My Time Dining or 6PM dining?? SO Confused!!

[ksg]

We too booked with an agent offering prepaid gratuities, and they insisted we choose traditional dining time for Oasis in February, which is counter to what they did for Allure last February, when we signed up for MTD.

 

I don't really mind traditional dining, except that I know it will conflict with one of the shows one night. Has anyone ever been seated for MTD when designated for traditional? We're late seating. I was wondering if we could just show up that one night and be seated.

 

TA says we can switch when we board, but I don't want to take the chance.

 

Thanks.

[katiel53]

We too booked with an agent offering prepaid gratuities, and they insisted we choose traditional dining time for Oasis in February, which is counter to what they did for Allure last February, when we signed up for MTD.

 

I don't really mind traditional dining, except that I know it will conflict with one of the shows one night. Has anyone ever been seated for MTD when designated for traditional? We're late seating. I was wondering if we could just show up that one night and be seated.

 

TA says we can switch when we board, but I don't want to take the chance.

 

Thanks.

 

 

I haven't ever heard of anyone with traditional dining being able to just go to MTD one night in that there are a certain number of reservations available for MTD, just as first or second seating and those seats are full. I think that if you are at all thinking of going to a specialty restaurant, that might be the night to do it. Enjoy!

[labeachcomber]

I haven't ever heard of anyone with traditional dining being able to just go to MTD one night in that there are a certain number of reservations available for MTD, just as first or second seating and those seats are full. I think that if you are at all thinking of going to a specialty restaurant, that might be the night to do it. Enjoy!

 

I haven't heard of it either. Specialty restaurant or even Windjammer for the night you anticipate missing dinner would be the easiest choice.

[helen haywood]

Be aware that if you have OBC from a travel agent....whether it shows up on your account is NOT the cruise line's worry. Your documentation of any OBC will help only if the OBC is from Royal or what ever cruise line you are on. They aren't going to get involved if their records do not show the OBC from your travel agent.

 

That being said, I have three times had mix ups between the cruise lines Headquarters and my TA over OBC from my TA that never showed up. I notified my TA and was always mailed a check for the OBC that did not make it to the ship for whatever reason.

 

I know Celebrity now allows TAs to let you have the option of having your OBC from your agent taken off the price of your final payment. I'm going to be doing this with my TA's OBC so I don't have to worry about where it is. Then the OBC I have from Celebrity will show up on board as usual.

[labeachcomber]

Be aware that if you have OBC from a travel agent....whether it shows up on your account is NOT the cruise line's worry. Your documentation of any OBC will help only if the OBC is from Royal or what ever cruise line you are on. They aren't going to get involved if their records do not show the OBC from your travel agent.

 

In my experience this is not true. I had an issue on a past cruise with OBC not showing up by the second day and the front desk emailed the travel agent to confirm the amount and then it was immediately posted.

[cleopetra]

I presume I could have switched to MTD once on board, but I really didn't want to mess with lines and such.

 

Since this is our first time doing MTD, I do want to confirm with those of you who seemd to have experience with it... If I don't want to go online and pre-book a nightly reservation now, can we just come to the dining room when we are ready for dinner each night? We're certainly okay with waiting a little while to be seated. It just seems to defeat the purpose of dining when you want, if you have to pre-book it months in advance!

 

We have done MTD since it started and love it. We always have had to pay gratuities ahead of time. We don't mind paying it up front and reward good service with an additional amount at the end of the cruise.

 

We generally try to make reservations on line but have changed them aboard ship on occasion. If you let them know the night before when you want dinner the next day it is usually no problem. This works especially well with a larger group. You can let them know if you want to stay in a particular waiter's station (or not) or want to eat with others (or not). We have let them know ahead of time so we don't have to wait on any line for more than 5 min. I think it is when you do not have a prior reservation, you have the higher risk of waiting in a long line.

 

The shows are geared to the main seatings. If there are just two of you at a table, service will be faster. But if you let your waiter know you are trying to make a show, they will try their best to accommodate you.

 

Hope this helps and enjoy!

[jimp1266]

We always go with the open seating option on any cruise line that offers it. We love the flexibility that it allows. The only real con that we have found is that you tend to lose the personal service that you receive with traditional dining. The quality of service is variable as well from so-so to as good as traditional. The staff changes each time you are seated in a new area of the MTD dining room. As others have said, you can mitigate this by requesting the same service area. We tend to just show up when we want to eat and sit at the first available table of our size request (which is often a 2 top).

[Cruisekin2]

Are there windows in the MDR on the oasis? Would we be able to request a window seat or is that a lot to ask?

[cleopetra]

Are there windows in the MDR on the oasis? Would we be able to request a window seat or is that a lot to ask?

 

The MTD is usually on Deck 5 of the Dining Room so yes, the Oasis MTD area has windows. You can always request it and if they can accommodate you, they generally will (especially if you ask nicely :)).

[DaNana]

My DH likes the late seating for dinner. He also likes being sure we get the same wait staff each evening. We had a table for 2 the last cruise, which he requested by email early. Boarded and confirmed we had a table for 2. We were cared for like we were the only ones on board the ship. I am sure he will be doing the same again! We were not disappointed. I would have like to try MTD but this is one thing he likes so it will be! I must admit that I really did like having a table for just us for dinner! We can mingle for breakfast, lunch and all other times, but this is our time!;)

[sherilyn70]

Are there windows in the MDR on the oasis? Would we be able to request a window seat or is that a lot to ask?

Yes, but you'll be looking at nothing if it's after sunset as you plan to do. :)

[cruiselife4me]

I've done both and truthfully, I 'd rather just have the set dinner times. Maybe because MTD was relatively new when we cruised with it, but I like the assigned seats and knowing when I have to be there. Darn, I sound stuffy and I'm not! :)

[cruiselife4me]

Are there window seats for a table for 2? We're going on Liberty.

[lovn2liv]

The MTD is usually on Deck 5 of the Dining Room so yes, the Oasis MTD area has windows. You can always request it and if they can accommodate you, they generally will (especially if you ask nicely :)).

 

Unless I was seeing things...we were MTD on Deck 5 of the Oasis and we saw NO OCEAN views. The lifeboats were in front of the windows.

 

My suggestion would be find out which table you can be seated at and determine if it works. We had MTD all week. We sat at the same table with the same wait staff all week. It was great...

 

We are booked for the Oasis again in November and we are going to opt out of the MTD because we want to sit by the ocean windows this time.

 

If anyone else has sailed the Oasis and sat at Deck 5 and had an ocean view, please let me know which table you sat at. I would gladly book that one.

 

Thanks.

[tneah]

We too booked with an agent offering prepaid gratuities, and they insisted we choose traditional dining time for Oasis in February, which is counter to what they did for Allure last February, when we signed up for MTD.

 

I don't really mind traditional dining, except that I know it will conflict with one of the shows one night. Has anyone ever been seated for MTD when designated for traditional? We're late seating. I was wondering if we could just show up that one night and be seated.

 

TA says we can switch when we board, but I don't want to take the chance.

 

Thanks.

 

That is what our TA said about changing over to MTD. Oasis was booked for MTD. We were on the ship by 11:30am and changing our dining was the first thing I tried to do. No go!

 

We had conflict with one night. We basically could not make any main dinner venues since we were trying to get in 3 shows starting early evening that continued to the last main show. We basically had quick gab and go meal from the promenade while getting to our next stop.

 

You can not show up or MTD if you are traditional.

[tneah]

I don't know about Oasis's set up of two top tables for MTD, but on Liberty and Freedom a few years ago. If I wanted to I could literally eat off the plate of the couple next to us. We all joked around how close we were to each other. It was like dining with a group.

 

Those two top tables are close.

[cariad1000]

We've just come back off Adventure and had MTD. I initially reserved specific times online in advance, but realized that this would be too restrictive so cancelled all the reservations on the first night and asked the maitre D if we could just turn up when we wanted to if we wouldn't mind a short wait. I had also emailed ahead requesting a table for two by the window. We had no problem with this whatsoever and never had to wait for our usual table for more than a couple of minutes. Our table and usual waiters seemed to appear by magic, it was brilliant. Enjoy:)