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STAR CLASS - Genie information from 1/15 cruise

Brittoni

By Brittoni,
in Royal Caribbean International

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Brittoni

Brittoni

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Allure of the Seas

 

I started writing this as we are backing in to port in St Martin, just to have you here with me. I finished this just now as we got off the ship Sunday 1/22.

 

 

We arrived at the port at noon, and it was chaos. It reminded be of the airport in Nairobi Kenya. Bags everywhere people scattered among them no real organization to be seen, but it was all working somehow. We fought our way to the suite door and made our way in. We were greeted by a genie, Not ours as our genie was already helping another suite. The process is as slick as everyone says, the only issue was a security guard was letting people in our security line, which slowed it down, a genie quickly sorted that out. There are a lot of reviews of this process, so you can find details elsewhere. I can confirm it's pretty amazing no pain.

 

There are 11 star suites on board the 6 ATS and 5 lofts, that means of the near 5500 people on our cruise there were 41 passengers that had this level of access. This is managed by 3 genies, there are 4 in total but only 3 are on the ship at one time. The genie is a self described personal assistant, that is a very accurate description. The only difference from the PA's I have had is Genie's do not anticipate they respond. But in one week the ability to anticipate things is difficult. As the week moved on the level of anticipation improved. At 3 pm on embarkation day our genie met us in our cabin and went over our benefits and his role in them. I think Star class benefits are easy to describe, "whatever you want just ask because whatever they can do they will".

 

With so few plum colored cards on board, the crew in nearly every instance just capitulates to what you need. Very different than other passengers, ill give a few examples, but there are too many to mention.

- [ ] Drinks we got every thing we wanted, period. Observing the other passengers on the ship with drink packages, the Star class card they went above and beyond to ensure we are happy. I bought rounds of drinks, shots, bottles of wine, and water juice, coffees, everything, unlimited no questions asked. Plum card is a $0.00 bill. Actually the 0.00 bill is a bit of a joke, but you will sign a slew of these. Crew called them zero bills.

- [ ] Cabanas on deck 17, we had a full time cabana on deck 17, And our friends who were not in our cabin were able to join us. The pool attendant who was amazing told us that the crew is instructed to keep Star Class happy and ensure there are no hassles. This they did.

- [ ] Specialty restaurant staff were particularly attentive, and gave us bottles of wine, and were simply amazing. Especially 150 park, which we will have dined at 3 times by the end of the cruise.

- [ ] Our cabin is stocked to the nines with food and alcohol, we always had a 12 pack of beer, a bottle of jack Daniels, Bacardi rum, vermouth and several bottles of wine.

- [ ] We exceeded our allotment of carry on wine and brought some beer on during embarkation, these were all specialty bottles and there were no issues.

One interesting thing which happened was we came a bit close to missing the ship in st. thomas due to a transportation issues. We contacted our Genie in turn the genie worked with the senior staff so they were aware and could assist if needed. We did make the ship with a little to spare, but having the genie on our side was a relief.

 

Another neat aspect of having our genie is, checking in on our trip. Several times our genie just stopped by before our dinner in the restaurant to ensure everything is going as we hoped. Would come by the cabin just to chat, very nice, and never obtrusive. Also our genie came by the cabin and spent a very long time just chatting, answered any questions about what ever we asked, and was very interesting to talk with.

 

Line hopping is truly luxurious. In St Thomas there was a massive line to disembark we merely walked to the front, flashed our cards and went first. Was amazing. One thing that would make this a bit better is a sign that stated this, as other passengers who were not informed were obviously annoyed. But the crew took care of this by informing them.

 

In cabin drinks were also interesting, every day more and more came. I mean MORE! Day after day, each day we would get Case of Heineken, or a case of bud light, bottles of champagne, or shots of rum, or case of Guinness. Got to be astounding. We left probably 30 total bottles of wine, beer, champagne and spirits on Sunday.

 

Your genie will get you a gift, I expected it to be silly. It was not, I was astounded it was so personal and well thought through it amazed me. But let's keep that a secret surprise because I have no idea what you will get.

 

As a final note, as we left to customs the genie said, " you were great, and so easy, people usually are so much more demanding". We did not know what to say, I thought we asked for a lot. I guess we need to do better next time.

 

Happy to answer any questions you have.

Edited by Brittoni
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suite dreams

suite dreams

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Good to know. We will be in AquaTheater Suite on the 29th, the Oasis. 3rd time for this suite, first time for a Genie. So looking forward to it. Trying to figure out how to have hard liquor in suite for drinks on the balcony without having to run out to the bars. How did you manage to have hard liquor in suite?

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cruisewithbaby

cruisewithbaby

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I often wonder what do people request from a Genie? I've only done sky class so far and have never had a request the concierge didn't fill for me without hesitation. I didn't ask him to book excursions, but he seemed to love my little one and go above and beyond to find us and make things special for her. I don't even know what I would ask a Genie to do?

 

 

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A&L_Ont "Live from...." Rare

A&L_Ont

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Good to know. We will be in AquaTheater Suite on the 29th, the Oasis. 3rd time for this suite, first time for a Genie. So looking forward to it. Trying to figure out how to have hard liquor in suite for drinks on the balcony without having to run out to the bars. How did you manage to have hard liquor in suite?

 

We didn't have hard liquor in our cabin. If others have it maybe they will chime in.

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A&L_Ont "Live from...." Rare

A&L_Ont

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I often wonder what do people request from a Genie? I've only done sky class so far and have never had a request the concierge didn't fill for me without hesitation. I didn't ask him to book excursions, but he seemed to love my little one and go above and beyond to find us and make things special for her. I don't even know what I would ask a Genie to do?

 

 

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We stayed in Star Class cabins long before they were established as Star Class. We had always booked it for cabin location and space. Now that they rolled it out we enjoy the new perks such as the free specialty meals, drink cards, wifi access etc that come with Star Class. These are all things we had paid for in the past, on top of the cabin price.

 

On a side note cabin prices have stayed within the same threshold pre and post new suite classifications. The do vary from week to week, such as Christmas is more than the first week of December but the same type of variances are found with all cabins. The Genie for us is an extra and we personally don't ask much of them but others will vary.

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Gordo

Gordo

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I often wonder what do people request from a Genie? I've only done sky class so far and have never had a request the concierge didn't fill for me without hesitation. I didn't ask him to book excursions, but he seemed to love my little one and go above and beyond to find us and make things special for her. I don't even know what I would ask a Genie to do?Forums

 

We had the same question going into our November sailing on Ovation. Our Genie, Wendy, was fabulous, and since we really didn't ask for much besides a change in our restaurant bookings, each day she would make suggestions on what she could do for us the following day, or for later in the week. And then she would meet us to make sure everything went smoothly.

 

We loved all the assistance she provided getting us on and off the ship, whether our first/last day or while in port, and because we were in ports we had never visited before, she walked us off the ship to help us find where to meet our tour guides. We agree with the OP that some of the fellow passengers seemed annoyed with the priority treatment, especially at check in when we were walking on with our luggage.

 

We booked our Sky Loft Suite (which was fabulous) prior to the roll out of the new program, and so were lucky to receive the new benefits. Such a wonderful addition to a great vacation experience. Told my DH it will be hard to sail in the future in a non-Star Class cabin (which we will find out on our next two sailings - the first one doesn't offer it, and on the second one, which we booked fourteen months out, didn't have any Star Class available - we will be Sky).

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