Poor Management / Customer Service ruined just about everday day

MSC Meraviglia Cruise Review to Canada, New England, New York

Cruises: 7+ cruises
Review: 1
Helpful Votes: 3

Overall rating:

2.9 out of 5
MSC Meraviglia

10 Night Canada & New England (New York Roundtrip)

Sail date: September 24, 2023

Ship: MSC Meraviglia

Cabin type: Inside

Cabin number: 5089

Traveled as: Couple

Reviewed: 1 year ago

Review summary

Good scores for hard working service staff. Failing score for poor management.

Embarkation

4 out of 5
Arrived later in the day with no delays

Ship experiences

Food and Dining

3 out of 5
Main Dining room service ranges from hectic to friendly. Market Place crowded with pushy, rude passengers, dirty tables and little variety day to day

Marketplace Buffet

3 out of 5

Can get very crowded, little outdoor seating, could use more staff to clear tables and clean properly. Food is what you would expect for a low budget fare. Good choice of breads, vegetables and meats, but no specialties found.

Waves Restaurant

4 out of 5

The first two days on board were chaotic with many people having difficulties being seated. The rest of the cruise service was steady and reliable, but staff did appear to be hampered because of not having enough servers.

Mervaglia Bar & Lounge

2 out of 5

This is a venue used a lot for music, dance, games and crafting along for having a drink from the bar. All of this makes it very crowded lacking sufficient space for seating and causing crowds to push out into the public walking space and into the nearby chocolate lounge.

Brass Anchor Pub

5 out of 5

Best go to lounge for comfortable seating, music and trivia.

Onboard Activities

2 out of 5
Lots offered for the fitness crowd, little else than 2-3 simple paper cutting, flower making camp-like classes for the entire cruise, crowded difficult to understand trivia games, no on screen questions.

Photo Gallery / Photo Shop

2 out of 5

Thousands of photos on display cramped into a very small space creating difficulties finding your photos. many photos simply packed into cases you have thumb through. There is no way to find photos using your cruise card. Long lines to pay for photos.

Entertainment

5 out of 5
Excellent main stage performers and lounge musicians.

Carousel Lounge

3 out of 5

Used for extra fee performances. The fee is worth the drink and seeing one or two performances, but after that they are pretty much similar to each other.

Children's Programs

no children

Service and Staff

2 out of 5
Management - no stars - apparently poorly trained, unmotivated or simply told to simply say Sorry, over and over again. Service staff 4 stars. Average..2 stars due to horrible management and customer service. All talk no action.

Ship Quality

2 out of 5
Cleaning gets 4 stars, tables left dirty too long. Design gets 1 star. Layout does not allow for a comfortable flow of 3500+ passengers. Decks 5 and 6 are too narrow for the mobs of people that crowd the areas with their groupings and spilling out from crowded lounges. Seating on these decks is insufficient forcing groups to stand around and spill out into public areas. Pool area is crowded due to narrow walkways, people spilling out with their chairs and hanging out thus blocking people traffic.

Cabin / Stateroom

4 out of 5
Suitable for sleeping, changing and storing our stuff. No chair, just a bulky bench.

Ship tip

Be prepared for 1-2+ hours delay getting on or off the ship at each port.

Ports of call

Brooklyn, New York

3 out of 5

Newport, Rhode Island

1 out of 5
MSC used just two tenders taking 1-2 hours to get off and back on.

Boston, Massachusetts

1 out of 5
MSC docked nearly two hours late. Did add on additional in port time, but forced 1000s to wait up to two hours to re-board the ship due to whatever excuse different managers told us. Lost 2-3 hours of time in port.

Saint John, New Brunswick

3 out of 5
We were delayed getting off for over an hour due to Canadian Immigration problems, we were told. Friendly and interesting container box craft village at pier, walk able town with many shops on King St.

Portland, Maine

3 out of 5
Once again border control issues delayed our disembarkation up to one hour. Sipped the excursions and took a walking tour. Visitor Center provides a good map.

Sydney, Nova Scotia

3 out of 5
Finally got off on time. Walk able town with some historic homes to visit as well as museum and crafts market.

Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island

5 out of 5
Everything went well getting off the ship. The city is right there making it easy to walk about. Queen St is the main shopping street. Plenty of historical homes with informative plaques.

Disembarkation

3 out of 5
Left early as a walk off. Two gangway exits merged into one terminal door creating a jam of pasengers and luggage.
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