What are your Yacht Club Butler requests?

[valandemmy]

I know in the Haven, the butler will bring breakfast, lunch and dinner and do an in room set up, would bring things for a bath./run the bath before we got back from a show, ect....   What are the things you ask for?

[oceans.calling]

We realize how hard they work every day for every cabin they have to maintain and choose not to burden them with simple things we can do. Really, run a bath? Wow. 

[valandemmy]

8 minutes ago, oceans.calling said:

. Really, run a bath? Wow. 

 

LOL.  I said they would, as in they told us they would.  NOT that we had them do it.  in fact, other than them bringing daily snacks to the room..and walking us down to shows...we never used them.

[Georgia_Peaches]

We request ice in the evening and occasionally order room service.  That's it.  However, they often insist on thing like escorting us to dinner and the theater, hand delivering our desired news paper and setting up our deck chairs on the pool deck.  YC butlers are awesome.

[Two Wheels Only]

42 minutes ago, oceans.calling said:

Really, run a bath? Wow. 

 

I know that it's not exactly the same but we've had multiple butlers across different ships offer to fill our hot-tub while we were still using the pool on the sundeck. That way, once we leave the sundeck, the kids can warm up in the hot-tub immediately after the "cold-air" walk to the suite. One parent can shower while the other hangs out on the balcony with the kids. 

 

 

1 hour ago, valandemmy said:

I know in the Haven, the butler will bring breakfast, lunch and dinner and do an in room set up,...

 

Breakfast delivery and set-up are no problem in the Yacht Club. You can even hand-write requests if the doorknob sheet doesn't have what you want. Because there are 4 of us, it usually takes 2 people to bring in all of the food and set it up on the balcony. 

 

Lunch and dinner delivery aren't really done on MSC as easily as they are done in the Haven. Even if the suite is large enough, MSC doesn't like to deliver lunch or dinner from the Yacht Club restaurant or from any specialty restaurant. Room service (especially pizza delivery 🍕) is no problem, of course. 

 

The list of what the butler can do is longer than what most guests ask for. I give the edge for butler service to MSC over NCL. Both groups of butlers are highly trained but often the communication (or lack thereof) between the guests and the butler leads to different results of satisfaction. Some butlers suggest more services than others while some guests request more services than others. 

 

 

 

 

Edited May 7 by Two Wheels Only

[morpheusofthesea]

The question is "What should be your butler requests ?"

Your butler is indispensable in solving problems and in helping avoid problems. I posted last month about a couple in the Yacht Club that sat at a table next to us in the YC Restaurant one evening. The lady was dying to tell everyone within earshot what had just happened to them at Butcher's Cut. They had a reservation for dinner and were seated next to a family with loud, unruly children and asked to be switched to another table. The manager refused to change their table. They got up and canceled their dinner reservation telling the manager they were returning to the YC Restaurant for their dinner. MSC in their advertising suggests using your butler to escort one everywhere (especially when exiting the confines of the YC) so the staff outside the YC know one is a VIP and will be treated as such.

P.S. 

I copied this from the MSC YC web site. "SIGNATURE DINING"

"Savor the flavors of exquisite specialty restaurants such as Butcher's Cut, Kaito Sushi & Teppanyaki, HOLA Tacos, and Ocean Cay."

"Elevate your dining experience with exclusive perks like priority reservation times, premium seating, and the luxury of a personal butler escort if you choose." Would also add that even the staff outside the Yacht Clubs do not like dealing with the clientele (steerage).

  If one doesn't differentiate oneself from the crowd, one will be treated like the crowd .

Edited May 7 by morpheusofthesea
P.S.

[reedprincess]

We usually have them unpack for us (yes, it's a listed perk, yes they offer and yes, we take them up on it, and no - don't give a dang whether they see our unmentionables or not. Non-issue for us). Way better organized and put away than we would do ourselves. And we can go enjoy sailaway and come back to get changed for dinner, etc  without any pause.  

 

Pizza delivery with two glasses of wine just about every night.  Occasional other room service items, but not much.  

 

Escort to dinner when dining specialty and/or to the show..  went to dinner on our own in Divina last year and our butler actually came looking for us and seemed out out that we didn't take advantage of his escort services. 🤷🏻‍♀️

 

That's about it for us .. we're pretty easy..

 

[Beamafar]

As an FYI - you must be in the cabin if you require a butler to unpack/pack for you. 
 

YC butlers also offer a shoe-shine service. 

[Fogfog]

We don’t make work

We ask that things like coke, soda in fridge be replaced with juices.

Ice daily.

Smart Wrist bands show status both YC and our voyager status so we never have issues around the ships.
They do such a great job and I believe there are notes in profile so they know what to  anticipate from past sailings. Crew that have know us from previous sailings greet us like family. We enjoy hearing from them and seeing them again

 

 

 

[Best Cat Mom]

Our "must have" is coffee and Baileys delivered to our cabin every morning. This is sometimes brought by our butler, a different available butler, the night butler or our junior butler.

 

We've never had a bath drawn on a cruise, but for land-based holidays I so enjoy having our butler draw a rose petal bath in the swimming pool sized tubs. (At home, I have no issue doing it for myself sans petals.)

 

 

[SpareBrew]

We always ask for 2 glasses of Baileys each night so we can enjoy it at bedtime.  On one cruise, the butler got smart and left us the whole bottle!

[Best Cat Mom]

2 hours ago, Fogfog said:

Crew that have know us from previous sailings greet us like family. We enjoy hearing from them and seeing them again

We agree! The YC crew is a small family and I'm amazed at how many remember us. The interesting thing is that it doesn't matter if we had tipped them specifically or not -- they still greet us warmly.

[cruisebeachgirl703]

Just off the Meraviglia YC. Service last July was great, service this time was mediocre. YC lounge bartenders seemed frazzled. No YC director, had to leave for personal reasons we were told. On a 6 day cruise we received chocolates in the evening 3 times. Nightly treat only 3 times. No afternoon snacks. No chocolate box with thank you from YC director last night. Top sail lounge snacks throughout the day were lacking. Last year flavored potato chips, this year, walnuts and raisins. Missed dinner 1 night playing in the casino, went to top sail lounge for anything quick, walked away with nothing. Chocolate covered apple was about all that was out. For us, we will ask the butler once for something simple/reasonable. If we have to repeat and repeat the request it starts to get exhausting. 

[morpheusofthesea]

1 hour ago, cruisebeachgirl703 said:

No YC director,

Very interesting the resulting lack of service and amenities. If there should ever be a repeat of this type situation, try seeking out the Head Butler with any concerns... They are next in line to be YC directors and should have taken control of the situation. There are those elusive YC directors that have depended upon their Head butlers to fill in for them. Appears on your cruise you had a 'double whammy'.

[ajoneen]

8 hours ago, Beamafar said:

As an FYI - you must be in the cabin if you require a butler to unpack/pack for you. 
 

YC butlers also offer a shoe-shine service. 

Hmmm I've heard others say they have left this to the butler and returned from dinner to a very organised cabin.

 

4 hours ago, cruisebeachgirl703 said:

Just off the Meraviglia YC. -No YC director, had to leave for personal reasons we were told. 

Oh I hope this is remedied soon- I sail the end of the month- first time YC and SO looking forward to a smooth stress free voyage. 🤞 🙏

[GPPhilly]

Our butler offered to unpack and said we did not need to be there.  We politely declined.  Our butler also was so attentive and asking us if we wanted certain things,  This was most recently on the Euribia.    

[GPPhilly]

4 hours ago, cruisebeachgirl703 said:

Just off the Meraviglia YC. Service last July was great, service this time was mediocre. YC lounge bartenders seemed frazzled. No YC director, had to leave for personal reasons we were told. On a 6 day cruise we received chocolates in the evening 3 times. Nightly treat only 3 times. No afternoon snacks. No chocolate box with thank you from YC director last night. Top sail lounge snacks throughout the day were lacking. Last year flavored potato chips, this year, walnuts and raisins. Missed dinner 1 night playing in the casino, went to top sail lounge for anything quick, walked away with nothing. Chocolate covered apple was about all that was out. For us, we will ask the butler once for something simple/reasonable. If we have to repeat and repeat the request it starts to get exhausting. 

Was the director Maria?   She was very good on the Seaside in October.   

[Beamafar]

The butlers are not supposed to pack/unpack without someone in attendance because they leave themselves exposed to being accused of stealing should someone claim that valuables have gone missing.

 

 

Edited May 7 by Beamafar

[cruisebeachgirl703]

17 hours ago, GPPhilly said:

Was the director Maria?   She was very good on the Seaside in October.   

No YC director onboard, so would not know who left the ship. It was not named.

[oceans.calling]

It was Maria. Hugh is rumored to be coming back. 

[ajoneen]

Could I ask for a tea service in the lounge on the first sea day?? 
Not the full tiered set up- just a pot and scones/fixings? 

[GPPhilly]

38 minutes ago, ajoneen said:

Could I ask for a tea service in the lounge on the first sea day?? 
Not the full tiered set up- just a pot and scones/fixings? 

Yes,  I am not sure what scones etc they might have but you can ask 

[no1talks]

1 hour ago, ajoneen said:

"Could I ask for a tea service in the lounge on the first sea day?? 
Not the full tiered set up- just a pot and scones/fixings?"

 

This is one of the bullet points on the printed request sheet we give our butlers. Please let your butler know early in your cruise.

 

We select our excursions with an eye on being back on the ship for afternoon tea in YC so we can have tea service every day.

 

•You will have multiple bagged teas from which to choose.

•The butler will serve a three-tiered assortment of available YC bites.

•Scones are only baked for the big afternoon tea, which should happen on the last sea day.

[GPPhilly]

We are on the Meraviglia in Sept and will miss the daily high tea we had on our Northern Europe cruise last month.  We very much enjoyed the high tea daily. 

[no1talks]

17 minutes ago, GPPhilly said:

"We very much enjoyed the high tea daily."

 

Is that the cart-served loose tea? Not bagged tea dust?

 

If so, I have another reason to eagerly anticipate the time we shall branch out to European port YC cruises.