Donnaseelevelhx
May 11, 2024
Waste of money
Run fast. Don’t even consider. As a frequent visitor to NYC(25+times), I was very cautious in booking this cruise. My husband has not been to NYC and I wanted to find a really romantic way to end our trip (primo Billy Joel tickets on May 9th and intimate cruise ship trip on May 10th). First the boat was late. They had trouble docking and as one guest commented, “I hope they don’t kill us from their obvious inexperience.” I tried to remain positive that mistakes happen. We finally boarded at about and were taking off at around 7:15. A lot of guests were upset and eager to board so we waited to last to get seated. We had VIP tickets so I was not concerned about seating and I could tell the crew were stressed out from being late. We tried to help out and be supportive. Then we were seated in not the VIP section. I politely raised the issue with two employees who assured us we were on the top deck. Since there was a floor above us with seating and the private bar and all the details of the VIP ticket that we could see through a locked door this obviously was not the case. Finally we spoke to a young man who seemed to had helped in the docking process and who seemed to be fulfilling many roles. At first he tried to explain that VIP had window seats but since every guest on the cruise had window seats and several confirmed they had not paid for VIP tickets, that was not the case. Finally he admitted the boat was not very full that night and supposedly the VIP Section was new and not really up and running. However, since the tables were up in the VIP section (quite clearly seen from the glass door and in particular the private bar which didn’t appear new), this didn’t seem to be the case either. Finally the young man admitted the boat was not very full that night and they wanted to seat everyone together. He offered for us to sit upstairs without access to any assistance, music, etc., but he noted we should get the two drink vouchers that came with the VIP section. Since the music hadn’t started and again we were trying to be very nice to a staff that was having a rough night we settled in to await the promised jazz music. If Superstitious, Dancing queen, Saturday night fever, Sex bomb (which included a full 10 minutes of the song including Dutch version, Bengalese version, and an obviously half drunk singer declaring himself the sex bomb), I shot the sheriff, La Bamba, Ring of fire, are actually jazz standards then I’m not sure I know what jazz is. The slow (or not so slow) realization that we had been victim to a gross version of a bait and switch became increasingly obvious. The staff only worried about pumping alcohol into the guests. With one of our vouchers the staff suggested I switch to a much cheaper version of wine, which seemed harder to top than the cheap wine they were serving, but it was cheaper still. The food was so subpar my husband threw up between courses. The “steak” was so doused in some horrible sauce to make it not seem so briny. Of course, you don’t expect great food on these cruises but for north of $500 you expect it to be edible. As someone who has spent a lifetime in customer service research, I know very well that every good company has an off night. The employees were courteous and were trying their best with the messaging they were given. They were obviously left holding the bag for the dubious company they worked for. If at any point we had been contacted before the cruise to let us know the VIP section would not be available or there had been any real attempt to solve that dilemma, I would have not written a review. However since this company’s standard seems to be a dubious bait and switch tactic, I can only hope to spare others of one of the biggest wastes of $500+ of my life.