On August 12th, my husband & I, both senior citizens, boarded the CARNIVAL Cruise ship ECSTASY at noon, leaving Galveston TX, for a 5 day cruise to Cozemel. We were with 6 other family members.
We were told our rooms weren't ready, and to go to the buffet. We sat at the pool for a short while, then proceeded to the buffet. The food was terrible. The selection was BLEAK, and there was a HAIR in the rice.By then it was 2PM, so we decided to go to the room and rest.
We had been in the stateroom for about 15 minutes, when my husband became ill. He was shaking, sweating, nauseous... We didn't know WHAT was wrong, but we feared it might be a claustrophobic panic attack, due to the small size of the room.
We decided to call the medical office, and try to reach the ships Dr. Perhaps there was some medication we could be given. This reaction had happened before during an MRI.
There was no answer, so we went to the pursers office. We were told the Dr. Wasn't available.By then my husband was trembling violently..in the middle of the tiny lobby. The purser then telephoned someone, who he said was a NURSE (a male) and handed the phone to my husband. The nurse agreed it might be a panic attack, and said he doubted if any medication he could give would be much help, and advised us to get OFF the ship! He assured us our fare would be refunded.
The purser ALSO confirmed our fare would be refunded, as well as the TOURS we had pre-paid for, and called to have our luggage brought to the lobby. He cancled out our boarding cards, and escorted us to the terminal ramp.
We drove the 10 hours home, believing their promises, safe with their assurance we had done the right thing. We couldn't have stayed on the ship in that tiny cabin, with panic attacks!
I had planned that cruise for 6 months... Shopping, booking tours, getting excited about the vacation with our relatives... WHY would I want to END it, unless it had been an emergency! We were shocked at the panic attack, and crushed our vacation was over.
NOW, comes the bad part: We were so upset during the attack, we got NOTHING in writting! We didn't have the NAME of either the purser OR the nurse.
When we got home, I called CARNIVAL to get the ball rolling on our refund.
HAHA... What a joke THAT turned out to be.
According tp their records, the purser said he had advised us NOT to disembark! They wouldn't be refunding ANYTHING, even the price of the tours. Their attitude was basically "too bad". They said we had cancled the trip, and refused to give us the names of the NURSE and the PURSER, so we could file a claim with our travel insurance! I asked about their "guarantee" that said we could get off the ship if we weren't happy with the cruise. They replied that only worked if we got off at the first FOREIGN port! We would have had to stay on the ship 2 more days, to do that!
Then they mentioned it was "mental". So I said what would you have done if it was a heart attack? Would we get our fare back THEN? The answer was NO.
I BEGGED them for the name of the NURSE, so we could submit a claim to the travle insurance... The refused to give me the names of anyone we had dealt with. We are stuck in a catch 22.
After several phone calls, I finally got a vague promise they would extend some sort of voucher on a future cruise. I don't want a future cruise. I will NEVER use Carnival again. This was our 15th cruise, and I am STUNNED at the treatment extended to us. We are out $978.00
Although the purser & nurse were very nice, the other crew members we encountered before his illness were rude and disinterested. The other 6 members of our family are still on the cruise as I type this. I only hope, after reading other complaints about CARNIVAL, they managed to have a good time.
I implore you readers, book ANY OTHER cruise line. Don't book Carnival. Their customer service is a JOKE! We had one other "bad" cruise before... And that was the only other time we sailed with Carnival! We swore we would never sail with them again. But we figured maybe they had changed. They hadn't.
I also urge anyone reading this to check out all the numerous other complaints about Carnival, on the internet. I was stunned when I saw so many people had so many bad experiences with this company.
Mary
Broken Arrow, Oklahoma
U.S.A.
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