Peggy, our shore excursions can be selected, I wonder why yours can't? Did you go to the drop-down menu to click on the port? I can get all the way to the payment page.

You know, I want to book excursions, but I have to say I am not confident in this website at all (that my payment would be applied and my excursions correct when we get onboard).

I don't like that they don't even show something as basic as our suite number (or guarantee) anymore. I just don't get that at all. This was supposed to be an improvement to the old site?! Hopefully they are not finished yet...

Yep, tried the drop down menu--actually tried it for every port on the trip. All it does is give a description of the port and the statement that excursions are not yet available, try again later. It is odd that it would be available for one passenger and not another... I'll just wait a week or two or three and try it later.

It's allowing us to book excursions for a cruise in September (over 200 days away). By the way, most of the excursions are free except for one's that include a lunch or a wine tasting. These run anywhere from $39 to $169 each. Also the helicopter tours are still quite expensive ($1,000+)

John,

The system also allowed me to book an excursion for a September cruise earlier today. I just tried to log in again and got an error message saying the system could not access my cruise. I wonder if making an excursion reservation earlier than 120 days from the sailing date threw the system for a loop.

Edited to add: The system was just able to access my reservation. The excursion I made this morning still shows as confirmed.

I was able to get into the "already booked" section, but there are no excursions listed for the Voyager May 8 cruise, even though the instructions at the beginning say we are supposed to be able to book for that cruise. What a mess Regent has made! So frustrating!

Cindy

Checked Tom's log in, his completed itineraries are screwed up too.

Tom asked me if we had fun on our 27 night trip from Osaka since neither of us remember it I asked him how he snuck away to Buenos Aires while I was in Alaska :eek:

No excursion booking available for VIKING yet...

My nights were correct and all cruise dates/length correct (except Lamb which was 19 nights and it reads 18) - all important stuff I care about is right but, yes, they have us here, there, and everywhere on itineraries :D :D

I'm appalled. We really like Regent and would like to see them live up to the quality of their cruises, but the web site is a joke. As alrady noted by others, our SSS cruise history bears little resemblance to reality (it was correct on the old site). Our "Already Booked" login isn't remembered after you navigate away from that page...be prepared to enter all the information every time you visit (it remembered you, via a cookie no doubt, on the old site). It appears to offer us the opportunity to book excursions well beyond the 120 day limit (more like 480 at the moment) only to tell you later that you can't (rather than not offering to begin with). Regent's operation is miniscule compared to many, many companies who manage to get this right. I'm embarrassed for them.

OMG Marcie I didn't even think to check both, just checked Franks. He has 91 nights, but I just checked mine and I have 140 nights - apparently I got double credit for several cruises,either that or I was on several I have no recollection of. Also, we were apparently during our first cruise not on a Panama Canal, but that time warp Seward to Los Angeles 7 day cruise, but ours took 14 days!!! :app: :app: I know we did the Panama, I do actually remember it - but whatever, too funny. We are at least still listed as gold and thats all thats important -- if we can ever afford to cruise RSSC again! Ouch!!!!

Tony's matched mine - so all is okay BUT it would have been stressful for those binging on newbies to Regent(I have done that, of course, before the "hey thanks old timer for introducing newbies to Regent" CREDIT) and telling them to check online for all info!!!

I think I transcended into another universe...I entered my excursions in and thought I saved them for Viking. Doug went to look at them and they weren't there. He re-entered them and I went back to look at what he selected and they aren't there. I guess we are going to have to call Regent.

Is there a restaurant selection section we are missing?

I think the Already Booked section is only for booking excursions and reservations, at least at this point -- so you can't see your excursions there because your cruise is more than 120 days away. Or maybe excursions will be viewable there, but they just haven't gotten to loading the data for December cruises yet.

I'm hoping in the future they'll bring together the different parts of their customer information systems so we'll be able to use a single sign-on to see our booked cruises, our booked excursions and restaurant reservations, our Seven Seas Society history, our guest information, etc. Right now, these all seem to be pieces of different systems. (I just found that the Already Booked site only lets me download a PDF Guest Information form for passport information, and yet the form says the information may be entered on the web site! It can't, at least currently.) Hopefully what's available today is simply phase one of an ongoing project to improve customer interaction on the web site, because what's there now is pretty far from state of the art. (But at least we can pre-book excursions! Or some of us can.)

-- Eric

Your cruise is in May, isn't it? Restaurants can only be booked 28 days in advance, as was the case in the past. I assume the "Book a Restaurant" link will pop up when the time comes for it to be open for your cruise. Since the first cruise to be allowed to utilize the new web booking system is the May 8 Voyager cruise, no one will be able to verify this until about APril 10.

-- Eric

We're boarding in nine days and still can't book anything - every port the same: "Shore excursions for this port are not yet available. Please check back as they are generally available for reservation 120 days prior to the cruise." When you click the "Book Excursions" option, you get "Please be aware that online Shore Excursion reservations are only available beginning with the following cruises:
Seven Seas Navigator May 10, 2009". The only other "Already Booked" options are "Guest Information Form" and "Log Out". Of course, the Navigator doesn't have much in the way of "specialty restaurants" to reserve, now does it.

Shaking out the bugs and wrinkles in any new system takes time, and I gather Regent didn't have much wiggle room on the conversion date from the Carlson system. On the other hand, in January at the Los Angeles meeting Frank del Rio (sp?) was quoted somewhere as boasting he had laid off one or more of Regent's computer people as a cost-saving measure. Perhaps just maybe he jumped the gun a bit. Let's see what happens.

Yes, this doesn't appear to be a bug, just a part of the transition, unfortunately. Regent is clearly saying that anyone cruising between now and early May will not be able to use the online booking system.

I'm guessing that's because they now need some additional time to upgrade or replace the software on each of the ships to be able to receive all the booking data from their main computer system and train their shipboard staff how to use the new system.

-- Eric

Found another little hitch. We're booked on a B2B2B (three 7 day segments on Navigator starting July 17). When I use our booking number I could only make reservations for the first segment. I called RSSC and found there are separate booking numbers for each segment. Our booking numbers for the second and third segments would not pull up those segments. Mark at RSSC said he'd make a note to the Web Page folks regarding how do folks booking multiple segments access all their segments. Also, got on about 2:45 MST yesterday and one of the tours in Istanbul was already full.
Greg

Greg, how can one of your excursions be full already when it is over 120 days until you sail?

Marc,
I can neither explain or justify only report ;) We were able to reserve tours for all ports on our first segment (17-24 July) though.


Greg

In addition to all the bugs and glitches, I miss the way that the old "My Cruises" actually acknowledged my name as well as cabin number. I may be wrong, but certainly with all going wrong, I would hate to have excursions booked incorrectly to someone else. I have not booked anything as I am not cruising until December, and its conceiveable that your name actually is confirmed on booking. Also being able to view your cabin number allowed one to check on their guarantee if that is what was booked. Can anyone clarify? I know that you have to put in your name to log onto the site, but is that enough given the problems?

Well...I haven't been able to book any excursions for Viking - on Voyager, May 8...like some others, when I select the port there are no excursions listed.

It must be havoc for Regent with this kind of computer mess to sort through. I'm glad it's not my job!

Greg,
I have spoken with Regent and the e-solutions people are working on building multiple segments in the system. Appears they will be available but not sure how soon. Also they may have gotten many requests for certain tours so while it may have appeared closed out they will reopen another tour so keep trying.

Margo,
May 16 is first sailing that you can book excursions on-line. Unfortunately you are going to have to use the fax form to request excursions in advance.

Dining reservations will be available in 7-10 days but will be for sailings within 28-7 days.

Two of the tours on our June 3 Mariner cruise were full yesterday, and in fact, they showed full when the site was accidentally viewable for a short time last week, before the site was even open to the public. In our case, those booked excursions are for small, private tours, so my guess is that someone locked them in talking to Regent or through their TA talking to Regent. Or another other possibility is that they have a contract with a tour operator to provide these tours, but haven't been able to get final confirmation, so they show as "sold out" when it really means "not currently available for booking".


Yes, your name is shown. In fact, under each available tour, the names of each passenger for your booking are displayed, so you are ordering excursion tickets by name, not just specifying the number you want. On the confirmation page, it shows each port each excursion under that, the date and time, and the name(s) of the passengers booked for the excursions.

By the way, being able to see and select the specific excursion times -- not just "AM or PM" as in the past -- is a nice improvement, in my opinion. It especially helps if a particular excursion is offered multiple times during the day, and you're trying to plan your day to do two different excursions. Of course the downside is that you can only book one excursion per port per day in advance, and then you have to hope your second choice will still be available at the time you board the ship -- a policy I really hope they'll change after they get some experience with this and all the bugs out of the basic system.

It does not show you cabin number however. I don't know if that's because this information is in two separate databases that they haven't yet integrated, or just poor design of the web site.

-- Eric

Susan, can we really book excursions now more than 120 days in advance? If so, better get going on C2C. :D

Susan, I hope that Regent will also fix it so you can opt for "remember me" so we don't have to continually keep signing in. That's a hassle!

I booked ours yesterday Marc.

For my May trip, I called Regent this morning and they faxed over excursion lists. No prepayment, but no guarantee either

It seems odd that they list May 8th as the start date when the 16th is the first sailing...if only they would correct these items it would clear up a lot of confusion!

Margo,
I understand how you feel. It is a work in progress so I think we will just need to be patient.

Marc,
Yes you can book more than 120 days out.

What is also nice is that when we receive an invoice from Regent it shows all the invoices you have prebooked including the free ones and those that are an additional charge.

I see some of the excursions are up for the 2nd half of Viking - most, but not all ports.

When booking do you now pay in advance? Or is it like in the past, you just reserve and pay on board?

You pay in advance.

----------

Eugene

Leslie, in the past we got to submit excursion "requests" to Regent in advance, but we had no idea where our requests fell in line nor how many seats were available for each excursion. On past cruises, I've been closed out of excursions I wanted, once because they lost the entire set of requests. The trade-off for paying up front under the new system is that you find out immediately whether you've got a confirmed seat on the excursions. I know not everyone likes the idea of paying early, but I love not having to worry and stress about whether I'll get the excursions I want.

-- Eric

I asked Regent to email me the list for Viking excursions - only got the first half (to Reykjavik)- the form doesn't email properly so I guess I'll call back and see if they can fax one that easier and shorter than 10 pages!!!!

Thanks - anything we have signed up for in the past we have had tickets waiting in our cabin upon boarding - I never realized that they were "requests" only. I don't have a problem w/ paying in advance per se, but I don't have a lot of confidence in Regent's systems at this point. We'll see how this goes!

Oceania pre-sells excursions - you pay with your booking. Tickets in the room. Then you meet in the theater at the 15 minutes before the proposed time and they give you a bus number. They call the bus and everyone goes off ship together. It's very well done.

I don't have a problem paying ahead of time either....I'm just tired of seeing the "no excursions yet....120 day blah blah blah" for VIKING. It is frustrating but nothing we can do but wait.

I like knowing that we not only requested the excursion, but also that it has been confirmed. However, I am bothered by the fact that paying early means that we can't use our cruise credit for the excursions that aren't free. We have to pay with a credit card, which is charged immediately. Since we are not big spa users or luxury wine drinkers, it is going to be interesting to see what we're going to end up doing with the credit, especially if we cannot get cash for it.

--------------

Eugene

--------------

Eugene

Yes, I'm bothered by that too.

Hmm, I've not been able to request shore excursions for Viking online, so I called and asked them to email be the shore excursions request. I got the first segment (3 complete pages on email) but not the second. When I called back for the excursion list for the second segment they said they couldn't get into the reservation to request that and to ask my TA to do it. I did and they did so the request for the second segment was also emailed to me. I now have Shore Excursion Requests for both segments (which I'll be happy to forward to you Leslie or Marcie or whoever wants them). They do NOT request payment in advance--all you have to do is fax them back to Regent.

Thanks for sending the list Peggy - I noticed too that there is no pre-payment asked for on the faxed form.

Also, three of the ports on the online booking form don't show excursions (Heimaey, Portree, Glasgow,) but the fax form does have them available...

Sounds like faxing the form in may be the way to go, but with no confirmation who knows what will happen.

Peggy...would you mind emailing me the excursion forms? Both segments - perhaps the ones you got are formatted better than the ones I received.

ogram1@mac.com

Thanks so much!