Holiday Cruise Line The Vacation from Hell! Fort Lauderdale Florida

21 July 2015

Holiday Cruise Line

2121 W. Oakland Park Blvd., Suite 1

Ft. Lauderdale, FL 33311

Ladies/Gentlemen:

I am writing to you to inform you of the terrible treatment we received regarding the vacation package you sold us. On 5 February 2015, I called 1-800-338-1211 and spoke to Robert (ID# FT7623) about a Holiday Cruise Line trip we won to the Grand Bahamas on the Grand Celebration ship from the Port of Palm Beach. We were told the cruise was 2 nights on the ship and 1 day on the Grand Bahamas Island. It included all meals, 24 h room service, and entertainment. We were told that we could extend the time on the island and there would be a $59 port tax for the first of two travelers. I told Robert that we would be bringing my wife’s grandson, Arsenii Churkaev (8 years old, from St. Petersburg, Russia).  I told Robert that Arsenii has a US visa in his Russian passport and that my wife had a notarized letter in Russian and English, written by a lawyer hired by Arsenii’s parents that authorizes his grandmother, my wife, to take him from St. Petersburg to anywhere in the world. He stated this was adequate. I asked if we should get Arsenii a visa for the Grand Bahamas for the visit. After consulting with a colleague, he said that was not necessary.

Next, we spoke to Pamela at 1-954-485-0708, but I did not record the date. I again asked her about bringing our grandson and she said that our documents were acceptable. She gave us our reservation number: FT020515-015ULH. On 27 April 2015, I spoke to Karen at 1-800-249-8695, Ext. 4254. I also informed Karen that we were bringing my wife’s grandson from Russia and told her that my wife had a notarized letter authorizing her to take Arsenii from Russia to anywhere in the world. She said that was fine. I also asked if we should get him a visa to visit the Grand Bahamas. She said that was not required.

Karen gave us the details of our trip stating the fees to be charged for the cruise and hotels, etc. We were to arrive in Ft. Lauderdale on 5 July, pick up a car from Alamo at the airport and check in at the Ft. Lauderdale Welcome Center to get our vouchers. We had upgraded our stay to the Westin. On July 7, we were to go to the Port of Palm Beach after 12 noon to board the Grand Celebration for the cruise. We upgraded our cabin. We would arrive on 8 July and then take a taxi to Breaker’s Cay. We upgraded our room there to have an ocean view and patio. We upgraded our stay to 6 nights, departing on 14 July.  We would cruise back to the Port of Palm Beach and arrive on 15 July. We would then drive to Orlando and check in at the Orlando Welcome Center to get our hotel voucher for the Park Inn by Radisson. We were told that our meals (breakfast, lunch and dinner) were covered by the hotel vouchers, but we had to pay for Arsenii’s meals.  Karen said that our itinerary would be mailed to us in mid-June. We were in Italy from 13 May to 8 June. I flew home, but Elena flew to St. Petersburg to see her mother and her daughter’s family. When I got home, I picked up our mail at the post office. I do not recall if it was there. On 13 June, I flew to Spain for a week of lecturing and on 20 June flew to St. Petersburg to meet my wife, Elena, and did a one week course at the Polytechnic University. We flew home with Arsenii on 30 June.  Before we left on 5 July, I called again to confirm the itinerary details and get a couple of addresses.  

Now for the horror part of our “vacation in Hell story!”  We arrived at the Ft. Lauderdale airport and picked up our luggage and the car from Alamo. You had reserved us a car that could hold luggage for one adult! I had to upgrade the car type. We went to the Ft. Lauderdale Welcome Center to get our vouchers. We were taken behind the counter crew where a man reviewed our passports. He said that all was okay. We drove to the Westin Hotel. It was not up to normal Westin standards. The food was poor, but edible. We had to go to the Welcome Center and were subjected to a 5 hour tirade by three progressively more pushy sales people trying to sell us a time share. No one had informed us that we were to get this sales pitch until we checked in at the Welcome Center. If we had been told, I would have immediately cancelled this vacation. 

I explained over and over to them that we travel extensively, mainly overseas, but also in the US. I am not your average American. I have given over 412 lectures and 234 seminars and short courses in 40 countries since the 1970s. I mentioned this year’s travels as an example. In February I did a one-week course in Zondulak, Turkey on the Black Sea for Ergeli Iron & Steel Works and then a 2 day seminar in Istanbul for ALS, the local dealer for Struers A/S of Denmark (I consult for them). In April, I did a 3 day seminar at Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Massachusetts, a 4-day seminar for ASM International in Ohio, and a 5 day course for Donhad PTY in Perth, Australia. In May, we went to Venice, Italy where I gave the opening and closing lectures at the annual European Heat Treat Conference. The following week I did 4 one-day seminars at different locations in northern Italy from Milano to Brescia. On 13 June, I flew to Madrid, Spain and then took the train to Oviedo in Asturias province. The following week I did a 2 day course for the Arcelor-Mittal steel company in Aviles and then gave the opening and closing lectures at the Spain “Minergy” Conference in Gijón. On 20 June, I flew to St. Petersburg, Russia, where I do an annual 5-day course at the St. Petersburg State Polytechnical University.  In every case, my travel expenses were paid by those who invited me.  For vacations, we mainly go to different countries with wine regions as we have many close friends all over the winery world – you name the country and the wine region, we have been there and in many cases, we have close friends there. This year, 5 of my friends from the US flew into Malpensa Airport on 30 May. My wife and I met them, and we visited about 25 wineries in northern Italy, with two of my Italian friends, for the next nine days, returning home on 8 June. These places do not have resorts and time shares. But, all I got was more pushy sales pitches.

We checked out on the morning of the 7^th and drove to the Port of Palm Beach where everything died. I gave my car to a man who was to valet park it nearby. We took our suite cases and had them run through an x-ray system. They told me to open my suit case. In it were 2 bottles of very good wine. They told me that I could not bring these bottles with me and drink them on either the ship or at hotel in the Grand Bahamas. They said I would get them back after the trip. No one told us this in the above discussions with your people. Obviously, the ship and hotel want me to buy their poorer quality wine at vastly inflated prices (as in all of the hotels you registered us in Florida where the prices were marked up more than 400%). Then, we went to a counter to check in and a woman named Bennett waited on us. We gave them our 3 passports and the letter authorizing my wife to take her 8 year old grandson out of Russia to anywhere in the world.  She looked at it but obviously she had never seen anything like this before. She asked her boss to come and read the notarized document. He looked at it and said that we could not go to the Grand Bahamas. He claimed that the document allows us to bring her grandson to the US from Russia, but does not specifically state that we can take him to other places outside the US.  Bennett said that the back page of the second page of the document (on the backside of the English translation) had two notarization stamps and the front side of the first page, which was in Russian, was notarized at the bottom. But, the first page of the English translation page was not notarized on the bottom (it was notarized with 2 stamps on the back, but the text was in Russian). I then complained and asked her boss if we could speak to his boss (the two men were Luis Valdivieso and Leo Atillo).  Her boss came back with his boss several minutes later and his boss repeated the claim that we could not go, backing up his employee. Both were very rude to us.  The head man then left with the document and came back about 10 minutes later and claimed that he showed the document to the Customs officials who also said it was inadequate.

But, we have brought Arsenii to the US three times with this document without any problems. We also took him on a one-week Caribbean cruise on the Disney Fantasy ship from Florida using the same document. Three times I asked your staff about bringing Arsenii with us and told them we had a document from his parents authorizing my wife, his grandmother, to take him from Russia to anywhere in the world. I also asked if we needed to get a visa from the Grand Bahamas government to bring him and was told that was not necessary.

While we were at the desk trying to register for the cruise and were told no, I called several telephone numbers that I had used previously in booking this vacation.  Everyone said, “That is not my responsibility, I cannot help you.”  Only one person, Fay, actually was pleasant and tried to help. Bennett told us that we could take the cruise to the island, not get off, and then take it back but Leo and Luis said “no way!”  Why? No reason was given.  I told Bennett, Leo and Luis that I would never, ever, take this cruise, that I would never deal with the Holiday Cruise Line again, that I would inform all of my friends about how we were treated and that I would post my complaint on the internet (you already have many bad comments on the internet now).

We were told to go back to the Ft. Lauderdale Welcome Center, which we did. Everyone claimed no responsibility and they were also rude to us. A woman said that she could put us up in a local hotel (but that they had no ocean-side properties) until the 15^th.  I asked her if we could spend less time here and more in Orlando. She said that she could not get us into the Park Inn by Radisson before the 15^th as it was full but she could get us into the Radisson Celebration in Orlando from 13-15 July.  As to the local hotel, I said we did not like the Westin. She offered to put us up at the Double Tree by Hilton in Deerfield Beach. Then, she wanted to charge us an extra 4 nights for the room! I screamed that we had paid for the cruise with our room and deck level upgraded and that we had paid for an upgraded room with an ocean view at the Grand Lucaya Hotel, and she wants us to pay for another 4 nights?  She relented.

The Double Tree was a better hotel than the Westin, but the food was not much better. The food vouchers did not cover every meal. On the 13^th we checked out and drove to the Orlando Welcome Center and got our vouchers for the 2 Radisson hotels. We drove to the Radisson Celebration hotel and checked in. When we got to our room, the A/C was buzzing like a band saw! It was frigid. I tried the thermostat and the controls on the system at the window – neither would lower the fan speed. It was either full blast or off. I called the front desk a bit before 4 pm and told them about it. They said they would send someone to fix it.  We went out to see the sights and came back a little before 9 pm for dinner. The thermostat said 65 °F and the fan was blasting! I tried again to adjust the fan speed – nothing happened. I turned it off and went downstairs and told the desk. They said they would get it fixed. We came back from dinner and were in bed – it had not been fixed – with the A/C off (who can sleep with such noise?).  About 11:30 pm a man knocked on our door and said that he wanted to come and check out the A/C. I said that we were in bed and asked him to come back tomorrow.  Of course, that never happened. The food was bad here, worse than the Westin or the Double Tree.

On 15 July we checked out and went to the Park Inn by Radisson. Same problem with the A/C! Also, there was no solution. A maintenance man told me that the hotel would not allow him to fix the fan systems!  The food at the Park Inn was by far the worse. We were told that our food vouchers could only be used for buffets – breakfast, lunch and dinner. We tried the breakfast buffet – it was horrible! How can anyone screw up breakfast?  But, the dinner buffet created a whole new definition for horrible food! It was almost totally inedible! We never tried lunch as we were out at different attractions in the area. On the 16^th and the morning of the 17^th, we ate outside the hotel, it was so bad. This hotel has many extremely negative reviews on the internet.

We were also forced to sit in on another session where a man tried to sell us a membership in some sort of club, not simply a time share. I repeated the nature of our travels and that much of my travel is paid for by those who invite me to speak at conferences or teach courses. He persisted in his effort for more than 3 hours, but was not as pushy, demanding and obnoxious as the first three people at the Welcome Center in Ft. Lauderdale.  Again, no one ever told us that we were required to attend this session, as part of the vacation package, either before the trip, or at the Ft. Lauderdale Welcome Center.  I would not be surprised if we missed a third such promotional sales pitch in the Grand Bahamas!

We drove to the Orlando Airport on the 17^th and returned our rental car to Alamo – a $464.05 bill.  Your “Dear www , Welcome to Holiday Cruise Line!” document sent to us on 11 February 2015, suggests that there is no charge for the rental car as it is written.

Sincerely

George

Note:  I sent this letter to the Holiday Cruise Line by e-mail.  I then mailed a copy by US Mail.  I called several days later, as I heard nothing.  I was informed that I had to fax my letter and was given a fax number.  As I have no fax system, I had it faxed at the local FedEx office – for $13.78.  On 30 July, I had still heard nothing, so I again called the customer service office (you cannot call the compliance office).  We were at a conference in Portland, Oregon, from 31 July to 7 August.  On 27 July the Compliance Department wrote a one page form letter to me, which I picked up at the post office on 8 August.  The form letter says it is not responsible for anything, particularly the Customs people at the Port of Palm Beach.  It stated that we must have a notarized letter from the parent authorizing the minor child to travel with us – which we had! They also claimed that there was a web site, that I had no knowledge of, we would have learned that we would be subjected to these ownership presentations.  They concluded by saying that we could re-book the cruise and island stay without penalty.  That I will never do!