kevinrobedm

The chocolate ship comes in  clear plastic box that is just bigger than the ship itself.

I would just confirm with them onboard that with a registered credit card that the OBC will be refunded as it seems MSC is not always the best at consistency of answers. 

If you check when your get on board then at least you will know what they told you and you can plan accordingly or at least deal with it early in the cruise instead of trying to figure it out close to the end.

Have a GREAT time.

Your on board credit is just like a bank account with money in it.  For everything you do on board it is charged to the same on board account.  When you purchase something on board (or use a specialty restaurant or shop) they add 15% gratuity to it and charge it to this acccount. The balance is then decreased by the amount of the purchase until there is no credit left.  At the end of the cruise if you have a negative balance (used all your credit and still have charges in your account), you have to pay if you have a positive balance (you still have some of your on board credit left ) we had it go back to the credit card we registered with MSC when on board.  If you don’t have a credit card registered I am not sure what the policy is. I am also not sure if this is the policy all the time as we were also told we would loose any onboard credit if we did not use it. Perhaps it matters the type of onboard credit you have (you put money on the account, or got an onboard credit from MSC, etc.).

I got the Generic Error too and I was told it means that the cruise does not apply for the 10% off even though  it says all ships and all cruises.  I talked with MSC and they did apply it for me but it had to be done manually.

The standard internet is up to 2 devices sharing a total of 3GB.  The premium internet is up to 4 devices sharing 6GB.  These are the US plans so it may be different if you are in a different country.  All 2 or 4 devices can be connected at the same time but they all share the data allotment.  We did use FaceTime and. Fongo (a voice over ip) application with these packages and it worked without issue.  We were on board the Seaview.

We were on the Seaview in November and quite honestly I have never seen such fast internet speeds on a cruise ship before.  We we able to facetime and use Fongo (a voip app) and did not have any issues at all.  It really was quite incredible.

We had the dining experience on the Seaview in November.  It was well worth the money for Butcher's Cut and the Pan Asian but for the Ocean Cay it was a waste of money.  Ocean Cay was the most expensive restaurant to eat at and the food was the worst visually and quality wise.  With the package we had to eat at the three restaurants, you couldn't go to one restaurant 3 times so if we take that into account, it wasn't worth the money.

Yes we can do that in Canada to.  I do download a number of shows from Netflix to my IPAD so I can watch them offline (without being connected to the internet).

They must pick and choose which cruises actually get the unlimited.  They probably make more on the shorter cruises so they don't offer it.

This is what I found for UK citizens going to China:

Since 2016, certain nationalities can apply for a Chinese visa directly online. iVisa is one of the few authorized companies that can handle this new China Group eVisa, which is different from the traditional 10-year Chinese visa. The Group eVisa is only issued to tourist groups with 2 or more members who must travel together in China. It is issued for single entry only and it is valid for 15 days after arrival. The China Group eVisa is issued on a separate sheet instead of visa sticker on the individual passport.

You only need to fill out our online form and we will do the rest. You don't need to send off your passport to any embassy as we only require a digital copy. Once your visa is issued by the Government of China, we will FedEx the actual visa to your home 15 days before your departure. This is because it must be used within 15 days of it being issued. Travelers must bring the document we FedEx along with their passports to enter China. This visa is authorized by the Ministry of Public Safety of the People’s Republic of China.

We are on a 29 day cruise leaving in 4 weeks and we got the unlimited for $260US.  It says you will not be able to stream though, I guess I will find out.

From our booking:

Unlimited Internet Cruise Package

Book now and save 20% vs. onboard price!

Duration: entire cruise

Data limit: unlimited

One device at a time

Benefits: 
This cruise package gives you access to unlimited web surfing, email access, social media access, Youtube and all apps. It can be used only on one device at a time. This package does not allow video streaming (e.g. access to websites such as Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Audible, Hulu etc.).

On board you will also pay the 15% service charge.  They charge that for anything you buy on board.

It is very true, for Shore excursions we met in the Yacht Club lounge at the designated time we got on a sheet in our room the night before.  The butlers then take the tickets and get your excursion number stickers.  They then take you down the priority elevators and right off the ship.  We pretty much went in front of everyone being in the YC.  The butlers just make room for the YC patrons and get you where you need to go.

When coming back you just meet a butler at the base of the ship, they take you through the line priority and up the priority lifts and back to the Yacht Club.

It worked very very very well on the Seaview and made for a nice perk of being in the Yacht Club.

Other patrons do you look at you (sometimes with disgust) but we have learned that we paid for this service, just like anyone could, and we should not feel bad for taking advantage of what we paid for.

Netflix did not work for me when we were on the Seaview in November of last year.  It did say in the packages that video streaming was supported.  Maybe this has changed since November but it did not work for me.

We tried to do what Ryan is doing and flying in the day of for a cruise last November. We were supposed to arrive into Barcelona at 8am and the cruise was not leaving until 8pm.  We thought we had lots of time. I mean it was 12 hours and even if we had a short delay it was 12 hours ......

One thing dominoed into a lot of things.  A slight delay leaving Canada,with our flight to Paris, was the first delay of just a few minutes.  We then got to Paris and found out there was an issue with the computer systems in Customs/Border Patrol so we could not enter Paris and had to stand in line for an hour and half with the other, what seemed like, 10000 people.  That caused us to miss our flight from Paris to Barcelona and had to sit in the airport in Paris for what seemed like hours. There was only one other flight left that we could take from Paris to Barcelona that day.  We then got on the last flight from Paris to Barcelona and had baggage on the plane without a passenger so we were delayed while they took the baggage off the plane.

We got into Barcelona just after 5:30pm and had the best and fastest taxi guy get us to the ship just after 6pm.

It just goes to show that best laid plans can go sideways in a minute.  One small things leads to another and another and none of them were anything we could control.

Was the most stressful day of our lives, thinking you were going on vacation and finding out you may miss the ship and have to try to catch up with it.  NOT a great feeling or way to start a vacation.

We learned our lesson and for our upcoming cruise from Dubai in March we are flying in the day before just to be on the safe side.

Nothing worse that worrying about missing your ship and trying to figure out how you will catch it if you miss it.

One close call for us was enough and will NEVER EVER fly in the day of the ship leaving again.

The vacation ended up being great but we learned our lesson.

There is onboard WIFI that the app connects to.  For basic things like looking at the schedule and booking restaurants it is free.  If you want to surf the internet and/or send email, you need to have some kind of internet package.

Depending on the promotion that was in place when you booked, some reservations included some kind of internet package.  If not you need to buy an internet package.  If you are going to buy, look at buying it BEFORE you get on the ship as it will be less expensive and you will not get charged the 15% service charge on top of the plan cost.

From the Voyager’s Club guide it doesn’t say anything about the length.

Complimentary Specialty restaurant "Tasting Menu" dinner (no beverages) [Black], per stateroom. Members are entitled to enjoy a tasting menu dinner for 2 at a specialty restaurant once during the cruise (beverages excluded). Members may extend their invitation to one occupant of the same stateroom only once andonly if the stateroom occupant is not a Black member. Privilege and speciality restaurants may not be available on all ship classes. Privilege is not available if the members decide to eat dinner at self-service buffet. Members under 18 must be accompanied in order to enjoy the privilege.Members are not allowed to bring any outside beverages into the restaurant.

The promotion does not state if it is per stateroom or per guest.

I would check with MSC to see if the package is per guest or stateroom.  If it is per stateroom then it would be (from your example above) 2 devices sharing the 3GB for the stateroom.  Only 2 devices could be connected and using the internet at once. You could have more than 2 devices on the account but only 2 of them can access the internet at one time.  This is how it worked for us on the MSC Seaview in November.

Hopefully it is per guest but from the wording on the website it really doesn’t make it clear.

When you purchase the intern package (not talking about the included WIFI) it is per guest.

I would 100% agree. 

When we bought in advance it was $50 U.S. dollars per person (which would be roughly 43 euros) for the trio.  We though that was incredible value for 3 different meals and included the 15% service charge.

We felt the price on board was not worth the value as Beamafar  has suggested.

Bucher's cut was by far the BEST meal hands down we had.  We ate there 3 times and each and ever time it was incredible.

Any time.  We are long time NCL cruisers but got tired of the increase and price and decrease in service.

We status matched to MSC (if you have any kind of longer term loyalty with another cruise line you can do this too ) and decided to give MSC a try.

For the dolllars we spent with MSC (which was much less than NCL) we feel it is great value for the money.

Yes they have some shortfalls but they are trying.

We are not demanding cruises and realize every company has its bumps in the road.

We have 2 more cruises booked with MSC and are looking forward to them.

It remembers the MAC address of the devices you connect and if you are allowed only 2 (on your plan) then it wil only allow those  2 to connect at one time.  Each time you go to use it you use they "website" to start and stop the internet.  You can have more devices registered but only 2 of them (based on your plan) can be active at once.

If you don't have an internet plan, nothing works (we tried).

It is amazing how fast the internet is though.  I was able to face time with my mom with no issues at all.

Hi Pineapple, we were on the Seaview in November/December and had the trio package.

We too were not big fans of Seafood but we could not swap out Ocean Cay.  

With the Trio you get a fixed set of choices in each restaurant and in Ocean Cay (during our sailing) there was only seafood on the menu for the Trio choices.

You try to talk nicely to them and see, we did but obviously not nice enough as the answer was still  NO.

Hope that helps.

We pre-bought the Trio on the Seaview in November and it included the service charge.

We enjoyed it so much we wanted to book the trio again while on the ship(as we were on an 18 day cruise) but it was 20 euros more person and they also charge the 15% on top of it so we didn't do it.

I will say that Butcher's Cut and the Pan Asian were great, Ocean Cay (Seafood) was a disappointment.  Ocean Cay was the most expensive of three (even in the package) and was the least value.

When you book the trio you get a fixed set of options for appetizer, dinner and dessert.  

Below is a link that compares the experiences on MSC, hopefully this helps.

https://www.msccruisesusa.com/en-us/Discover-MSC/Our-Fares.aspx

We were on the Seaview in November/December 2018. 

It is a beautiful ship.

The YC is large an quite impressive.

They were still working out some the kinks in the YC Restaurant but we would go back on her in an instant.