Company information:
Norwegian Cruise Lines
Miami, Florida
United States
www.ncl.com
Ms. Montross,
I am in receipt of a letter of apology and assurance that you sent to my wife and me in regard to our recent correspondence with NCL.
As I had originally mentioned in our letter, our experience was horrible and because of this or honeymoon was very dissatisfying.
Jill and I read your letter and found the gesture of good will that was attached; I must admit to you that we both felt everything to be quite disingenuous.
You wrote that NCLs goal for the last 40 years has been to offer a fantastic cruise experience from beginning to end. When we described how this goal failed from beginning to end all you could respond to us with were assurances that this was not the case and that our experience was unique? I can assure you that our experiences WERE accurate and VERY common from our experiences and other passengers that we met and continue to correspond with.
We have done some further research and can assure you that the word is spreading about NCL, we only wish that we had checked before we paid for our honeymoon. Check out these websites if you think we are kidding:
http://www.complaints.com
https://post.complaints.com/post.php?followup=2&original_id=4318
http://members.tripod.com/phdewar/main.htm
You see, it isn't about the debauched delivery of the champagne and chocolate covered strawberries, it was about a totality of the failure of your company's policy over and over during the cruise's 7 days. We all know that the sign of a true champion is repetition, but many people forget that the sign of a true failure is the same. NCL failed us and contrary to what you tell us in your letter, they fail many people.
The entertainment and activities onboard were pitiful and although you tell us that this was an unusual experience, I find it impossible to believe. EACH night the entertainment was just as poor. There was no wavering in the inadequacy of the activities through out the trip, how could that dictate an unusual or rare circumstance? It doesn't, NCL has some serious issues on this ship.
When we booked the cruise we were given many assurances, just as we are being given now. The unfortunate part is that talk is cheap and the reality of things isn't. We learned a good lesson about NCL and the Norwegian Sun when we cruised; NCL makes promises it can't keep and then refuses to make wrongs right.
NCL's sincerest apologies are not worth much to us at this juncture now that our honeymoon fund has been expended and the time has been lost. We will never get a second honeymoon.
I feel that you should know that the original letter that I sent to NCL was forwarded with a cover page to Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines . That cover letter expressed to Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines how sad we were that we didn't get to cruise with their company for our honeymoon and applauded them for the last trip sailed with them.
On April 21, 2008 we received a response telephone call from Royal Caribbean and we were offered a 3 day cruise for or comments and input regarding our experiences with them and their competition. The executive representative we dealt with hoped that Royal Caribbean's sense of fairness might offset some of the losses suffered by sailing with NCL for our honeymoon.
I can't believe the differences in these two companies! For a company that has been delivering cruises for over 40 years NCL seems to have no concept of customer service in comparison to Royal Caribbean, and has insulted us by offering us a $200.00 onboard ship credit for the perfectly inadequate cruising experience that it provide us.
Jill and I know this, when we speak with our friends and colleagues about our honeymoon, when we attend union meetings or any social functions, we both say the same thing; Thank God we had each other, because NCL was horrible.
Sincerely,
