Dine My Way & all new Dining questions since cruising restart!!

[aimee0715]

57 minutes ago, Steelers36 said:

When you do see times offered, how many different DR's?  They most likely have not loaded all DR's to the App.  But to get what you want, looks like you have to book on board or just show up as a walk up and you get taken care of.  I imagine it will be clearer after boarding where you should go as a walk-up.

 

I can pick from Boticelli or Da Vinci on most nights.  Some nights only Boticelli is given as an option. 

[cruisingram1]

2 hours ago, FlaMariner said:

 

.  So each evening we got it but we wasted time in line and had to plead, beg, request and demand...whatever they had in store for us that evening.

 

The waiters were great and were the highlight of our cruise but we were fighting to enjoy that and so without fixed seating dining and a few other things, we are not going to cruise Princess. 

That’s my point too. Instead of queuing on day 1 and walking to designated table on days 2-7 they’ve got us in the line every night. What a waste of time and  energy having to plead and beg for a table. Supposed to have pre-determined table designation tonight. We’ll see how that goes!

[Nebr.cruiser]

On our recent Discovery cruise we had no problems with just walking in--no reservations--but we don't dine early by preference.  Usually we go to the early show and then right to dinner.  Never had more than a five minute wait.

 

A couple of times when we went by a dining room early, noticed large lines and kind of a chaotic mess.

 

But, we are a party of three. This seemed to throw some of the dining room people for a loop.  One time, the person taking us to our seats was totally confused because she couldn't find a table with three seats, kept searching and searching.

 

  She had to be told to just seat us at a table for four, which I found hilarious but kind of sad.

Edited April 7, 2022 by Nebr.cruiser

[Thrak]

7 hours ago, Nebr.cruiser said:

But, we are a party of three. This seemed to throw some of the dining room people for a loop.  One time, the person taking us to our seats was totally confused because she couldn't find a table with three seats, kept searching and searching.

 

Wow. That is disturbing.

[Roberto256]

On 4/7/2022 at 10:31 AM, Nebr.cruiser said:

But, we are a party of three. This seemed to throw some of the dining room people for a loop.  One time, the person taking us to our seats was totally confused because she couldn't find a table with three seats, kept searching and searching.

 

This is just like the app ... spinning and spinning.

 

"Check back later."  ??

 

[tere247]

On 4/5/2022 at 8:04 PM, cruisingram1 said:

That’s my point too. Instead of queuing on day 1 and walking to designated table on days 2-7 they’ve got us in the line every night. What a waste of time and  energy having to plead and beg for a table. Supposed to have pre-determined table designation tonight. We’ll see how that goes!

We were on a 12 night b2b in December on the Regal. When we set up our information on the medallion app, under dining preferences, we requested seating for 2 at 6:30 every night.   We were assigned a table, I believe in the Palm dining room,, and had the same table and waiter every night. On those nights we went to one of the specialty restaurants, we were able to cancel our main dining room reservation without loosing our table the following nights.

[FlaMariner]

Not our experience on the Sky 3/12 thru 3/28....Had same time reservations in the MDR but had to queue every night and ask for a certain table.  

 

When asked if we could just go there every night, was told no guarantee and we must wait in line.  

 

 

[cmorgeng]

We just boarded the discovery and they are saying every single specialty restaurant is 100% booked for the entire cruise. It’s lovely because we were unable to make reservations through the medallion app because the technology sucks so bad. so, now we have specialty dining credits we can’t use. 
 

[Steelers36]

1 hour ago, cmorgeng said:

We just boarded the discovery and they are saying every single specialty restaurant is 100% booked for the entire cruise. It’s lovely because we were unable to make reservations through the medallion app because the technology sucks so bad. so, now we have specialty dining credits we can’t use. 
 

Absolute bummer.  And I don't understand it because 100% of table space has never been made available pre-cruise.  I presume you tried shortly after boarding?  

[cmorgeng]

37 minutes ago, Steelers36 said:

Absolute bummer.  And I don't understand it because 100% of table space has never been made available pre-cruise.  I presume you tried shortly after boarding?  

Yes. We boarded and called to make reservations because we couldn’t ever do it on the app. We were told that all specialty restaurants are totally booked for all nights this week. 
 

[pootsien2]

24 minutes ago, cmorgeng said:

Yes. We boarded and called to make reservations because we couldn’t ever do it on the app. We were told that all specialty restaurants are totally booked for all nights this week. 
 

So now, when the specialty restaurant begins serving, try going there in person, ask for a table and see what they say. That used to work before the app "occasionally". Possibly someone cancels their reservation or they have more servers and an empty table. Don't give up! i hope that will work for you. 

[Nebr.cruiser]

2 hours ago, pootsien2 said:

So now, when the specialty restaurant begins serving, try going there in person, ask for a table and see what they say. That used to work before the app "occasionally". Possibly someone cancels their reservation or they have more servers and an empty table. Don't give up! i hope that will work for you. 

This worked for us on the Discovery.  We didn't try to make reservations pre-cruise.  One day we read the MDR menu and weren't that interested so I called to see if I could get a reservation.  I was told they were completely booked for the whole cruise.  Said maybe we could walk up and see if they could get us in.

 

So, that night we went to the Crown Grill and asked.  The front desk people were so nice and said they thought they could in ten minutes or so.  It took maybe 15 minutes, but we did get a table (for 3) and had a very good meal and great service.  Way too much to eat, of course.

 

So, it is worth a try.  They will try to accommodate you if they possibly can.

[Tedferg]

Our recent experience on Majestic agrees with the above posts. Specifically, eating a little later 7:00 plus was easy. We had not made reservations beforehand. First night was crazy at 6:30. Long line for those with reservations. They took our cabin number and had us wait nearby, periodically a waiter would walk through shouting cabin numbers, sometimes taking parties to other dining rooms. Oh, for a pager and glass of wine in a nearby bar :-). We made reservations for other nights using app. Sometimes DMW would not come up on cabin TV. Were never able to link with our fellow passengers and so we made separate reservations for two and told them we were four at check in, that worked OK.

 

I think making reservations pre cruise for specific dining rooms / times, is an illusion. Great idea but hard to execute and hard for Dining Rooms to implement in real time on board. One time we made our two separate reservations for two, but when we checked in at Allegro, they said one reservation was for Concerto. They saw that Concerto could accommodate four and sent us there, so they do have visibility for other locations. Service was fine and we were mostly very happy with food.

[JF - retired RRT]

1 hour ago, Tedferg said:

Our recent experience on Majestic agrees with the above posts. Specifically, eating a little later 7:00 plus was easy. We had not made reservations beforehand. First night was crazy at 6:30. Long line for those with reservations. They took our cabin number and had us wait nearby, periodically a waiter would walk through shouting cabin numbers, sometimes taking parties to other dining rooms. Oh, for a pager and glass of wine in a nearby bar :-). We made reservations for other nights using app. Sometimes DMW would not come up on cabin TV. Were never able to link with our fellow passengers and so we made separate reservations for two and told them we were four at check in, that worked OK.

 

I think making reservations pre cruise for specific dining rooms / times, is an illusion. Great idea but hard to execute and hard for Dining Rooms to implement in real time on board. One time we made our two separate reservations for two, but when we checked in at Allegro, they said one reservation was for Concerto. They saw that Concerto could accommodate four and sent us there, so they do have visibility for other locations. Service was fine and we were mostly very happy with food.

This will NOT get fixed, until Princess realizes DMW won't work until one MDR is set aside for "same time/same table".

[Steelers36]

6 minutes ago, JF - retired RRT said:

This will NOT get fixed, until Princess realizes DMW won't work until one MDR is set aside for "same time/same table".

100% true.  The "Same Time/Table" reservations (a.k.a. TD style) need to be collected and then processed a few days before departure by DR mgmt on the ship.  That system worked and the IT system is a problem looking for an impossible solution.

[Tedferg]

35 minutes ago, JF - retired RRT said:

This will NOT get fixed, until Princess realizes DMW won't work until one MDR is set aside for "same time/same table".

Do you envision one dining room with variable times or set sittings as original TD was? Seems the old two sittings had problems and not sure how to provide TD experience efficiently. Even now DMW is haphazard for people choosing a variety of times.

[mpk]

so.....  if I am reading these reports correctly, the reservations we make in DMW are essentially useless since there are still lines when you show up.  Maybe rename it "DMV" to describe the experience, lol  😄

[Tedferg]

36 minutes ago, mpk said:

so.....  if I am reading these reports correctly, the reservations we make in DMW are essentially useless since there are still lines when you show up.  Maybe rename it "DMV" to describe the experience, lol  😄

Yes correct, I think after a few days reservations worked better especially 7:00 or later, just a short line.

[Dbld777]

1 hour ago, Steelers36 said:

100% true.  The "Same Time/Table" reservations (a.k.a. TD style) need to be collected and then processed a few days before departure by DR mgmt on the ship.  That system worked and the IT system is a problem looking for an impossible solution.

I'm getting the feeling that there was little to no implementation training for the dining room managers and they are each implementing the DMW system the way that they think it should work.

[cruisingram1]

4 hours ago, Steelers36 said:

100% true.  The "Same Time/Table" reservations (a.k.a. TD style) need to be collected and then processed a few days before departure by DR mgmt on the ship.  That system worked and the IT system is a problem looking for an impossible solution.

All these pages of comments mostly come down to the same thing. People are opting for a Traditional Dining experience that does not exist on the app. It pretends to allow you to do it and if you do manage to get it set up,  you have to be lucky if the system doesn't mess you up after you board. I am going to remain hopeful that someone is actually listening to the many voices complaining and do something about it. Can't believe management would hear the negatives and choose to ignore so as not to lose face because their program isn't working the way they envisioned. I don't know how they set things up in the olden days, but the thing is to save however many tables are needed to service TD and go from there. There was a box I checked off that I wanted a table near the window. Crazy! Didn't realize that was the least of my issues. I was happy just to get a table for 4 anywhere in the dining room. I can say with 99.99% certainty that no one in the dining room knew or cared that i wanted a window table!

[Tedferg]

Do other cruise lines have TD?

[cruisingram1]

3 hours ago, Tedferg said:

Do you envision one dining room with variable times or set sittings as original TD was? Seems the old two sittings had problems and not sure how to provide TD experience efficiently. Even now DMW is haphazard for people choosing a variety of times.

I'm guessing the issue with the original TD was people not showing up at their dining times. The  additional food venues they added to the ship only compounded the issue. There would be empty tables scattered throughout the dining room and staff would be underutilized. I can understand they needed to address this imbalance. When it was just the main dining room or buffet, it wasn't as much of a challenge. Clearly they need to put their thinking caps on and try a different angle because this one isn't working the way they want.

How can their system accommodate larger family groups (20-30 people) who all want to eat together on several tables next to each other? No way this app can handle this every night. I'm thinking of our next family cruise.. which at this point won't be on Princess.

[Astro Flyer]

Disembarked Discovery yesterday (4/10) after 2 weeks onboard and there were many DMW problems.
 

Our nightly 1800 reservations in Skagway (6 midship) were made last June when DMW began. Upon boarding they were changed to Ketchikan (6 aft) so we accepted that change having found waiters we liked to have the same table. Near the end of the 1st cruise we talked to the staff at the entrance to have the same table at 1800 for the next cruise…consider it done. On the 2nd cruise we were assigned at 1700 in Ketchikan thankfully at the same private table. That time was too early for my wife but the only other time was at 1840 in Skagway at a shared table…not much of a choice. I talked to many others with missing confirmed reservations so we weren’t alone.

 

For the first time never saw the maître d’ nor a headwaiter even briefly stop to talk to any passengers. My guess is that with so many reservations issues & no answers to provide they decided to not engage anyone in conversation.
 

And now that the former CCL chief innovator who created MC including DMW is now PCL president think we’re stuck with DMW. In my opinion staff have been provided an unworkable system that is basically ATD with reservations every 20 minutes in addition to seating those without reservations. And if the DMW system cannot handle 60% capacity it’ll get even worse at full capacity.

[highloyo]

We were aboard the Majestic 3/5-3/12. We had reservations made on the app for a party of 4 each night with a private table for either 6:20 or 6:40 in one or the other open dining rooms. We waited no more than a few minutes each night except 1 night we waited about 10 minutes. I felt the app worked well for reservations. One night spent at SD with pre cruise reservations also went without a problem. It’s possible that the passenger count is much higher but one dining room is still closed. I could see that causing a major problem.

[FlaMariner]

12 hours ago, Tedferg said:

Do other cruise lines have TD?

 

Holland America Line offers two choices....1). Anytime Dining. 2) Traditional Fixed seating dining.....You choose when you book the cruise (no app required!).