“Just returned from an amazing cruise. I have to say that the experience was absolutely amazing but sadly it wasn't down to Sixstarcruises. We booked with them because we expected the perfect package to be put together and with hindsight we wish we had sorted it ourselves, here's why... . They were really keen to get us to book this new cruise ship experience, so much so that the flights weren't even on sale and the initial booking was great and smooth. We took a risk and booked and was promised a call the minute the flights went on sale to give us the best options. This didn't happen and we chased and chased again and eventually managed to book some flights (not great ones though). The options weren't the best and again with hindsight we would have done it different and would have expected the agent to advise us properly on the best route options, flight times and seat upgrade options. We were given a flight that was later changed to a different airport and the transfer which we were told would be fine and nothing to worry about, but it was awful. Our flight was delayed, we had to queue for an hour at security and had we not gone premium we would have been at the back of the queue and missed the connection. We had to collect our luggage and go to the new drop off and then find the gate (which was wrongly displayed) we almost missed it. I would have rather had a direct flight or flown from London if no direct flights were available but this was never suggested to make the experience better. Even security could not understand why we were changing in Orlando to get to Miami and scrutinised us thoroughly which was not pleasant! The flight home was at 10pm and we were disaembarked from the ship at 8am. They never suggested that we could have stayed at a hotel to get a better flight the next day and provide transfers or even a day pass at a hotel which many other guests seemed to know about or have included, because their agent told them about it. We thankfully made our own arrangements for the day and sorted our own transport which should have all been provided. No information about things like ESTAs was given but thankfully we worked it all out ourselves as we had done it before. We had log in issues with the cruise website and kept getting a message saying it had not been paid when it had. It took over a month to get this sorted, with lots of chasing and we were unable to view and book excursions through the cruise website and missed out on ones with limited availability due to this. No suggestions on excursions or locations we were visiting were given and whilst most places were fantastic, some were not because we felt unsafe walking around and were harassed so much we went back to the ship. No advice around these destinations was given and no suggestions on what to do or not to do was provided. I would have expected this from Sixstarcruises as our booking agent, but in our experience they don't deal with the extras that make the journey less stressful and a better experience. Information provided by the cruise company was also limited and we have given feedback on this, but they are new. We did have an amazing holiday but we won't be using an agent in future because the best package was not sold to us in our opinion and we were underwhelmed overall by the booking experience and our package could have been so much better, more complete and less stressful.
Date of experience: March 01, 2024”
