Hi my lovely readers!

As you may know I worked a good three years for a cruise line as a reservation agent. I used to work in trade reservation, where I worked closely with travel agents and tour operators from across Europe. I mainly booked, amended and changed cruises.

I enjoyed working there, but sometimes the favours, questions or demands guests had were weird, funny, ridiculous and sometimes unbelievable.

Today, I thought I’ll share three of them with you that I’m still thinking about and that still make me shake my head and that I can’t forget.

The weirdest questions and demands I encountered when I worked for a cruise line

1. SMOKING SHISHA

I once had a guest who wanted to bring their shisha on board to smoke in the cabin and on the balcony. I thought that question was sort of funny and unexpected.

Guys, fire is the biggest risk for cruise ships and therefore it’s forbidden to smoke on your balcony for health and safety reasons. Never mind smoking a shisha on your balcony or in your cabin with hot coal…

So no, you can’t bring your shisha. Some cruise lines have even banned a normal kettle for making tea and coffee in the past as faulty once can cause sparks, which can develop into a fire.

There are designated smoking lounges and areas across most cruise ships for smokers.

Just remember, although cruises are often referred to as floating resorts, they aren’t like an actual resort build on land. You are on open seas and therefore the rules are different than those of a hotel.

2. I WILL NOT BOOK YOUR CRUISE IF I CAN’T HAVE MY OCEAN SPRAY CRANBERRY JUICE

Oh this is a hard one that still makes me shiver in disbelief as I can’t sometimes believe people, if you get what I mean.

The world cruise season opened up and there was a couple who wanted to do the full world cruise. However, they were only going to book if we were able to confirm that there would be Ocean Spray cranberry juice available for the Mrs every single day of the world cruise, because she was having a glass of Ocean Spray cranberry juice every morning for the past years.

Of course cruise ships have cranberry juice on board, but it can be any cranberry juice. You see, cruise ships can get deliveries several times during one sailing. And of course the brand Ocean Spray might be well known and popular in the US and the UK for example, but probably not in China. I know in Germany we don’t really have Ocean Spray as a brand. Maybe now, but not a few years ago.

You can’t really guarantee that you will be able to source this brand of cranberry juice in certain countries and for an entire world cruise for every single day.

Some demands people have are ridiculous and this couple said they will not book the cruise unless Mrs can get her Ocean Spray cranberry juice. Seriously? You will miss a holiday, a world cruise, travelling to all continents in the world, because of cranberry juice?

3. CAN YOU FIND ME SPACE?

Okay, this is just a stupid question.

Someone calls for a cruise and you tell them that the cruise is fully booked and there are already 15 other people on the waitlist and they still ask you if you can find them a cabin, if there is space …

This one came up often actually, especially for very popular cruise itineraries or those itineraries that only are available once or twice a year. If it’s full it’s full. That’s it. I can’t kick off other guests that are booked and confirmed and I can’t construct new cabins.

Of course you can always go on the waitlist, if that’s an option or call back regularly and check online to see if there were any cancellations, but again when it’s full, it’s full.

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Have you worked in travel or encountered any weird and bizarre questions from people when you were travelling?

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