at the food hall and the MDRs and the local. the point is that there is a lot of criticism out there about the prima, if you're open to hearing it and don't dismiss it as coming from curmudgeonly malcontents. people are passionate about their dislike for the prima. but i honestly haven't seen the same passion from those who like the ship.

not a one-off. so far, it's a three-off. at least three successive cruises have skipped the port. i was on the 5/14 and 5/25 sailings... port skipped. several different reasons given. not on the prima. the odds are stacked against that. probability is high that you will encounter several challenging situations. i've detailed in my own review and in many posts some of those challenges. but briefly: in addition to apathetic senior officers, there are fundamental design flaws that may disrupt your sleep, prevent you from making full use of available space and getting a seat at the MDRs and the food hall. in addition, the entertainment schedule is decidedly lacking. the OP didn't have a good time because there are chronic and persistent problems on the prima that NCL has failed to address. i'm a fan of NCL, have two cruises currently booked and will continue to cruise with them. but never on the prima. the prima is not ready for prime time. the problems on the prima are systemic and persistent. start, middle and end of the trip... a large number of people will face one or more serious challenges, especially if they book one of the rooms known to NCL to have a problem with excessive noise that will keep guests awake all night. week after week, people come to cruise critic to voice their concerns about the prima. their stories are incredibly similar. they should be believed. i will say that it's entirely possible to sail the prima, have a great time, and never encounter any service problems or disruptions. but for those, including me, who do encounter problems, the problems are complex, debilitating and time consuming and do indeed threaten to ruin our vacations. what NCL needs to do is issue a press release saying "we could have done better and we will do better. here's what we are doing to make the viva and other prima class ships more compatible with guest expectations. and here are the changes we will now implement on the prima to make it the best in class ship our customers deserve." again, the prima is not ready for prime time!