allennn

19 minutes ago, Jkaczanowski said:

We’ve sailed star class twice and had 2 extremely different experiences. First was at height of Covid.  I think our genie ended up having to cover addl rooms while we were onboard because pre-cruise communication was great but on ship was lacking (which we’ve heard is out of character for him). 2nd genie we didn’t communicate much with before the cruise so I was concerned, but she was phenomenal.
 

My advice - post here or on the star class cruisers board of the big social media site if you have generic questions.  Emails to the genie should be: room (beverages in frig and bed config if applicable), tours scheduled and times you will be off boat, shows you would like to see (we skip all adult comedy), restaurant requests and eating time, and special events or requests (anniversaries, birthdays, flowrider rentals).  This is enough to put together your schedule for the week. Anything else can be addressed on boat.

This is extremely helpful, I wasn't even sure what we should send her as the communication has been not great to start with.

34 minutes ago, topnole said:

What ship?  

Harmony

20 minutes ago, mkmaj said:

Someone can correct me if I'm wrong... but I think that a sky loft is sky class, not star class and would have a concierge rather than a genie. Did this change?

Its star class, thus the genie reaching out to us to begin with.  🙂

Our skyloft suite cruise is coming up in a couple weeks and our genie just reached out with a form email.  We replied with questions and days later got a couple vague answers but mostly just 'go read the website'.  We do a fair amount of lux travel and its rare to get someone in this realm responding like that.  Am I expecting too much?  Does it get better as you get closer?

On 3/23/2022 at 9:24 AM, graphicguy said:

I've seen Harr's YouTube videos.  Interfaced with him once last year.  Seemed nice enough.  Also seemed too busy to answer many questions outside of date of booking and cabin type you wanted to book.  Same goes for most of those YouTube TAs.

 

yea we reached out with some questions and basically got a 'tell us what you want to book and we will do it for you'.  Pretty sure they didn't read any of the email we sent.  My guess is that you are right about him being to busy doing the videos and such but doesn't have much time for booking travel for others these days.

22 hours ago, graphicguy said:

The "so called" Vacation Planners are there to sell new bookings.  Follow up and post planning aren't things they make commissions on.  TAs can correct me if I misunderstand their commission structure.

 

As such, they don't make any money by making changes, other than to upgrade you to a more expensive fare.

 

Just guessing, but I'll bet that's the reason they aren't returning your calls.  They don't make any money by spending any time helping with your planning.  Have you been calling him/her a lot?  Do they spend a lot of time on the phone with you AFTER you've already booked?

 

One of the reasons I like my TA (who I've used for over a decade) she's been with me through numerous COVID cancellations and rebooks.  She knows if I'm cruising, I'm calling/emailing her.  And, I'm not just kicking tires on a cruise.  I'm close to booking if I contact her.  Plus, she always throws in some of her commission back to me either in the form of a rebate check, or OBC.  If there's a price drop, she lets me know, and does all the paperwork for me.

 

Before COVID, we were in Miami the night before an NCL sailing.  They were predicting a CAT 5 Hurricane, but NCL had not cancelled the cruise.  We were going to lose our cruise fare if we cancelled the day before sailing.  So, NCL finally cancelled at 3:00 a.m. the day of the cruise.  Woke up to a phone call from our TA who already had made reservations on a flight home for us.  That's a good TA.

 

I can't imagine Royal Caribbean's "vacation planners" doing that.

 

Long and short, find a good TA.

That totally makes sense on the commission structure.  Sucks for this guy though as he would make a lot of commissions from us if I thought we could trust him.

I've seriously considered using Harr Travel as we see their videos on youtube all the time when looking at premium bookings.  The thing that has kept me from doing that is that I've travelled a lot in my life and it just seems there are always less problems when I go direct with whatever company it is.  Maybe this is not the case with cruises.

23 hours ago, Jimbo said:

Call the crown and anchor number and ask for a supervisor and tell them your concerns.

 

800-526-9723

do the royal vacation planners work for the crown & anchor desk?  Just curious what the connection there is?

we've done many cruises on RCCL and previously had an agent we worked with at royal who was really amazing.  She left the company and now we have an agent assigned who never returns calls or emails, is somewhat rude when we do get them on the phone etc.  I don't see any way though to get someone else assigned as there doesn't appear to be any links for that.  We are booking all star class rooms so its frustrating we can't get simple callbacks.  Any suggestions?

Does anyone know if the ocean view panoramic suite is considered a standard suite and thus gets access to the suite lounge?  I'm unfamiliar with if any suite perks there are on this ship or if this is really a suite as the name suggests.  We are booked in this suite for a july sailing.

I'm so glad you told me that, we assumed that it was the same as the others and would have potentially booked based on that.  thanks!

On 11/25/2020 at 6:36 PM, Ourusualbeach said:

Make sure that you are looking at the price after the discounts.

 

July 17, 24 and 31 are all around the $8000 mark.

This was the answer.  I didn't realize I was looking at the rack rate and not the other 'total price' rate.  thank you so much!

we are looking at the 4 day cruises in june for navigator / bahamas and there are some full suites that are around $4k for 3 people, but the royal suite is just $6.4k.  How much are the star class perks from the royal suite really worth and how much of the difference does that make up?  Like star class has included specialty dining, unlimited drink package, etc.  On a 4 day bahama cruise I would think the drink package is like $400 / person.  The included specialty dining package appears to be worth about $150 / person.  Are these calculations right?  Are there other considerations and perks for star class that would make the delta more worth it?

we are looking at some crown loft suites for mid july on symphony and the prices on cruiseplum are 8k where as the prices on royal website are 14k.  Any idea why I'm seeing such a differential in pricing?

I'm struggling with the rccl web page in finding exactly what we want.  We are looking at crown loft suites (we always do those) and prices and availability across all the ships that have them over certain dates.  This appears completely impossible on rccl's site but I was wondering if there were any other cruise search engines that could do it?

Only 3 ships have the Crown Loft's and go to St. Maarten.........

 

I did some searching, can't tell you where and think you will find in hard to come up with one with a lower price then:

 

Category L2 Total for 2 $4809.07 Non - Refundable Deposit Rate

2 passengers

 

$ 250 OBC

 

Free Pre Paid Gratunties

 

Free Travel Insurance

 

 

ALLURE of the Seas

 

December 2, 2018

 

Leaves from Miami

 

Ports are St. Maarten, San Juan, and Labadee

 

Enjoy these complimentary amenities when you book a Sky Class Suite:

 

• Concierge services

• Dining in Coastal Kitchen

• Unlimited VOOM High Speed Internet

• Suite Lounge

• Exclusive Signature Activities

• Exclusive Beach Access for suite guests only

• 1-day pass to Spa Thermal Room

• L'Occitane Bath Amenities

• Luxury Pillow Top Mattress

• Bottled Water

 

It’s spectacular accommodations, attentive service and exclusive experiences – with the Royal Concierge as your guide to it all. From priority reservations at the suites-only Coastal Kitchen to a private kayaking trip to catching the first wave of the day on the FlowRider®. Enjoy exclusive access to signature activities, venues and more. While thoughtful inclusions, like luxury in-suite amenities, special spa access, and free VOOM high-speed Internet touch every other aspect of your vacation.

 

 

Jimbo:)

sold! you rock, thanks for helping! As a tangent to that, should i talk to a cruise travel agent to help me or just go find it on the rccl site and book it?

One of Cruise Critics rules is we are not allowed to name travel sites.

ah shoot, didn't realize that. I'll keep looking. Maybe there is an API I can attach to with RCCL that I can search by hand. heh.

thanks for the info everyone.

its been a bit frustrating trying to find a cruise on royal's website. We are trying to find a combination of ship, destination, and room category and just don't see a way to do it on their site. I keep having to go to individual sailings to see pricing on crown loft suites available within our cruise range of may 2018 through dec 2018 that also visits st maarten. If not on the rccl site then are there third party sites that might have this search ability? Also, should we use a third party cruise agent to get us a better deal or are the best deals on the rccl website?

thanks!

we are looking to book harmony for some time in may or june. Looking back over previous years, are there usually sales that consistently happen for these periods or am I better to just book now with the %30 for second guest?

Today at Labadee, I purchased my first alcohol drink while at the beach. I received a 6" plastic cup of Labadoozie in it . Total cost was $14.25. This was not with the souvenir cup. I asked the bartender if the amount was correct as I was dumbfounded. He replied; yes it's the same as on the ship. I nicely informed him I had not purchased any alcohol onboard. My hubby and I plan to buy no more this week. We will only be drinking the wine we brought onboard. I am completely flabbergasted. We spoke to some other cruisers that just did an NCL and they said they were blown away by drink prices. They said they paid half to sail on the Getaway as they did the Allure. I have heard many complaints from other passengers about the alcohol prices.

thats why we got the unlimited drink package. We drink 4 drinks in a day and it more than pays for itself.

The new DL will not have exactly the same perks as the old CL did. The new DL will have the cocktail hour and snacks in the evening, and the 24 hour complimentary specialty coffee. However, it will not have the made to order breakfast and lunch that the old Allure CL had.

 

Suites Lounge will also have the cocktail hour, snacks, and specialty coffee. However, it has some food items during the day that are not offered in the DL. Not exactly sure, because the Suites Lounge is right next to Coastal Kitchen and I'm unclear exactly what is provided by each venue.

I"m on the oasis right now (in the solarium) and I LOVE the new suites lounge where the viking crown lounge used to be. It seems like Royal is doing more for suite guests now that pay up (I am in the crown loft suite).

the required gratuities are a joke to begin with. Ever since they came out service has gone down considerably. It used to be that I would overtip for great service and hold back for bad. Now its just all built in and I let it all slide.

last year we cruised rccl from ft lauderdale in the royal suite. At the check in I asked 3 different rccl folks where the suites check in was and they said there wasn't one so I ended up having to go through a very long line. I have since heard that there is in fact a suites check in area. We are cruising on the oasis tomorrow again in a suite (crown loft) and I'm wondering where the suite check in is (if it exists) and when should we show up?

any help greatly appreciated

I haven't been impressed with the new site at all. Half the time I can't even use the filter criteria and have it effectively change my search results. Not that the previous website was great, but this was a step back in my opinion.

I've found the new site almost impossible to use.

so the cruise is upon us soon and I had a couple questions if anyone is still reading. :) does the RS get any special consideration in dining placement? (we were hoping for a window seat). And how does the luggage concierge thing work?

I will post pictures from it when we get on board.

I had a lot of these same questions for the vision of the seas. Hoping to hear some good information.