Dining reservations

[suzyed]

On 6/17/2024 at 7:01 AM, negn said:

Went on to reserve times.   Guess what not available!  Should have known June 17 did not really mean June 17

Well it was changed from June 17th to July 1st, but guess what?  It's still a mess and reservation that you want cannot be had.  
I got through half of my 30 day cruise and then couldn't make any more reservations for a private table and in some instances could not make any reservation!

[suzyed]

On 6/17/2024 at 7:48 AM, PacnGoNow said:

https://www.princess.com/en-us/news/news-releases/2024/04/princess-cruises-rolls-out-fleetwide-dining-revolution-traditional-reservable-open-seating-and-anywhere-service-now-available-for-every-guest-preference
 

It’s only been 2 months since the announcement!  😆Coming soon?  Maybe IT is in another time zone?  Another planet?

 

 

Funny but yet not!  IT is terrible.

[suzyed]

On 6/17/2024 at 12:57 PM, phabric said:

Waiting to book my dining

I am STILL waiting to book my dining.

[suzyed]

15 hours ago, Cruise till you drop said:

Thanks but didn’t work

Didn't work for me either.

[susancruzs]

It can't possibly be this easy, can it?  I decided to try because I haven't had any luck with the web version.  On my phone, make sure everything is green, go to my Oct. 17th Emerald cruise.

 

First dining room, nothing available, 2nd one, time slots every 20 minutes, 3rd one, time slots 5 and 7:30 PM, I chose 5, populated for 14 days and got a confirmation.  What the heck, Princess?

I'm very skeptical as nothing they've done lately leads me to believe it would work like this!

 

[susancruzs]

Wouldn't post then it posted twice, sorry!

 

 

 

Edited July 8 by susancruzs
duplicate

[Z0nker]

15 minutes ago, susancruzs said:

It can't possibly be this easy, can it?  I decided to try because I haven't had any luck with the web version.  On my phone, make sure everything is green, go to my Oct. 17th Emerald cruise.

 

First dining room, nothing available, 2nd one, time slots every 20 minutes, 3rd one, time slots 5 and 7:30 PM, I chose 5, populated for 14 days and got a confirmation.  What the heck, Princess?

I'm very skeptical as nothing they've done lately leads me to believe it would work like this!

 

Congrats! Just to be sure you could check back in a few days and see if the reservations are still there. But I think you’re good to go. 

[arizonaperson]

@susancruzs could you share your dining reservation ? No,not your confirmation or your name or anything like that.

So you booked traditional dining room at 5 PM and did you have a choice to get a private table or a shared table or both?  I have a thread called new dining,ship by ship that I am trying to update. Do I have the dining rooms correct for the  Emerald princess ? Your cruise is October 2024? Thanks.

 

Here is what I have for Emerald Princess:

Emerald Princess -2024/2025

Michelangelo is traditional 5 pm & 7:30pm

Botticelli is reservable every 20 minute time slots

DA Vinci walk-in

[PR-Texas]

On 7/4/2024 at 2:41 PM, Z0nker said:

Speculation here, but I suspect people who prefer walk in dining are not planners and are therefore unlikely to be on Cruise Critic. 

Not necessarily.  I am a planner.  Excursions for our Nov 2024 cruisetour have been selected and paid for for months.  We're used to eating fairly late and just decided that we wanted to "wing it" for dining.  If that doesn't work out the first couple of nights then we'll book reservations on board. DH would prefer a private table and I would enjoy sharing so we may just go with the flow of what's available. 

 

Sorry for the frustrations for folks trying to book dining.  Considering the number of reservations involved (probably between 5 and 10 million) I'm really surprised it's working as well as it is. 

[OceanoPair]

Was able to make Reservable same time each night reservations for Discovery(Nov/Dec 2024), Discovery(Mar/April 2025 B2B), and Emerald(Jan 2026) without any problems once the app  opened up. App worked flawlessly. Would suggest to anyone who wants Reservable same time every night to make them before Specialty Dining, so as not to have make day by day reservations around your Specialty Dining reservations. Not sure what would have happened if I had checked the "same time every night" box, but I didn't want to chance it. The only thing that puzzled me is the availability to book Traditional or Reservable on the Grand( Jan 2025) when we have Suite Dining. The old system would only allow Specialty Dining as we didn't have to make reservation being in a suite.

[Mara4166]

1 hour ago, OceanoPair said:

The only thing that puzzled me is the availability to book Traditional or Reservable on the Grand( Jan 2025) when we have Suite Dining. The old system would only allow Specialty Dining as we didn't have to make reservation being in a suite.

someone in a suite might like the traditional shared table dining so that does make sense. I guess it was too difficult for Princess IT to exclude the reservable option.

[Cruise till you drop]

2 hours ago, OceanoPair said:

Was able to make Reservable same time each night reservations for Discovery(Nov/Dec 2024), Discovery(Mar/April 2025 B2B), and Emerald(Jan 2026) without any problems once the app  opened up. App worked flawlessly. Would suggest to anyone who wants Reservable same time every night to make them before Specialty Dining, so as not to have make day by day reservations around your Specialty Dining reservations. Not sure what would have happened if I had checked the "same time every night" box, but I didn't want to chance it. The only thing that puzzled me is the availability to book Traditional or Reservable on the Grand( Jan 2025) when we have Suite Dining. The old system would only allow Specialty Dining as we didn't have to make reservation being in a suite.

When you say that you did this when the app opened up, what date exactly did you do this ?

[Cathygh]

I have just booked a cruise for September 21st. I can only book tables for 2 in any of the main dining rooms, is that right? We would prefer to share!

[Cruisemeister2002]

A few observations on this unsatisfactory dining situation. The roll out in my humble opinion is completely wrong. Princess should have informed all passengers paid up or otherwise which restaurant would be available on what ship. They should then, regardless of status as per tiered benefits system (Elite, Platinum etc) informed passengers depending on sail time and date when they would be able to book their dining. They could stagger the dates to allow Elite, Platinum and below to allow those who have sailed the most the benefit of booking first. Instead we have a free for all with people not cruising until late next year scrambling to book their dining whilst some who travel in a few months cannot access the system. Personally I don't see the need for people travelling in more than 6 months to be worrying about whether they have their dining arrangements booked. Likewise I waited until the last possible moment to pay my full balance. May as well earn interest on the money rather than give Princess the satisfaction they have your money early.

[Cruise till you drop]

58 minutes ago, Cruisemeister2002 said:

Personally I don't see the need for people travelling in more than 6 months to be worrying about whether they have their dining arrangements booked. 

Agree to disagree.  Some of us like things buttoned up early. Also most other cruise lines allow you to do this (and Princess did as well before this).

 

And many of us know that if you snooze, you lose in that those of us with anytime dining preferred times go quicky and we don’t want to eat at 5pm or 9pm

 

 

I do agree that Princess f***ed up the rollout with their complete lack of communication and clarity on how this is supposed to work.

 

I have a backup booking on Celebrity Edge awaiting in case this doesn’t get fixed soon

Edited July 8 by Cruise till you drop

[susancruzs]

My cruise is Oct. 17th on the Emerald, I haven't booked my Coral April 2025 but I should, smaller ship.

 

I didn't book table size, traveling alone I prefer a bigger table but I was just happy to see 5 p.m. and that it populated for every evening.  I was startled it worked better than expected seeing the complaints here.  I was out of town 1st-6th so first try worked great.

[555]

38 minutes ago, Cruise till you drop said:

And many of us know that if you snooze, you lose in that those of us with anytime dining preferred times go quicky and we don’t want to eat at 5pm or 9pm

 

That's our biggest concern also. I'd hate to find out our preferred time is completely filled and we would be forced to wait at the door for the next available seat.

[blackfly]

We are a group of 6, 3 couples with separate booking numbers.  Want to sit together at reservable times each night.  Jan 19 Enchanted Princess.  No one in our group has been able to access the reservation function of the app.  Once reservations become available how do you do a group reservation?  Can one person book for everyone?  Say we have to wait for final payment does everyone have to be paid up?  

[mthomp5]

2 hours ago, Cruisemeister2002 said:

A few observations on this unsatisfactory dining situation. The roll out in my humble opinion is completely wrong. Princess should have informed all passengers paid up or otherwise which restaurant would be available on what ship. They should then, regardless of status as per tiered benefits system (Elite, Platinum etc) informed passengers depending on sail time and date when they would be able to book their dining. They could stagger the dates to allow Elite, Platinum and below to allow those who have sailed the most the benefit of booking first. Instead we have a free for all with people not cruising until late next year scrambling to book their dining whilst some who travel in a few months cannot access the system. Personally I don't see the need for people travelling in more than 6 months to be worrying about whether they have their dining arrangements booked. Likewise I waited until the last possible moment to pay my full balance. May as well earn interest on the money rather than give Princess the satisfaction they have your money early.

Princess marketed one of the platinum and elite benefits as being able to reserve dining as soon as your book your cruise (as opposed to having to pay in full to reserve dining).  Although I just noticed that the Captain Circle benefit says it’s “early access to dining reservations “. Previously, it was that platinum or elites could reserve dining upon booking of the cruise. So maybe this benefit has changed.  And how do they define “early”. 

 

Many book cruises 2 years in advance and have seen instances where if you don’t reserve dining early on, you may get a time slot you don’t like. Sure you may be able to resolve it when you board but some would rather have these details taken care of so as not to have to deal with these things while on vacation.

 

If Princess had clearly communicated a plan by ship or sail dare, it would avoid a lot of frustration so people don’t have to keep checking which only causes further annoyance.

 

i don’t think it’s passengers who plan ahead that are causing the problem. It is Princess’s roll out.

[dreaminofcruisin]

48 minutes ago, blackfly said:

We are a group of 6, 3 couples with separate booking numbers.  Want to sit together at reservable times each night.  Jan 19 Enchanted Princess.  No one in our group has been able to access the reservation function of the app.  Once reservations become available how do you do a group reservation?  Can one person book for everyone?  Say we have to wait for final payment does everyone have to be paid up?  

 

You can likely go "play" with this now, just so you know how to do it, once reservations are available to you.

Click on "Book Dining".

Click on the dining room you want.

Scroll down and you will see New Reservation and yourself and your cabin partner.

Click on the pencil.

Click on the person icon with the + in the upper right corner.

Enter the Booking Number of one of the other parties.

Click Search

It should then bring those people up and add them to your "Shipmates", which you can then add to your reservation.

Repeat for the other party.

 

So, Yes, have one person book a table of 6 private party if that's what you want adding the others as indicated above. Once those reservations are made, you should all be able to see them on your app.

 

It seems there are varying results on whether or not everyone has to have made final payment. Others have been successful in the app if they have tried to use the web version or vice versa.

Best bet is to follow the threads and see if others on your ship/sailing have been able to make reservations or not....'might' be an indication of whether or not you will be able to.

 

Good luck.

[OceanoPair]

5 hours ago, Cruise till you drop said:

When you say that you did this when the app opened up, what date exactly did you do this ?

Around July 2nd or 3rd. Started trying from Midnight July 1st, but it still took a while to get going. Make sure to have Android App Version 1.3.0-5004. Don't know about iPhone or web version. Android app works awesome. Best thing that ever happened to Princess.

[OceanoPair]

6 hours ago, Mara4166 said:

someone in a suite might like the traditional shared table dining so that does make sense. I guess it was too difficult for Princess IT to exclude the reservable option.

You're right. We even considered booking our normal reservable dining time for the whole 10 day cruise, but it would be in Botticelli and we've heard that there is a lot of vibration in that dining room on the Grand Princess. 

[Sea Hag]

18 hours ago, SeaCBear said:

I've been trying since July 1 to book ANY dining reservation for our Grand Princess cruise coming up this September.  I get various error messages, including ""can't retrieve shipmates", and "Invalid data".  There are also no time slots available, on any day or at any time, for specialty or main dining reservations. I am Platinum, and we both have the Premier package.  We are both completely checked in and "Ready to Sail" with Medallions ordered.  Very, very frustrating.  

 

I've deleted and reloaded the Princess app. I've tried using the Princess web version of Cruise Personalizer where I'm told the booking has already been claimed and I can get no further.  

 

Anything else I should try?

 

 

I got that continually. You sort of have to give the system a poke and move around it a bit. Go back to post #232, where somebody pointed me in the right direction. I took some of that poking, but I was able to get in.

[Sea Hag]

18 hours ago, SeaCBear said:

I've been trying since July 1 to book ANY dining reservation for our Grand Princess cruise coming up this September.  I get various error messages, including ""can't retrieve shipmates", and "Invalid data".  There are also no time slots available, on any day or at any time, for specialty or main dining reservations. I am Platinum, and we both have the Premier package.  We are both completely checked in and "Ready to Sail" with Medallions ordered.  Very, very frustrating.  

 

I've deleted and reloaded the Princess app. I've tried using the Princess web version of Cruise Personalizer where I'm told the booking has already been claimed and I can get no further.  

 

Anything else I should try?

 

 

I got that continually. You sort of have to give the system a poke and move around it a bit. Go back to post #232, where somebody pointed me in the right direction. I took some of that poking, but I was able to get in.

[Sea Hag]

18 hours ago, SeaCBear said:

I've been trying since July 1 to book ANY dining reservation for our Grand Princess cruise coming up this September.  I get various error messages, including ""can't retrieve shipmates", and "Invalid data".  There are also no time slots available, on any day or at any time, for specialty or main dining reservations. I am Platinum, and we both have the Premier package.  We are both completely checked in and "Ready to Sail" with Medallions ordered.  Very, very frustrating.  

 

I've deleted and reloaded the Princess app. I've tried using the Princess web version of Cruise Personalizer where I'm told the booking has already been claimed and I can get no further.  

 

Anything else I should try?

 

 

I got that continually. You sort of have to give the system a poke and move around it a bit. Go back to post #232, where somebody pointed me in the right direction. I took some of that poking, but I was able to get in.