Going through a time zone?

(John*Sisker) wrote:

"Sue Mullen" wrote in message
...

John Sisker wrote:

One needs to separate facts from opinions
on this newsgroup, but who can tell?

You have it wrong, it isn't fact vs opinion, it is
each persons experience which for them is
fact. As has been said in this thread, it is up
to the Captain to change the time or stay on
ships time. I personally would not trust the
answer I get directly from the cruise line, the
support staff mostly have never been on a
ship. Many times in the past my TA or myself
have been given info from the cruise line,
that we both knew from experience and
reading reports was not true.

sue

Sue,

All you might have done with your response is
put more doubt in Marcia's mind, as to not
trust the cruise lines as well. So now we have
opinions as fact, more distrust, and cruise line
personnel who may or may not know what
they are talking about. Unfortunately, we're
right back where we started from - but now
with an added layer of a so-called authority
who is not always right.

John Sisker

Here's an example of the actual experience being different from what I
was told by my contact with the cruise line.

I was part of a roll call last year for our Eastern Mediterranean cruise
on the Holland America Noordam. After our roll call started to grow, it
was suggested we set up a meeting. I ended up volunteering to be the one
to see about getting in touch with HAL set it up.

I first tried calling HAL, and was told to contact my travel agent. I
knew this was WRONG because I had read posts in cruisecritic from others
who had set up meetings through HAL. I posted in cruisecritic and was
directed to the proper department at HAL. I first spoke to the secretary
to the guest relations director for the Noordam and later had several
e-mail exchanges with the guest relations director. I was told that they
would supply cookies and coffee as well as space for our meeting. (The
space later grew as our roll call grew.) Well they did supply the
cookies, but instead of coffee, there was a round of drinks set up for
us. Note, I'm not complaining about this change, just saying on ship
they can make changes from what was originally said.

Also, more importantly, note that the first customer service
representative I spoke to did not know there was a department set up
specifically to do what I wished to do. When I did get in touch with the
proper person, one of the first things communicated to me was that they
were well aware of cruisecritic roll calls. That was true for her
department, but obviously was not true for all customer service
representatives.

Just as one should not take everything written in this group as the
gospel truth, one should also realize that something told to you by a
customer service representative on the phone may also not be 100%
accurate.

Jeff Gersten wrote:
(John Sisker) wrote:

"Sue Mullen" wrote in message
...

John Sisker wrote:

One needs to separate facts from opinions
on this newsgroup, but who can tell?

You have it wrong, it isn't fact vs opinion, it is
each persons experience which for them is
fact. As has been said in this thread, it is up
to the Captain to change the time or stay on
ships time. I personally would not trust the
answer I get directly from the cruise line, the
support staff mostly have never been on a
ship. Many times in the past my TA or myself
have been given info from the cruise line,
that we both knew from experience and
reading reports was not true.

sue

Sue,

All you might have done with your response is
put more doubt in Marcia's mind, as to not
trust the cruise lines as well. So now we have
opinions as fact, more distrust, and cruise line
personnel who may or may not know what
they are talking about. Unfortunately, we're
right back where we started from - but now
with an added layer of a so-called authority
who is not always right.

John Sisker

Here's an example of the actual experience being different from what I
was told by my contact with the cruise line.

I was part of a roll call last year for our Eastern Mediterranean cruise
on the Holland America Noordam. After our roll call started to grow, it
was suggested we set up a meeting. I ended up volunteering to be the one
to see about getting in touch with HAL set it up.

I first tried calling HAL, and was told to contact my travel agent. I
knew this was WRONG because I had read posts in cruisecritic from others
who had set up meetings through HAL. I posted in cruisecritic and was
directed to the proper department at HAL. I first spoke to the secretary
to the guest relations director for the Noordam and later had several
e-mail exchanges with the guest relations director. I was told that they
would supply cookies and coffee as well as space for our meeting. (The
space later grew as our roll call grew.) Well they did supply the
cookies, but instead of coffee, there was a round of drinks set up for
us. Note, I'm not complaining about this change, just saying on ship
they can make changes from what was originally said.

Also, more importantly, note that the first customer service
representative I spoke to did not know there was a department set up
specifically to do what I wished to do. When I did get in touch with the
proper person, one of the first things communicated to me was that they
were well aware of cruisecritic roll calls. That was true for her
department, but obviously was not true for all customer service
representatives.

Just as one should not take everything written in this group as the
gospel truth, one should also realize that something told to you by a
customer service representative on the phone may also not be 100%
accurate.

Good example and I am sure a lot of us have stories we could tell.

One of mine is when we were cruising with a group on the Azamar Journey
and were told we could make specialty restaurant reservations ahead of
sailing. In trying to make the reservation different people in our group
were told different things. Eventually one person in our group lucked
out and got someone on the phone that knew what he/she was doing and
our reservation was made.

sue