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No Alcohol in any UK ports - what! 😱

ziggyuk

By ziggyuk,
in Norwegian Cruise Line

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rattla

rattla

Posted
Posted
33 minutes ago, ollienbertsmum said:

For me it is not a question of do I hate or love NCL.  In fact I am critical of what is going on with the alcohol issue, but I love cruising with NCL.  

 

My frustration is that we are not warned about the issue.  If NCL said “we can apply the package in 3 out of 5 ports (for example) so we will sell the package to you on a day by day basis”, then it would seem fair.  If they would warn customers that - when we are sailing in waters by Trieste we will not be able to serve you alcohol if you don’t have the package it would seem forewarned and fair.  

 

The way they are doing this seems so random.  You want all of this information before you get on board, not just go down to a bar and find a notice that basically says ‘we won’t be serving you tonight’.  That is what frustrates me and makes me cross.  


Im sort of in this camp. I’m not like “I must have alcohol”, but if I was aware up front I would have considered these sort of points when weighing up my decisions.  I’m flexible with cruise line and itinerary and maybe knowing there may be these restrictions in advance it would have lead me to consider an alternate line or cruise.

 

There’s plenty of choices of cruise out there and NCL does have some Cons compared to others, but a Pro, and part of the appeal of going with NCL for me this time was to get a wider choice of cocktails.  I’ve sailed with P&O most recently and missed the range of cocktails they have by comparison so this was a draw for me.  
So it’s a small consideration, but it’s something that attracted me towards NCL this time, even though I had to pay a bit more for this trip than I could have done with alternative options.  Hence the disappointment of maybe not being able to access them for a proportion of the trip, including key days like first and last day.

 

I do think it’s possible it’s a mess up on their side, but I also think it may be they then decided to try to get away without resolving it, hopefully there’s been enough uproar they are trying to fix the issue.

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Travelling2Some

Travelling2Some

Posted
Posted (edited)
1 hour ago, ollienbertsmum said:

For me it is not a question of do I hate or love NCL.  In fact I am critical of what is going on with the alcohol issue, but I love cruising with NCL.  

 

My frustration is that we are not warned about the issue.  If NCL said “we can apply the package in 3 out of 5 ports (for example) so we will sell the package to you on a day by day basis”, then it would seem fair.  If they would warn customers that - when we are sailing in waters by Trieste we will not be able to serve you alcohol if you don’t have the package it would seem forewarned and fair.  

 

The way they are doing this seems so random.  You want all of this information before you get on board, not just go down to a bar and find a notice that basically says ‘we won’t be serving you tonight’.  That is what frustrates me and makes me cross.  

Agree with everything you wrote.  We have status on NCL and always seem to lean into it because of that and also because we place a high value on evening entertainment, which they do well.  The FAS package is also a main factor for us in choosing NCL as many other lines have their drink packages priced so high that we have never bought them. 

 

However, I am getting a bit testy as we felt duped by bogus itinerary changes on our last two cruises that were announced right after final payment.  So that was "Strike 2".  Strike 1 was observing NCL continuing to sell and collect final payments during the pandemic on cruises that anyone here on CC (but not most cruisers) could predict would never sail and then fobbing people off with FCC for a future product whose price they were then able to inflate.  I did not loose money personally as I insisted on cash refunds.  Now we have "Strike 3" and it is NCL's pervasive lack of transparency that sours me once again.

Edited by Travelling2Some
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Travelling2Some

Travelling2Some

Posted
Posted
5 minutes ago, ChiefMateJRK said:

We were on the Sky in the Carribean in January and one day the app told us we were going to be in Canada the next day. 🤣

I saw an amusing one where somebody apparently did not know the difference between Sydney, Australia, and the Sydney in Canada.  No surprise that it took them awhile to figure out that Belfast is in the UK I guess.

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luv2kroooz Holiday Sharing Rare

luv2kroooz

Posted
Posted (edited)
5 hours ago, DCGuy64 said:

Leaving aside the possibility that administrative bungles can happen more than once across multiple countries (yes, shocking I know), what's your solution? If you ran NCL, how would you fix this? I'm curious to know.

Oohh. Ooh. I can offer my opinion. Let's assume this was an administrative bungle as you describe. Totally honest mistake. I would have added a sentence or two at the bottom of their signs that said something like....We deeply regret that this happened and are taking steps to correct this. Since you paid  service charges for bar service that is not being provided, we have already refunded the service charges in the amount of $21.80 that we collected for today. ( Or maybe 50%, we can all input the number). This will reflect as a REFUNDABLE onboard credit on your shipboard account. To our premium plus passengers, we are refunding the daily upgrade fee ( or portion of) plus your service charge. 

 

What I would not have done is responded to inquiries with confusing language and half truths about how port regulations are preventing them from opening the bars. That response makes it sounds like no one could ever serve alcohol in a UK port. And we all know that simply isn't true. They still haven't said if they are working to fix this. Instead, the article above says no comment from NCL. So, is it really and administrative bungle or could it be intentional? Who knows?

 

So, again I would ask, if this was an administrative bungle, why do you think they've acted the way they have to date? And I will put the question back to you because I am curious, if you were NCL and made an administrative bungle, how would you have handled it? 

Edited by luv2kroooz
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tony s

tony s

Posted
Posted

As I said simple solution for those with package. Ad unable to get served in certain ports, demand guest services refund the service charge as pre paid. If they refuse have them remove the DSC and tell staff why it was removed. After the inevitable crew discontent with bar staff who is getting tipped for doing nothing, the policy will be adjusted. Ad I said earlier it’s a nuclear option but effective one as paying customer, us should not be the loser. This is a paid vacation not a charity service.

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insidecabin "Live from...." Rare

insidecabin

Posted
Posted
30 minutes ago, Travelling2Some said:

Agree with everything you wrote.  We have status on NCL and always seem to lean into it because of that and also because we place a high value on evening entertainment, which they do well.  The FAS package is also a main factor for us in choosing NCL as many other lines have their drink packages priced so high that we have never bought them. 

 

However, I am getting a bit testy as we felt duped by bogus itinerary changes on our last two cruises that were announced right after final payment.  So that was "Strike 2".  Strike 1 was observing NCL continuing to sell and collect final payments during the pandemic on cruises that anyone here on CC (but not most cruisers) could predict would never sail and then fobbing people off with FCC for a future product whose price they were then able to inflate.  I did not loose money personally as I insisted on cash refunds.  Now we have "Strike 3" and it is NCL's pervasive lack of transparency that sours me once again.

Itinerary changes after final are fairly common across many cruise lines.

Some even stagger multiple changes to try to get round UK law that major change you can cancel for a full refund(contract cannot override) and where it is a cruise line change compensation for losses.

 

Incidentally most cruise lines sign up to the ABTA code of conduct and are covered by Package travel legislation which require the companies to notify customers of material changes ASAP.

 

For the Star cruise 11th May there was ample time to notify booked passengers as the issue was known on or before 4th of May.

Many knew already through social media.

 

 

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The Traveling Man

The Traveling Man

Posted
Posted
44 minutes ago, Travelling2Some said:

I saw an amusing one where somebody apparently did not know the difference between Sydney, Australia, and the Sydney in Canada.  No surprise that it took them awhile to figure out that Belfast is in the UK I guess.

We were on a Baltic cruise several years ago.  Someone on board checked online for the weather in St. Petersburgh instead of St. Petersburg and got quite a shock when they stepped outside in shorts and a T-shirt. 

 

We were on a cruise to Australia just before COVID.  One of our fellow passengers had checked schedules for flights from Miami to Melbourne.  WOW, they thought.  Only a couple of hours!

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Greener123

Greener123

Posted
Posted
46 minutes ago, luv2kroooz said:

Oohh. Ooh. I can offer my opinion. Let's assume this was an administrative bungle as you describe. Totally honest mistake. I would have added a sentence or two at the bottom of their signs that said something like....We deeply regret that this happened and are taking steps to correct this. Since you paid  service charges for bar service that is not being provided, we have already refunded the service charges in the amount of $21.80 that we collected for today. ( Or maybe 50%, we can all input the number). This will reflect as a REFUNDABLE onboard credit on your shipboard account. To our premium plus passengers, we are refunding the daily upgrade fee ( or portion of) plus your service charge. 

 

What I would not have done is responded to inquiries with confusing language and half truths about how port regulations are preventing them from opening the bars. That response makes it sounds like no one could ever serve alcohol in a UK port. And we all know that simply isn't true. They still haven't said if they are working to fix this. Instead, the article above says no comment from NCL. So, is it really and administrative bungle or could it be intentional? Who knows?

 

So, again I would ask, if this was an administrative bungle, why do you think they've acted the way they have to date? And I will put the question back to you because I am curious, if you were NCL and made an administrative bungle, how would you have handled it? 

Still remains to be seen if it is actually fixed… Dawn last week had no issues in Scotland, so we’ll see in Liverpool, Belfast and then Southampton again. 

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Travelling2Some

Travelling2Some

Posted
Posted (edited)
1 hour ago, insidecabin said:

Itinerary changes after final are fairly common across many cruise lines.

Some even stagger multiple changes to try to get round UK law that major change you can cancel for a full refund(contract cannot override) and where it is a cruise line change compensation for losses.

 

Incidentally most cruise lines sign up to the ABTA code of conduct and are covered by Package travel legislation which require the companies to notify customers of material changes ASAP.

 

For the Star cruise 11th May there was ample time to notify booked passengers as the issue was known on or before 4th of May.

Many knew already through social media.

 

 

We understand itinerary changes for legit reasons.  I did not want to go into detail because it is not relevant to the problem at hand except in the sense of explaining why we are now getting fed up.  We were on the Panama Canal cruise in January that was absolutely gutted and had a long thread on here.  Nightmare embarkation from a makeshift berth in LA,  Acapulco (a Level 4 "Do NOT Travel") substituted for Costa Rica "out of concern for our safety" which, BTW also invalidates your travel insurance.  Next, we were to have a day and a half in Panama but never even saw the dock.  NCL knew ships could not call due to construction well in advance.  (I saw it on previous Roll Calls but we were past final payment.)  Nicaragua was dropped too but I fully expected that from the get-go. 

 

Our Trans Atlantic in November dropped Horta (legit - seas too high to tender) and Madeira - NOT legit - perfect weather and we went right by it on our way to the Canaries.  It was to be a highlight for most and obviously dropped for no other reason than to save money.  We were told the port was overcrowded which was a blatant lie.  We would have been the only ship in port that day.  

 

Rant over but we're still pretty ticked and not up for possibly tolerating more NCL nonsense on our Baltics cruise in a few weeks.

 

 

Edited by Travelling2Some
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rattla

rattla

Posted
Posted (edited)
9 hours ago, flamingo_fancies said:

Just saw this from someone booked on the May 21st sailing on the Star. Seems like there will still be some sort of restrictions in place

Screenshot_20230517_221828.jpg


Why beer and wine and not other drinks?  🤷‍♂️. Also, let’s wait until we see what happens as my experience of receiving accurate and consistent information from via these cruise line call centre agents is not exactly great. 😊

Edited by rattla
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insidecabin "Live from...." Rare

insidecabin

Posted
Posted
37 minutes ago, rattla said:


Why beer and wine and not other drinks?  🤷‍♂️. Also, let’s wait until we see what happens as my experience of receiving accurate and consistent information from via these cruise line call centre agents is not exactly great. 😊

The next stops that are on the problem list are Dawn Belfast(they got drinks last stop Star didn't) then maybe Liverpool (first stop), then Portland(none last time) after Star.

 

21st is the next tester date for the Star.

 

 

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flamingo_fancies

flamingo_fancies

Posted
Posted
1 hour ago, rattla said:


Why beer and wine and not other drinks?  🤷‍♂️. Also, let’s wait until we see what happens as my experience of receiving accurate and consistent information from via these cruise line call centre agents is not exactly great. 😊

No as seen as when the problem first arose they were insisting there wasn't a problem

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hawkeyetlse

hawkeyetlse

Posted
Posted
4 hours ago, Krydstosser said:

If it was a mistake in UK, is it also a mistake in Livorno and Civitavechia?

 

It's not the same situation in Italy (and Greece), because people with beverage packages are being served (but limited to beer and wine specifically in and around Livorno). Consequently, as far as I know, passengers on those ships have not pressed the officers on board for specific explanations. If you don't do that, then you don't force them into making dubious statements in an attempt to appease dissatisfied guests and deflect blame from themselves. The kinds of bogus statements we have been seeing for the UK cruises: the port didn't tell us the rules in time, we can't know what the current rules are until the ship actually arrives in port each day, etc. etc.

 

And then finally: OK OK, maybe NCL messed up and we're working on it. Of course, we know this comes too late for passengers who have already been affected, and for them we will just pre-emptively say: no compensation will be offered.

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