Allure of the Seas, July 3-10, Decent but some issues

[dt126]

Allure of the Seas – Eastern Caribbean (7/3/2016 Departure), Deluxe Family Oceanview Balcony Room

 

This is not a formal review, I just wanted to get the opinions from some of you here who’ve traveled a lot more on RCL ships than I have to help my understanding before I do a formal review and/or contact RCL with some of my concerns. Overall I liked the cruise and I’d probably rate it a 3.75/5 or so, but I’m not inclined to sail on RCL again at this time based on some of the issues I had. Before I start these comments, I wanted to mention that our only other cruises were on Disney (so keep that in mind while reading).

 

POSITIVES (there were a lot more than this, I just wanted to list a few that stood out)

 

1) Rooms – Decent size and layout. They do seem a bit worn in some areas but overall not bad at all. We do prefer Disney’s bathroom layout with a separate toilet/sink in one room and shower/sink in the other, but I knew about this before booking with RCL, so this is not a complaint.

 

2) Dining Room Staff – I realize that there is going to be a lot of difference based on which personnel you get, but overall we were extremely pleased with the dining room staff in all of the places we dined. This included the smaller cafes as well.

 

3) MDR Food Quality – This was actually considerably better than I expected based on other reviews I read, although we were disappointed in a few of the dishes and the last day’s meal was really poor (all dishes) so I’m just going to assume something happened that day.

 

4) Chef’s Table – I was very pleased with the food and wine pairing as well as the service and chef. Pricing is very fair as well.

 

5) Voom – Speeds were decent for a ship (~5Mbps range) and reliability was pretty good as well. I would have preferred speeds to be higher, but given the number of people on the system and location (at sea), I’d give this a high rating.

 

NEGATIVES

 

1) Website – The site is fine for planning cruises but poor for booking excursions, dining reservations, etc. We did book through a travel agent. Despite this, before the cruise we were able to pull up the reservation. Actually it was two reservations since for some reason 5 people staying in a room designed for up to 6 people is separated into two reservations with 4 people max, so every time we wanted to make a dinner reservation, we had to type in the second reservation information. RCL’s website makes it difficult to even get into the screens where you can make and confirm reservations and check what you’ve already booked. About a week before our cruise, we were no longer able to access our reservation at all on the RCL website. It had been saved on our account and we used it several times, but it was now gone. Every time we tried to add it back in, the website said to try again later. For two weeks before and all the time on the cruise we kept getting the “try again later” message and we were unable to access anything related to our cruise online (no itinerary, no changing or booking more excursions, nothing). Through several emails to tech support they kept saying that they are working on our problem and hope to have a resolution soon. We even got one of these emails several days after we returned from the trip (useless at this point).

 

2) Phone App (Royal iQ) – This is supposed to be their onboard portal app. It’s apparently not functional yet on the Allure. Disney has a very good app on their ships that worked perfectly on our cruise more than 2 years ago. Nothing at all like this is available on a massive ship like the Allure? This is a huge failure, and unless everyone in your party is paying for Voom, there is no way to communicate, check your schedule, make plans, etc. We should have brought portable radios.

 

3) Television (information portal) – Since RCL doesn’t have any on-ship app working on this ship and we had no access to our account via the internet, the TV information portal was the only way we could electronically check our itineraries, make dinner/show reservations, make changes, book excursions, check out billing, etc. The layout of their menus is acceptable. The problem is that the whole system is very buggy and feels more like a beta or test system. Here are some examples:

a. There are screens to view your on-board charges, which is good. However, every time I tried to view a receipt to see transaction details, it would say, “We’re sorry. The receipt is not available at this time.” This happened dozens of times throughout the cruise. I was never actually able to view any receipt details. This is important information in case you don’t recognize or want to confirm the details of a charge.

b. You can reserve entertainment options. In use, I’d go on the reservation page and only one show would display. Then I’d back out one menu step and go back in and there would now be three shows available. This happened repeatedly and when I discussed what was available with the staff, I found that there should have been many open things to book, but for some reason only a few actually showed.

c. Apparently you cannot change a reservation with this system. I wanted to change a comedy show reservation and it deleted it, but would not let me book another time, telling me that I was already attending the event when I pulled it up on the screen. It never showed on my calendar, so I correctly surmised that it didn’t actually “take” in the system and I went to the show armed with cell phone pictures of my TV screen in order to get into what turned out to be a very good show.

d. Other than a few major shows, the majority of the other activities are not listed on the TV system at all. For example, there could be a “Family Movie” in a particular theater at 2PM. This is listed in your printed daily Compass. However, the Compass doesn’t actually tell you WHAT movies are playing so that you can decide if you have any interest in going to this show. This could easily be included on the TV system, but it is not.

e. Dead links – There are many menu functions that seem useful, such as Daily Compass, which you’d think would be an electronic version of the printed compass, ideally with more information since it doesn’t have to fit on a fixed page size. However, this menu item (along with many others) doesn’t actually do anything. Maybe it’s just meant to let you know that the Compass exists (somewhere) in printed form. Or maybe it’s something that’s going to work in the future?

 

4) No one to call for information from the room – Some of the communications issues we had could have easily been solved by a “Concierge”, “Guest Services”, or similar function on the phone system. Surprisingly, nothing like this exists. I’m assuming it does for the Suites, but not the regular rooms. If you want to know what movies are playing on Family Movie Night in advance, your only option is to physically go down to Guest Services and wait in line on Deck 5. Have a question about an upcoming excursion? Go down to Deck 5. Really this is one of the more infuriating problems I had with RCL, there should be someone we can phone or message on the ship to ask questions and there is not.

 

5) Poor/Inconsistent Staff Training and Demeanor – I complimented the Dining Room staff already above. However, I found a very large range in terms of competency, attitude and training during my various interactions with the crew (especially compared to Disney). Many employees seem well trained and happy with their jobs while others just seem miserable. Here are two particular examples:

a. I was on the Pool Deck #15 sitting on a chair and reading a book. I noticed that the prior occupant of this chair had left what appeared to be a pretty new set of high-end sunglasses under the seat (in their case). I thought I would give this to the first crew member I saw and that they must have lost and found areas onboard. The first person who walked by picked up my drink glass and I asked him about them. He said that he couldn’t take them, but the person at the nearby counter (I guess it’s a snorkel/dive shop?) could definitely help me. I walked to him and he said that he had no idea what to do with them. I then went to the bar and they said I had to take them down to Guest Services on Deck 5 myself. This was shocking to me. RCL expects their passengers to go down 10 decks and wait in line to do something nice for a fellow passenger? Unbelievable.

b. Shows can get crowded on the ship. We went to the ice show in Studio B one night. RCL had a crew member at the entrance to each aisle. Knowing that this was going to be a full house, I would have expected these employees to walk up and down and try to determine which open seats were being held for other guest and which were available. That way, when people came to their aisle, they would know how many seats were left in their section. They didn’t do that or really anything at all except stand around and then pull a barrier across the entrance to the aisle when they felt like it. In one section probably more than 25% of the seats were still empty when access to the area from the top was closed. You now had to walk down another aisle to the bottom and then back up and, of course, then had to determine yourself which seats were truly available. About 15 minutes into the show, I counted 14 empty seats in one section (representing maybe 1/5 of the total sections). There were people standing at the top of each section watching the show and others sitting on the aisle steps. I’d guess maybe 50-60 people total watching the show without seats while more than enough empty seats existed. A professional theater would have taken care of this.

 

6) No printed deck plans or ship guide is placed in your rooms and the online plans are not current. If you’ve been on these ships a lot, this probably isn’t an issue but I had really expected to see some nice colored deck plans in the rooms along with summaries of every location. RCL does not have ANY printed deckplans in your room. The closest you will find is a sectional view of the ship (one page of the Day 1 Compass) which helps you determine on which deck and rough location something you are looking for is located, but this is not the same as a proper map. There are interactive deck plans in each elevator lobby, but really something should be in the rooms themselves. I downloaded the most current deck plans before I left and again while on the ship and they are not current either. For example, you will still see a single Main Dining Room instead of separate rooms for Silk, American Icon, and The Grande.

7) Sea Pass Card – Blocking charges. This happened to my brother traveling on the same cruise as me. You can block or allow minors to charge on their Sea Pass cards. Apparently, this block DOES NOT extend to the arcades. That’s right, specifically blocking charges for one of your kids’ cards will still allow them to purchase games in the arcade. Many kids don’t understand the value of money or event that they are buying anything at all. To their credit, the third person he spoke with finally voided the $150 charge his son racked up in two hours, but this should not happen. This is ridiculous.

 

7) Shopping – Despite the cost of the cruise, RCL is all about selling, selling, selling. Everywhere you go you will have people trying to sell you things. One thing you can’t buy anywhere, however, would be a book or magazine to read by the pool. There was technically a library, however, but there were only (2) English language magazines and maybe a dozen books there. There must have been more than 2,000 watches for sale on board, but nothing to read? Kind of odd.

 

Any comments, suggestions, or similar would be appreciated. Thank you in advance.

[Clarea]

Welcome to Cruise Critic.

 

Number 4 surprises me. We've always been able to call Guest Services from the stateroom phone.

Edited July 14, 2016 by clarea

[Merion_Mom]

Welcome to Cruise Critic.

 

Number 4 surprises me. We've always been able to call Guest Services from the stateroom phone.

 

............because you can. ;)

 

I don't know why the OP was unable to do this.

[N2DFIRE]

#7 also surprises me

If a child is old enough to roam the ship by their self. They are old enough to understand the value of money. It's the parents responsibility to set rules for the child. Rather the card blocking worked the way you thought. Which has been discussed many times on cc

 

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Forums mobile app

[5soonerfans]

I agree about #3. We had the same issues.

 

We were able to call guest services, by dialing 0.

 

I am surprised about the arcade charges. There are signs in there that say there is a $50 daily limit and then the adult must approve a higher limit.

 

The Pomodoro menu on the last night must go. We never eat in MDR the last night, so we always do our extra tipping on the last night we are there. One of the chefs did say they are working on new menus for the Allure.

[SnorkelAway]

Interesting and informative review. Thank you for posting.

 

Numbers 4 and 7 are well outside my experience. 4: I have never been unable to call Guest Services or someone and ask a question - now, whether I could get a good answer is another subject, but I always was able to reach someone on the phone to take my question. 7: it is really weird to think that there were only a dozen or so English language books in Allure library - I would have said that there would be at least a couple hundred in the library on any Oasis class ship cruise. Also, I thought every ship sold paperbacks in a rack in the shop where they had drug store stuff - but maybe that is no longer true.

[dt126]

Thanks for some of the responses.

 

1) Here's a picture of the phone onboard. Anything remotely tell you a way to contact guest services? I did try 0 once but just got a quick busy signal sound. Since it's not marked and there are no instructions about dialing 0, I didn't try it again.

 

2) On the charge issue, that happened to my brother, not me. I do now notice this issue on the boards. My only comment is that from a technology standpoint, it would be much easier to block ALL charges than only selectively block certain charges on the cards. The decision to implement it in this manner can only be about added revenue for RCL and it seems underhanded. You used to not be able to add a pin to your Google Store purchases, but complaints from thousands of people who's kids racked up huge bills purchasing frivolous app items items finally led them to change this. You have people on board from many countries with different languages and currencies, so expecting all young children to understand this rule and the value of the US dollars when the policy is not obvious to parents I don't see as s positive customer oriented policy.

Allure Phone.pdf

[dt126]

@SnorkelAway, I wish I had taken some pictures in the Library so you could see that I was not exaggerating. Most of the shelves are completely empty. The only books my wife found which looked remotely interested were in Spanish or French.

 

On deck 15, there is a small shop which sells swimming, sunblock and similar items (I cannot remember the name). On the interactive directory, it even notes, "reading for the pool" or something like this. However, the person running the store said that had no books or magazines. I asked at least 5 or 6 employees this questions so I'm pretty sure there isn't anything. I was set, I had more than enough to read, but my wife did not which meant I couldn't read as much as I wanted to either. :)

[KG1924]

Thanks for your review!

I can agree to most of what you experienced and it was pretty similar to what we felt on our May sailing of the Allure. Overall we loved it, but there were definitely some glitches. I've never had an issue calling guests services from the cabin, but that doesn't mean they will actually solve the issue that way ;) For example, our closet door was malfunctioning on day one. No big deal, we just told the cabin steward on our way out on the first evening. 2nd day it still wasn't fixed and we didn't see our steward that day (we were out of the cabin for majority of the day) By late day 3 it still wasn't fixed and I tried calling guest services and I was told to advise maintenance, which I feel at the minimum they should have at least transferred me?? At this point the door completely came off the hinge so my husband just propped it up against the wall and it was fixed the next day :p Not a big deal, but those doors are heavy-it "could" have caused an issue if it fell on somebody other than my 6 foot tall hubby. In the past, I felt like any issue, no matter now small, was handled quickly and efficiently...not so much this time.

 

I will also agree on just some downright rude staff members. Thankfully not to us directly, but we witnessed some arrogant responses to other passengers, especially at the pool deck bars. I always try to give the benefit of the doubt that sometimes it's just a language barrier or different nationalities having a different way of handling situations (let's face it, Americans can be pretty hard to handle sometimes, especially when drinking lol!) Again, this is just not what we had experience on any of our previous 4 RC cruises, so it all stuck out like a sore thumb to us.

 

RC's website is just awful. We booked ourselves and it was still ridiculous to try and plan everything. It's even more annoying on this class of ships because you NEED to plan everything in advance. There's just no excuse for the website to be so glitchy.

 

While I've never been on Disney, everything I've read is that they are top notch when it comes to customer service. And anyone can argue that when one sails Disney, they are paying top dollar to receive top notch service. That said, I don't consider RC cheap in the slightest and while I never ever expect perfection, I do expect courteous service-and respect should be given to both the customer and the staff member.

 

After our trip, we both agreed we still like RC more than Carnival (only other line we've sailed on) but we can't tell if service is truly slipping or if we are just getting older and noticing it more. I remember our very first cruise on the Adventure (I was 20 years old with my now husband being 21 and my "guardian" for the week) and in my head everything was perfect. Or our wedding cruise on the Oasis 5 years ago-it was amazing! Now did everything go perfectly on either of those? Of course not! But I was younger and a lot more carefree/distracted at that time. Now I give more value to my money and how I spend it and how we delegate our limited vacation time. Had you not experience Disney prior to this or been a first time cruiser overall, you may not have blinked an eye at some of the negatives....but that's irrelevant. I hope you guys still had a great vacation!

[setsail]

I stopped reading after "not inclined to sail RCCL again at this time"

[crusinthrough]

#5 VOOM was fast to me especially compared to some of the other ships. You can easily stream movies. Which plan did you purchase? I know they are not equal in speed.

 

Negatives

 

#1 and #2 - I agree. RC website is the worst of any cruise line or 3rd party I have used. The latest edition is by far the worst. You can't easily select a different category within the same type of stateroom category. Why can't the available rooms on a deck blink (similar to other websites)? This would be very helpful. Why can't IT update the pictures of each stateroom to correctly reflect the image of the room? Especially after a dry dock and the stateroom has been updated. There are so many issues with the website.

 

RC is behind with creating an app. My guess is that they want people to purchase VOOM. This wouldn't be an issue if VOOM wasn't so slow on some ships.

 

#6 - I would presume RC doesn't not printed deck plans because they have the Way finders (not sure if that is the right name) on each deck, which is more interactive and technological advance than a paper deck plan. You are able to see the deck plans, cruise compass, menus and dining venues wait times.

[KG1924]

I stopped reading after "not inclined to sail RCCL again at this time"

 

Why? I think it was a well, thought out review with some valid issues.

[Eagle329]

Seems like some unrealistic expectations on the list. Should RCCL be policing children's spending or should adults be monitoring and counseling their children on what not to do and do.

[setsail]

Why? I think it was a well, thought out review with some valid issues.

 

I am not here to change someone's mind once they have made it up. They are not sailing rci anymore, what's the use. The review might be fine but I am not reading it

[reallyitsmema]

Interesting review. In regards to the arcade issue, to use the arcade, you need to load money onto your sea pass from a separate machine at the entrance of the arcade. The child would have either had to load $150 onto his card in one transaction or keep going back repeatedly to load more funds. You can not just stick a sea pass card into a game and play, so this child had to have some idea what they were doing.

 

While I agree that there has to be someway for this machine to recognize when a sea pass card has no charging privileges, responsibility also lies with the child and parents. No child should be allowed to run free without having guidelines set.

[SnorkelAway]

@SnorkelAway, I wish I had taken some pictures in the Library so you could see that I was not exaggerating. Most of the shelves are completely empty. The only books my wife found which looked remotely interested were in Spanish or French.

 

On deck 15, there is a small shop which sells swimming, sunblock and similar items (I cannot remember the name). On the interactive directory, it even notes, "reading for the pool" or something like this. However, the person running the store said that had no books or magazines. I asked at least 5 or 6 employees this questions so I'm pretty sure there isn't anything. I was set, I had more than enough to read, but my wife did not which meant I couldn't read as much as I wanted to either. :)

 

I hope that this is not a reflection of a continuation of the thinking by which Royal has removed the libraries that were on the ships originally - often creating a book nook kind of thing. I had thought they were committed to having decent libraries on the Oasis class and later mega ships but maybe not.

[Fouremco]

I continue to be surprised by the number of threads that are started on this board by people who apparently only discover CC after a cruise that they viewed as less than satisfactory. While the OP's review has slightly better balance than some of these threads, as the OP did point out some positives, there is an offsetting negative included in most of them.

 

As for the lengthy list of negatives, I can't help but think that a number of them would have been avoided had the OP spent time on CC before the cruise, read existing threads and asked questions. Kids and arcade game charges is a prime example of an issue that resurfaces constantly and shouldn't have been a surprise to anyone in the OP's party. Similarly, both RCI's website and innumerable CC threads clearly state which ships have Royal IQ, so the OP shouldn't have been surprised.

[Thetrail]

Why? I think it was a well, thought out review with some valid issues.

Have to :(agree with Set Sail......there were more issues that the OP just plain flat out didn't know about, therefore in their mind is was an annoyance.......K.O.

[KG1924]

I continue to be surprised by the number of threads that are started on this board by people who apparently only discover CC after a cruise that they viewed as less than satisfactory. While the OP's review has slightly better balance than some of these threads, as the OP did point out some positives, there is an offsetting negative included in most of them.

 

As for the lengthy list of negatives, I can't help but think that a number of them would have been avoided had the OP spent time on CC before the cruise, read existing threads and asked questions. Kids and arcade game charges is a prime example of an issue that resurfaces constantly and shouldn't have been a surprise to anyone in the OP's party. Similarly, both RCI's website and innumerable CC threads clearly state which ships have Royal IQ, so the OP shouldn't have been surprised.

 

I also continue to be surprised by the amount of people that discount people's reviews just because it wasn't a great cruise. While I agree that there are plenty of people that join CC just to do a quick bashing of a cruise line and are never heard from again, I don't believe this is the case here. The OP has responded to others and said that he/she was welcome to any info/feedback from people that are better familiar with the RC product as a whole. Nowhere did they state the RC is the worst or that they wanted people to talk them into trying it again.

 

I'm not new to CC but I agree with quite a bit of what they said. Things like the library or the arcade aren't things that apply to me in particular but they may help somebody else that is sailing the Allure in the future.

[cruisdog]

I would never count on getting reading matter from the library. I always bring a Kindle that I have loaded up with books. It is just easier to carry and I can have it anywhere. Kindles are cheap and they work perfectly.

[Fouremco]

I also continue to be surprised by the amount of people that discount people's reviews just because it wasn't a great cruise. While I agree that there are plenty of people that join CC just to do a quick bashing of a cruise line and are never heard from again, I don't believe this is the case here. The OP has responded to others and said that he/she was welcome to any info/feedback from people that are better familiar with the RC product as a whole. Nowhere did they state the RC is the worst or that they wanted people to talk them into trying it again.

 

I'm not new to CC but I agree with quite a bit of what they said. Things like the library or the arcade aren't things that apply to me in particular but they may help somebody else that is sailing the Allure in the future.

I didn't discount the OP's review, I simply pointed out that joining CC before the cruise, not after, and reading all the helpful information and asking questions might have avoided many of the issues that the OP deemed negative. Ignorance isn't always bliss.

Edited July 14, 2016 by Fouremco

[Duke Mazer]

I'm still sticking to my theory that MOST (NOT ALL) people prefer the line they usually sail with, the one they started on and that's it, no matter how good the other cruise is, nada not as good as (Fill in the blank). Yes I agree with the negatives, would that make me say I wouldn't cruise with a line because of them, no. I think it's bias towards Disney. Same bias when you read a NCL or CCL review from an RCL loyalist. Thinks it's nice to see others perspective, but realistically people coming from Disney don't generally like RCL better, even Oasis class can't wow them, just like I can't be wow'd by the Getaway after Oasis class.

[bobmacliberty]

I'm still sticking to my theory that MOST (NOT ALL) people prefer the line they usually sail with, the one they started on and that's it, no matter how good the other cruise is, nada not as good as (Fill in the blank). Yes I agree with the negatives, would that make me say I wouldn't cruise with a line because of them, no. I think it's bias towards Disney. Same bias when you read a NCL or CCL review from an RCL loyalist. Thinks it's nice to see others perspective, but realistically people coming from Disney don't generally like RCL better, even Oasis class can't wow them, just like I can't be wow'd by the Getaway after Oasis class.

 

I think there's some merit to what you're saying, but our first cruise was on Disney and our next 5 have been on Royal. Disney was great, especially when my daughters were younger, but Royal is a much better fit for us now. We haven't felt the need to look elsewhere. Oh...and we still think of our Allure cruise as our best cruise ever, although that was 5 years ago.

[Merion_Mom]

Purely in the interest of education and information for any future cruisers who will read dt126's review, I am inserting some thoughts and comments in red.

 

Allure of the Seas – Eastern Caribbean (7/3/2016 Departure), Deluxe Family Oceanview Balcony Room

 

This is not a formal review, I just wanted to get the opinions from some of you here who’ve traveled a lot more on RCL ships than I have to help my understanding before I do a formal review and/or contact RCL with some of my concerns. Overall I liked the cruise and I’d probably rate it a 3.75/5 or so, but I’m not inclined to sail on RCL again at this time based on some of the issues I had. Before I start these comments, I wanted to mention that our only other cruises were on Disney (so keep that in mind while reading).

 

POSITIVES (there were a lot more than this, I just wanted to list a few that stood out)

 

1) Rooms – Decent size and layout. They do seem a bit worn in some areas but overall not bad at all. We do prefer Disney’s bathroom layout with a separate toilet/sink in one room and shower/sink in the other, but I knew about this before booking with RCL, so this is not a complaint.

 

2) Dining Room Staff – I realize that there is going to be a lot of difference based on which personnel you get, but overall we were extremely pleased with the dining room staff in all of the places we dined. This included the smaller cafes as well.

 

3) MDR Food Quality – This was actually considerably better than I expected based on other reviews I read, although we were disappointed in a few of the dishes and the last day’s meal was really poor (all dishes) so I’m just going to assume something happened that day.

 

4) Chef’s Table – I was very pleased with the food and wine pairing as well as the service and chef. Pricing is very fair as well.

 

5) Voom – Speeds were decent for a ship (~5Mbps range) and reliability was pretty good as well. I would have preferred speeds to be higher, but given the number of people on the system and location (at sea), I’d give this a high rating.

 

NEGATIVES

 

1) Website – The site is fine for planning cruises but poor for booking excursions, dining reservations, etc. We did book through a travel agent. Despite this, before the cruise we were able to pull up the reservation. Actually it was two reservations since for some reason 5 people staying in a room designed for up to 6 people is separated into two reservations with 4 people max, so every time we wanted to make a dinner reservation, we had to type in the second reservation information. RCL’s website makes it difficult to even get into the screens where you can make and confirm reservations and check what you’ve already booked. About a week before our cruise, we were no longer able to access our reservation at all on the RCL website. It had been saved on our account and we used it several times, but it was now gone. Every time we tried to add it back in, the website said to try again later. For two weeks before and all the time on the cruise we kept getting the “try again later” message and we were unable to access anything related to our cruise online (no itinerary, no changing or booking more excursions, nothing). Through several emails to tech support they kept saying that they are working on our problem and hope to have a resolution soon. We even got one of these emails several days after we returned from the trip (useless at this point).

 

It is a fact that RC's reservation can place only four people on one reservation. Any time that there are more than four, you get a second booking number. It's how their software works.

 

I agree that RC's website "needs work." And by "needs work" I mean: incinerate it and start over, with a staff that knows what they are doing. ;)

 

2) Phone App (Royal iQ) – This is supposed to be their onboard portal app. It’s apparently not functional yet on the Allure. Disney has a very good app on their ships that worked perfectly on our cruise more than 2 years ago. Nothing at all like this is available on a massive ship like the Allure? This is a huge failure, and unless everyone in your party is paying for Voom, there is no way to communicate, check your schedule, make plans, etc. We should have brought portable radios.

 

I don't know where you read that Allure had the Royal IQ app. It doesn't. Quantum and Anthem and Ovation have it, and Harmony has it. It was created for the launch of Quantum. RC has NOT gone back and retro-fitted any older ship that was not built with it.

 

3) Television (information portal) – Since RCL doesn’t have any on-ship app working on this ship and we had no access to our account via the internet, the TV information portal was the only way we could electronically check our itineraries, make dinner/show reservations, make changes, book excursions, check out billing, etc. The layout of their menus is acceptable. The problem is that the whole system is very buggy and feels more like a beta or test system. Here are some examples:

a. There are screens to view your on-board charges, which is good. However, every time I tried to view a receipt to see transaction details, it would say, “We’re sorry. The receipt is not available at this time.” This happened dozens of times throughout the cruise. I was never actually able to view any receipt details. This is important information in case you don’t recognize or want to confirm the details of a charge.

My experience has been that despite a place to click, the receipts have NEVER been viewable. They should remove that. I just save my receipts. :)

b. You can reserve entertainment options. In use, I’d go on the reservation page and only one show would display. Then I’d back out one menu step and go back in and there would now be three shows available. This happened repeatedly and when I discussed what was available with the staff, I found that there should have been many open things to book, but for some reason only a few actually showed.

c. Apparently you cannot change a reservation with this system. I wanted to change a comedy show reservation and it deleted it, but would not let me book another time, telling me that I was already attending the event when I pulled it up on the screen. It never showed on my calendar, so I correctly surmised that it didn’t actually “take” in the system and I went to the show armed with cell phone pictures of my TV screen in order to get into what turned out to be a very good show.

d. Other than a few major shows, the majority of the other activities are not listed on the TV system at all. For example, there could be a “Family Movie” in a particular theater at 2PM. This is listed in your printed daily Compass. However, the Compass doesn’t actually tell you WHAT movies are playing so that you can decide if you have any interest in going to this show. This could easily be included on the TV system, but it is not.

e. Dead links – There are many menu functions that seem useful, such as Daily Compass, which you’d think would be an electronic version of the printed compass, ideally with more information since it doesn’t have to fit on a fixed page size. However, this menu item (along with many others) doesn’t actually do anything. Maybe it’s just meant to let you know that the Compass exists (somewhere) in printed form. Or maybe it’s something that’s going to work in the future?

The Daily Compass has its own channel on your TV. Not sure why you didn't see that.

 

4) No one to call for information from the room – Some of the communications issues we had could have easily been solved by a “Concierge”, “Guest Services”, or similar function on the phone system. Surprisingly, nothing like this exists. I’m assuming it does for the Suites, but not the regular rooms. If you want to know what movies are playing on Family Movie Night in advance, your only option is to physically go down to Guest Services and wait in line on Deck 5. Have a question about an upcoming excursion? Go down to Deck 5. Really this is one of the more infuriating problems I had with RCL, there should be someone we can phone or message on the ship to ask questions and there is not.

Again, not sure why you didn't just hit "O", which would have connected you to Guest Services. Not having it labeled "guest services" should not have been a deterrent.

 

5) Poor/Inconsistent Staff Training and Demeanor – I complimented the Dining Room staff already above. However, I found a very large range in terms of competency, attitude and training during my various interactions with the crew (especially compared to Disney). Many employees seem well trained and happy with their jobs while others just seem miserable. Here are two particular examples:

a. I was on the Pool Deck #15 sitting on a chair and reading a book. I noticed that the prior occupant of this chair had left what appeared to be a pretty new set of high-end sunglasses under the seat (in their case). I thought I would give this to the first crew member I saw and that they must have lost and found areas onboard. The first person who walked by picked up my drink glass and I asked him about them. He said that he couldn’t take them, but the person at the nearby counter (I guess it’s a snorkel/dive shop?) could definitely help me. I walked to him and he said that he had no idea what to do with them. I then went to the bar and they said I had to take them down to Guest Services on Deck 5 myself. This was shocking to me. RCL expects their passengers to go down 10 decks and wait in line to do something nice for a fellow passenger? Unbelievable.

You would not have had to wait in line. I have done this more than once. March up to the front of the counter, say "I found these on the pool deck." and walk away.

b. Shows can get crowded on the ship. We went to the ice show in Studio B one night. RCL had a crew member at the entrance to each aisle. Knowing that this was going to be a full house, I would have expected these employees to walk up and down and try to determine which open seats were being held for other guest and which were available. That way, when people came to their aisle, they would know how many seats were left in their section. They didn’t do that or really anything at all except stand around and then pull a barrier across the entrance to the aisle when they felt like it. In one section probably more than 25% of the seats were still empty when access to the area from the top was closed. You now had to walk down another aisle to the bottom and then back up and, of course, then had to determine yourself which seats were truly available. About 15 minutes into the show, I counted 14 empty seats in one section (representing maybe 1/5 of the total sections). There were people standing at the top of each section watching the show and others sitting on the aisle steps. I’d guess maybe 50-60 people total watching the show without seats while more than enough empty seats existed. A professional theater would have taken care of this.

You expected those crew members to act as ushers. That's not why they are there. They are there to prevent fistfights between passengers fighting over the saving of seats. :D

 

6) No printed deck plans or ship guide is placed in your rooms and the online plans are not current. If you’ve been on these ships a lot, this probably isn’t an issue but I had really expected to see some nice colored deck plans in the rooms along with summaries of every location. RCL does not have ANY printed deckplans in your room. The closest you will find is a sectional view of the ship (one page of the Day 1 Compass) which helps you determine on which deck and rough location something you are looking for is located, but this is not the same as a proper map. There are interactive deck plans in each elevator lobby, but really something should be in the rooms themselves. I downloaded the most current deck plans before I left and again while on the ship and they are not current either. For example, you will still see a single Main Dining Room instead of separate rooms for Silk, American Icon, and The Grande.

You want the highest level of technology and yet you complain about not having printed paper deck plans? As mentioned by others on this thread AND YOU, there are Wayfinders in every elevator lobby. The MDR *is* one large dining room. Having those different names means nothing, since Allure never switched to Dynamic Dining.

7) Sea Pass Card – Blocking charges. This happened to my brother traveling on the same cruise as me. You can block or allow minors to charge on their Sea Pass cards. Apparently, this block DOES NOT extend to the arcades. That’s right, specifically blocking charges for one of your kids’ cards will still allow them to purchase games in the arcade. Many kids don’t understand the value of money or event that they are buying anything at all. To their credit, the third person he spoke with finally voided the $150 charge his son racked up in two hours, but this should not happen. This is ridiculous.

Parental Responsibility. It's a beautiful thing.

 

7) Shopping – Despite the cost of the cruise, RCL is all about selling, selling, selling. Everywhere you go you will have people trying to sell you things. One thing you can’t buy anywhere, however, would be a book or magazine to read by the pool.

I find it not credible that Disney does not try to sell you as much Disney crap as possible.

There was technically a library, however, but there were only (2) English language magazines and maybe a dozen books there. There must have been more than 2,000 watches for sale on board, but nothing to read? Kind of odd.

 

May I suggest that there were many books and magazines in the library, but others beat you to them?

 

Any comments, suggestions, or similar would be appreciated. Thank you in advance.

 

All of these comments are NOT meant to negate your feelings, your opinions or your experiences. As I stated above, others will read what you wrote, and need to know more.

 

:)

Edited July 14, 2016 by Merion_Mom

[vacationprincess]

Just curious about #7. How old was this child? The cost of each game is posted so if the child was 13 or older, he/she should have known how much money they were spending. If they were under 13, should they have been alone for 2 hours in the arcade? I don't think RCCL is at fault on this one.