oceania: too bad!

Time for a rant.
I recently had the opportunity to travel with a friend to various ports of call in Europe via Oceania Cruise Lines. I was previously unaware of Oceania (namely because I was not into cruising) but it turned out to be “the world’s leading culinary-and destination-focused cruise line”. Well, OK… that they may be, but I discovered they sure aren’t customer focused. How surprising.
My travel agent had turned me on to the great deals Oceania was offering due to Covid. The trip we selected sounded wonderful: Italy, Croatia, Malta, Greece, Spain, France, Monaco, all from a first class ship featuring only 500 guests. What’s not to like, right?
And indeed, the ports of call were outstanding, as was the cuisine, accommodation and activities on board.
Now, I’m not about to bore you with details, don’t worry, but suffice to say, there were several incidents that occurred that negatively impacted our ability to fully enjoy this trip. What is truly surprising is that attempts to bring this to the attention of senior people on the ship or back at their head office were ignored (even my snail-mail letter to their CEO brought no response). And we’re not talking about trivial matters.
We had embarked on this trip with high expectations. To have those anticipations dashed was sad. But to learn that a company supposedly priding itself on quality doesn’t seem to give a damn about their customers is even sadder.
 
So Oceania: sayonara. You might just have had a champ here, ready to extol your virtues. Instead, you’ve won yourself an opponent who will not sail with you again (let’s face it: there are lots of alternatives) and will go out of my way not to recommend you to anyone I know.

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