Listening to Announcements in Your Cabin

[sailawayward]

We previously sailed on the Rotterdam in June.  Whenever the Cruise Director or the Captain made an announcement over the loudspeaker, we'd have to open our stateroom door in order to hear them from the audio speakers in the public passageway.  Is this standard protocol, or should passengers be able to listen to and adjust the volume for announcements inside their cabins?  If so, how?  We just don't remember seeing anything like this in our cabin, and we never thought to ask about it while we were onboard.  

[The-Inside-Cabin]

4 minutes ago, sailawayward said:

We previously sailed on the Rotterdam in June.  Whenever the Cruise Director or the Captain made an announcement over the loudspeaker, we'd have to open our stateroom door in order to hear them from the audio speakers in the public passageway.  Is this standard protocol, or should passengers be able to listen to and adjust the volume for announcements inside their cabins?  If so, how?  We just don't remember seeing anything like this in our cabin, and we never thought to ask about it while we were onboard.  

That is standard.    

 

The announcements are usually broadcast over the same channel as the bow cam.  Or maybe a different channel now, but they are usually on one of the channels.  Otherwise you have to open the door.    There isn't anyway for you to control the volume.

 

 

Edited September 22, 2023 by The-Inside-Cabin

[sailawayward]

Thanks!  We recently watched a video of an older Royal Caribbean cabin that had a knob/dial for announcements, and we began to think maybe we missed something from our Rotterdam cabin. 

[Heartgrove]

Pretty standard across most cruise lines. If you hear an announcement in your staterooms, it will be an important one to listen and comply with.

 

[Sir PMP]

Just turn up the bow cam.

[Rubyfisch]

3 hours ago, Heartgrove said:

Pretty standard across most cruise lines. If you hear an announcement in your staterooms, it will be an important one to listen and comply with.

 

We found that out with the seemingly deafening 6:00 announcement on departure morning. The captain's voice startled us fully awake (note - I'm not complaining). I am sure it was to help make sure we were all up and out in an orderly and timely fashion.

[Banditswife]

4 hours ago, Heartgrove said:

Pretty standard across most cruise lines. If you hear an announcement in your staterooms, it will be an important one to listen and comply with.

 

This.  They have the capability to broadcast into the staterooms, but only do so for important messages they don't want you to miss, like muster drill or an emergency situation. The reminder to do your muster drill thing was broadcast into the cabins IIRC.

Edited September 22, 2023 by Banditswife

[rodndonna]

14 minutes ago, Rubyfisch said:

We found that out with the seemingly deafening 6:00 announcement on departure morning. The captain's voice startled us fully awake (note - I'm not complaining). I am sure it was to help make sure we were all up and out in an orderly and timely fashion.

 

We always laugh when we hear the departing one - we call it the "GET UP and GET OFF!" announcement.

[Wayfairers]

54 minutes ago, Rubyfisch said:

We found that out with the seemingly deafening 6:00 announcement on departure morning. The captain's voice startled us fully awake (note - I'm not complaining). I am sure it was to help make sure we were all up and out in an orderly and timely fashion.

Wish those doing back to backs had the option to opt out of those announcements!  🤣🤣

[Heidi13]

10 hours ago, sailawayward said:

We previously sailed on the Rotterdam in June.  Whenever the Cruise Director or the Captain made an announcement over the loudspeaker, we'd have to open our stateroom door in order to hear them from the audio speakers in the public passageway.  Is this standard protocol, or should passengers be able to listen to and adjust the volume for announcements inside their cabins?  If so, how?  We just don't remember seeing anything like this in our cabin, and we never thought to ask about it while we were onboard.  

 

The PA system has numerous zones and an "All Zones" that can be selected on the control stations. Announcements to pax cabins are severely restricted to emergency and urgent content, usually requiring the Master's approval.

 

Since the pax cabins zone is not normally selected for routine announcements, so are usually available from the alleyway and cabin TV channel.

 

Routine announcements through pax cabins are extremely rare, as that is a career liming mistake by the responsible officer/purser.

[Reagan0712]

I’ve tried to get the announcements on the Bow Cam but by the time I get that channel up the announcements are mostly over so it’s easier to just open the door.

[horseymike]

1 hour ago, Wayfairers said:

Wish those doing back to backs had the option to opt out of those announcements!  🤣🤣

They do. Just put in some earplugs 🤣

[horseymike]

Only kidding 😎

[Torquer]

9 minutes ago, Reagan0712 said:

I’ve tried to get the announcements on the Bow Cam but by the time I get that channel up the announcements are mostly over so it’s easier to just open the door.

I wish there was a button in each cabin so that you could opt-in to getting these captain/cruise director routine announcements, since we always listen to them.  We are fortunate to always be in the PS, which has two TVs.  We keep the TV in the living room turned on all day, even when we are not in the room, tuned to the bow cam channel.  So when we hear an announcement all we have to do is hit the unmute button on the remote to listen to it in the room.

[rafinmd]

I wish there was a second channel where we could get the announcements but not the canned music the rest of the time.  Announcements against a background of silence would be great.

 

Roy

[sciencewonk]

3 minutes ago, rafinmd said:

I wish there was a second channel where we could get the announcements but not the canned music the rest of the time.  Announcements against a background of silence would be great.

 

Roy

I liked the canned music but only for a day or two.  After that I noticed that it was a small playlist and that they were playing multi-movement compositions like the movements were separate pieces.  (I'm not sure which of these bothered me the most.)

[USN59-79]

We noticed when we were last on the Westerdam that the Captain's noon announcement was broadcast in our room, but when he turned the mike over to the Cruise Director (or whatever they are called today) that we had to open the door to hear it.  Personally, I would like the option to hear both of them in our room, especially on sea days.

Ray

[Mary229]

On some ships there is a sneaky little button on the headboard which allows/disallows all announcements.  

[Heidi13]

2 hours ago, Mary229 said:

On some ships there is a sneaky little button on the headboard which allows/disallows all announcements.  

 

It may control many announcements, but the main Bridge Control Station is required to over-ride all others. Announcements made from the main Bridge Control Station must be audible throughout the entire ship and will cut-out any P/A announcements from another control station, theatre audio, casino, piped music, etc. During an evening show, if the Bridge selects "All Zones" the show music/audio stops and the announcement is heard throughout the ship, including all cabins.

 

During annual inspections, I have walked the ship many times with Flag/Class Inspectors proving this fact.

[oakridger]

5 hours ago, USN59-79 said:

Personally, I would like the option to hear both of them in our room, especially on sea days.

 

"Option" is the key word for me.  I don't like announcements by the cruise director in general and certainly don't want to hear them in my cabin!  If I want to know what time bingo starts, or what movie is playing today I can read the Daily or look at the Navigator App, thank you! 🙄

 

I do want to hear the captain's daily announcement but not in the cabin except on the TV Bow Cam channel.  Options!

 

~Nancy

[Mary229]

7 hours ago, Heidi13 said:

 

It may control many announcements, but the main Bridge Control Station is required to over-ride all others. Announcements made from the main Bridge Control Station must be audible throughout the entire ship and will cut-out any P/A announcements from another control station, theatre audio, casino, piped music, etc. During an evening show, if the Bridge selects "All Zones" the show music/audio stops and the announcement is heard throughout the ship, including all cabins.

 

During annual inspections, I have walked the ship many times with Flag/Class Inspectors proving this fact.

Right, I should have been clearer.  On some ships there is a button that pushed allows you to hear non-essential announcements in your room

[BackNow]

On the Konningsdam at the beginning of Sept, you can barely heard the announcements in the public areas.  At the Lido Market I had to stand under a speaker to hear.  There were no sound under a lot of speakers.  They were either not working or turned off.  The speaker with sound was not very loud.  I wanted to hear the announcement as it was informing us what deck to get ashore.

 

We had 2 cabins side by side.  I used the phone to call the other cabin.  A lot of times the phone in the other cabin do not ring.  It did ring once.

 

On the first night, our phone ring while we were asleep.  Seems like a crew member called to see if we had called them.  We were asleep.

 

Seems to me, their electronic systems need to be upgraded or fixed.

 

 

 

[NextOne]

21 hours ago, USN59-79 said:

We noticed when we were last on the Westerdam that the Captain's noon announcement was broadcast in our room, but when he turned the mike over to the Cruise Director (or whatever they are called today) that we had to open the door to hear it.  Personally, I would like the option to hear both of them in our room, especially on sea days.

Ray

Same thing happened on the Zuiderdam for the Voyage of the Vikings, at least for the return trip.

[VMax1700]

Currently on Rotterdam and there is a new booklet in the stateroom titled 'The Basics'.  It has a lot of information including about announcements (no announcements before 8am even if the ship arrives early) and non emergency announcements will not be broadcast into stateroom - use bow camera channel)