Keeping in contact with teenagersor

[dverzic]

Loved having the Hub app on our last cruise. Depending on the size of the ship its not always easy to find people in our party, so this was a big help. When one of us was at the pool or buffet we could easily let the others know exactly where we were. My friend used it to keep tabs on her teen daughters.

 

 

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[moongal]

I was just on the Valor 4 days ago and did not find the Hub app useful at all.

 

I don't know if I needed an update for it (downloaded it last year for our Liberty cruise which it wasn't available yet for that ship) or maybe different ships have different set up for it but I could not access any of my onboard account info, no menus, the daily schedule was missing a good bit of what was printed on the Fun Times, so much so that I just quit looking at the hub app and carried the Fun Times.

 

I didn't find the texting ability to work at all. No notification at all. After reading here I guess I needed to leave the app open? Not sure but my husband and I didn't use it. I absolutely had to be able to keep in touch with my teens at home who were on a separate trip with their grandparents so I just used Facebook Messenger. I bought the social plan for $5 day (or whatever it was maybe 4.95?? I can't remember but it seemed very cheap and it worked like a charm. Never had any trouble communicating with anyone. iMessage DID NOT work either which I found odd since I thought it was always supposed to work iPhone to iPhone and we were only texting each other - all phones on the same plan. But I recommend using Facebook Messenger. I was amazed that I could text my teens who were all the way in Hawaii in the middle of the Pacific Ocean while I was in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico on a ship and there was no lag and I got the "ding" notifications all the time. Seemed more reliable than the hub app, which I had had such high expectations and was looking forward to using.

 

 

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[A&Jfamily]

The OP specifically asked about methods of communicating with their kid(s) using wifi. When you tell them, "Really, it's not hard to find them on the ship," then go on to explain they don't need wifi to communicate, you're suggesting the exact opposite of what they're actually here looking for. That's not discussion, it's pushing your methods onto someone who clearly wanted the opposite. No one's threatened by your post. It simply had no relevance here because the OP was specifically seeking answers that involved ship's wifi, and not just the Hub app. By the way, in your first comment you said you have "never needed the app before and did not use it last cruise when it was available." But here you say you used it, but it didn't work well. Then go on to say you don't need it because, after so many cruises, you know the routine. Never needed it, used it, don't need it.

 

My parenting comment was directed at the one who posted right after you. With their ridiculous capitalizations insinuating that, just because a parent communicates with their children through texting on board, it's improper parenting. Pardon me for not distinguishing between the two posts.

 

 

 

Re-read the OPs post. "Alaska cruise. Any suggestion for keeping up with ten eaters." Then goes on to talk about the app. My post was completely relevant to the question.

 

 

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[Organized Chaos]

I was just on the Valor 4 days ago and did not find the Hub app useful at all.

 

I don't know if I needed an update for it (downloaded it last year for our Liberty cruise which it wasn't available yet for that ship) or maybe different ships have different set up for it but I could not access any of my onboard account info, no menus, the daily schedule was missing a good bit of what was printed on the Fun Times, so much so that I just quit looking at the hub app and carried the Fun Times.

 

I didn't find the texting ability to work at all. No notification at all. After reading here I guess I needed to leave the app open? Not sure but my husband and I didn't use it. I absolutely had to be able to keep in touch with my teens at home who were on a separate trip with their grandparents so I just used Facebook Messenger. I bought the social plan for $5 day (or whatever it was maybe 4.95?? I can't remember but it seemed very cheap and it worked like a charm. Never had any trouble communicating with anyone. iMessage DID NOT work either which I found odd since I thought it was always supposed to work iPhone to iPhone and we were only texting each other - all phones on the same plan. But I recommend using Facebook Messenger. I was amazed that I could text my teens who were all the way in Hawaii in the middle of the Pacific Ocean while I was in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico on a ship and there was no lag and I got the "ding" notifications all the time. Seemed more reliable than the hub app, which I had had such high expectations and was looking forward to using.

To my knowledge, the app is the same for every ship, but I've read that people have different experiences with it on different ships. And, just like the regular internet plans, I think it's also possible that the amount of wifi activity at any given time could affect the Hub app too.

 

The dining menus are a part of the most recent update, so if you haven't updated your app, that's why you didn't see them. I listed the other new features in post #24 above. If I remember correctly, I seem to recall someone else saying that not all activities from the paper FunTimes are on the app FunTimes. Not sure why they'd do that, other than to save space or make it easier on them. That kind of defeats the purpose of that feature a bit.

 

Last year when we were aboard the Conquest, the Hub app wasn't available. We purchased the Social app and were able to text one another using iMessage on our iPhones. At that time, iMessage was not specifically listed in the Carnival FAQ's as working with the Social plan, but it worked perfectly...other than a few places on board where wifi was spotty. They've since reworded their FAQ's and now they list iMessage as not available with the Social plan. But I had hoped they had just gotten a bit overzealous with their wording because they lump iMessage in with in-app calling and FaceTime. It can be used for simple messaging, just like facebook messenger, so I don't know why they blocked it. It worked before, what gives? A couple other people on the forum had said they were able to use iMessage with the Social plan recently, so now I don't know what to think. We don't use any other messaging apps and would rather not. We have 8 people going and I don't want to mess with coordinating the same messaging app for everyone. But if the Hub app chat doesn't work well, and iMessage is a bust, we'll have to come up with an alternative. Another reason I liked being able to use iMessage was because my mom has an iPhone too and she likes to know how we're doing. As someone who isn't very tech savvy, teaching her to use a new messaging app is easier said than done.