Jump to content
Cruise Critic Community

Why does Celebrity Website suck?

mosleyman

By mosleyman,
in Celebrity Cruises

 Share

Recommended Posts

mosleyman

mosleyman

Posted
Posted

Is it just me ...why do I have such a hard time with their website?

 

It is absolutely the worst site that I have experienced in trying to get anything done.   I try to search for excursions and it does not bring me to excursion...I am now on the phone with them...what a waste of time.

 

 

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Mynki

Mynki

Posted
Posted

I used to work in the IT team of a global bank. Even minor website changes were thoroughly tested by a team using different operating systems and web browsers in a methodical way to ensure full functionality before changes were rolled out to the general public. 

On extremely rare occasions we had issues with back office systems that were customer facing. When this happened there was a huge investigation and those responsible for inconveniencing our customers were dealt with accordingly (Annual performance review could result in a large discretionary bonus but if you failed you'd get a poor rating resulting in no bonus, promotion hopes dashed etc). In short, failure was taken very seriously. 

How the monkeys in the RCL IT department get away with their performance based on what I've seen in the corporate world is beyond me. They need to make sweeping management or contractor changes or more likely, both. Otherwise it looks like nothing will ever improve. There are a number of faults on the UK site too. I won't expect them to be fixed anytime soon. 

  • Like 13
  • Thanks 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites
DirtyDawg

DirtyDawg

Posted
Posted
3 hours ago, mosleyman said:

Is it just me ...why do I have such a hard time with their website?

 

It is absolutely the worst site that I have experienced in trying to get anything done.   I try to search for excursions and it does not bring me to excursion...I am now on the phone with them...what a waste of time.

 

 

 

The same people who designed the Celebrity  IT system designed the Phoenix pay system the Feds use. 'nough said. 😉

  • Haha 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Reel Love

Reel Love

Posted
Posted
1 hour ago, DirtyDawg said:

 

The same people who designed the Celebrity  IT system designed the Phoenix pay system the Feds use. 'nough said. 😉

Laughed out loud at this one!  😂

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites
keesar Great Review Rare

keesar

Posted
Posted

For those who thought they booked excursions or such on the sale, make sure you get a confirmation.  I had thought I had purchased excursions, paid for it ( or so I thought) , and later did a double check.  No confirmation and I was closed out of my account.  .  Had to make a phone call to resolve the issue.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites
cruisingnewtoit

cruisingnewtoit

Posted
Posted
8 minutes ago, keesar said:

For those who thought they booked excursions or such on the sale, make sure you get a confirmation.  I had thought I had purchased excursions, paid for it ( or so I thought) , and later did a double check.  No confirmation and I was closed out of my account.  .  Had to make a phone call to resolve the issue.  

The excursions are showing up as booked in my CP. What type of confirmation are you supposed to receive?

Link to comment
Share on other sites
keesar Great Review Rare

keesar

Posted
Posted
1 hour ago, cruisingnewtoit said:

The excursions are showing up as booked in my CP. What type of confirmation are you supposed to receive?

 

I  always receive an e-mail confirmation.  Did not receive one today.  The OBC  did not reflect any money having been deducted.  The excursions were still in my cart under a "hold" status.  Had to call Celebrity to take care of it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
davekathy

davekathy

Posted
Posted
22 hours ago, mosleyman said:

Is it just me ...why do I have such a hard time with their website?

 

It is absolutely the worst site that I have experienced in trying to get anything done.   I try to search for excursions and it does not bring me to excursion...I am now on the phone with them...what a waste of time.

 

 

And for those of us that cruise with both RC and Celebrity it's the same issues. Same IT department!! 🤬

Link to comment
Share on other sites
MarielC

MarielC

Posted
Posted

Have to agree, Celebrity has the worst website and the app is really bad also. I've had to call them 3 times because the website is either wonky (links not going to correct pages) or you can't find a simple answer anywhere on the site.

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites
TeeRick

TeeRick

Posted
Posted
On 6/9/2019 at 12:29 PM, Mynki said:

I used to work in the IT team of a global bank. Even minor website changes were thoroughly tested by a team using different operating systems and web browsers in a methodical way to ensure full functionality before changes were rolled out to the general public. 

On extremely rare occasions we had issues with back office systems that were customer facing. When this happened there was a huge investigation and those responsible for inconveniencing our customers were dealt with accordingly (Annual performance review could result in a large discretionary bonus but if you failed you'd get a poor rating resulting in no bonus, promotion hopes dashed etc). In short, failure was taken very seriously. 

How the monkeys in the RCL IT department get away with their performance based on what I've seen in the corporate world is beyond me. They need to make sweeping management or contractor changes or more likely, both. Otherwise it looks like nothing will ever improve. There are a number of faults on the UK site too. I won't expect them to be fixed anytime soon. 

Mynki, both Celebrity and RCCL now have the same identical web site.  Although they have an internal IT group for sure, these sites were designed and rolled out by a contracted company (Accenture was involved I think but not sure if they designed and implemented).   if you remember back maybe a year ago (?) the website was upgraded and changed and rolled out.  First to a small beta test group. When it went live it was truly horrible but it has become better over time.  It seemed rushed into service.  I do think the current web site is better than the old version.  But not perfect and sometimes it is truly hard to find what you are looking for.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
bEwAbG

bEwAbG

Posted
Posted

The information on the old website was easier to find.  It was also more extensive.  Over a year later and the FAQ is still a disorganized mess that still doesn't contain everything the older version spelled out.  That doesn't really have to do with the mechanics of the website, though, which have indeed improved over time.  It took them a very long time to fix it, though.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
cangelmd

cangelmd

Posted
Posted

I have noticed that there are some similarities between RCL/Celebrity websites and the website of a professional organization that I belong to. This professional organization has a large public website that contains within it a private area where specific testing results have to be entered (highly regulated by the feds and the need for privacy. in contrast the public part of the website contains info of interest to the general public as well as info only of interest to the members of this organization. The security is not nearly as tight as that of a financial institution, so it is quite analogous to Celebrity with the open part of the website where you can search for cruises and the password protected part where you enter your data for your Express Pass.

My pro organization has a lot of the same problems with the website that Celebrity does - it is really glitchy, the org has spent bookoodles of money on upgrading it (it gets updates for maintenance at least monthly and seems like weekly). The search function is really bad (which is a problem because there is a lot of archived content on the site, webinars, white papers, all kinds of "stuff" if you can find it). And it just randomly goes down or just doesn't work or locks up, etc - sound familiar?

I've often wondered when I'm using either site, if the glitchiness has something to do with having to have that internal program, which is really not a website, it is a completely internal program that you have to access through the website. I know for our pro org, because I'm old enough to remember when we moved from reporting this info on paper to electronic reporting, that the system had to be custom built to collect the data - and it orginally was even worse than it is now.

Any IT folks out there?

Link to comment
Share on other sites
cangelmd

cangelmd

Posted
Posted
25 minutes ago, Floater4life said:

Can't say for sure but in my IT experience web sites have these kind of issues (Poor UI, errors, unstable interaction with back end systems) for one reason...…….IT function is outsourced.

LOL! Now I'm going to sound like a Luddite - I don't want to say exactly what I do, but I work AT, but do not work FOR a large organization, that I get to observe first hand. They are/have insourced IT to wholly owned subsidiary - I think that scenario may be worse than outsourcing! Bless their hearts as we say in the south, they sent all their knowledgeable IT employees with a wealth of industry specific experience to the subsidiary and then completely lost control. I think it is bad just because it is a computer.

 

As for my pro organization, I'm sure they had to get someone to build the system for them, it is too much of a one-off thing, but I think the small internal department has been slowly "fixing" it for the last 10 years.

 

It is all about money. And IT costs big, big money.

  • Thanks 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites
dkjretired

dkjretired

Posted
Posted

Another problem with the website is the difference between the different countries websites. Sometimes they have different info which contradicts themselves. When Celebrity went from three dress types to two several years ago it took them almost five years to change the U.K. site.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
DirtyDawg

DirtyDawg

Posted
Posted (edited)
7 hours ago, knittertwitter said:

 

For real?!  No wonder the Celebrity website is terrible.

 

 

For REAL! The top IT guy's name was Larry and he worked with his brother Darryl and his other brother Darryl. 

 

😊

Edited by DirtyDawg
  • Haha 4
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Please sign in to comment

You will be able to leave a comment after signing in



Sign In Now
 Share
Go to topic listing
  • Forum Jump
    • Categories
      • Welcome to Cruise Critic
      • New Cruisers
      • Cruise Lines “A – O”
      • Cruise Lines “P – Z”
      • River Cruising
      • ROLL CALLS
      • Cruise Critic News & Features
      • Digital Photography & Cruise Technology
      • Special Interest Cruising
      • Cruise Discussion Topics
      • UK Cruising
      • Australia & New Zealand Cruisers
      • Canadian Cruisers
      • North American Homeports
      • Ports of Call
      • Cruise Conversations
×
×
  • Create New...