I WILL NEVER CRUISE WITH MSC AGAIN (Worst Cruise Ever)

If you are concerned about Covid, a cruise ship is the last place you should be.

Did they make things right?

Review is nauseating

"Little Caesars" - Holy Moly! Mention truly bad so-called food.

I'm new here, and I've been binging your channel for hours. I'm thrilled to hear the Apex is your favorite ship, because it's what I recently booked! Keep up the good work!

MSC is great! I did 2 cruises (MSC Bellissima and MSC Virtuosa) 2 more are booked (MSC Sinfonia and MSC Euribia). I had great food, very friendly staff and great entertainment!

You're not alone. I've been a Travel Agent for almost 20 years and I will NEVER ever book another client with MSC. Thanks for your honest reviews. I recommend your videos to many of my cruise clients!

Did you mention it was half the cost?

I’ve heard that cruise lines use their older, more dated ships for the short cruises like this one and save their newer ships for cruises lasting 7 days or longer. Have you found this to be the case?

MSC is a shipping company not a passenger cruise ship company. They just cannot do it. I've been on 3 MSC cruises and 3 strikes they are out. Never again. The customer service is absolutely Horrible. They lie to pacify customers. The food is pig slop. The crew members are miserable ( mostly) Do yourself a big favor and do not go with a container shipping company if you expect a nice restful experience. You will not have it. No more MSC.

Oh man, I wish I’d seen your video a few months ago. We just cancelled our July MSC booking for Yacht Club. No refund yet but it’s only been a few days, but now I am nervous 😬

Vc está enganado MSC the best!

Wij hebben in februari 2023 een cruise gemaakt met Divina van MRC. Het lopend buffet was prima, het had iets gevarieerde gekund maar alles was vers en lekker. Het avondeten was ook goed, maar iets te weinig keus voor vegetariërs. Wij hebben diverse cruises gemaakt, dus hebben redelijk wat vergelijkingsmateriaal.

As an introvert, forced shared dining is a dealbreaker. I’m not paying for that.

Took my first ever cruise on MSC and I agree. It was the WORST. Everyone in our party said so too.

your opinions are matching everyone I talk to :(

We didn't like table sharing either. We always wait until we can get a table with just us together

I find this review ridiculous.

Hello Zach, how are you doing. New subscriber , I have watched other videos on MSC and they were very similar to your experience. I love cruisers just as you do , after hearing your story and others like you I will not be booking with MSC . I would suggest sailing with NCL, I have sailed with them 4 times and it was wonderful. Looking forward to seeing more videos from you , Thanks again 😀

We have just been on MSC Splendida, sailing from Sokhna (a freight port for Cairo) down the Red Sea. Worst cruise we have ever been on. The ship itself and stateroom were fine - but pretty much everything else was poor to disastrous. Huge queues & waiting times if you needed to see customer mis-services, rude, thuggish East European security staff for embarking & disembarking - they all appeared to be police-military wannabe’s or ex Stasi, chaotic organization, nice but poorly trained and unempowered staff. The worst buffet food on a cruise we have ever experienced. Very obviously multi-recycled food, very limited choices, no fresh eggs and omelette station. To be fair, food and service in the Reggia restaurant we were allocated to was fine, though we had to say on the first two evenings that we 2anted a table for two - to to be shoehorned between two other tables either side with zero space between them - even though there were plenty of empty tables for two.

Ripped off on their drinks package we upgraded to……..wines we requested were almost never available in any bar or restaurant, usually had to settle for the lowest quality & priced wines that we could have had on the cheapest basic drinks package. In the Bora-Bora buffet restaurant when I asked for a wine from the package I had purchased I was told they only had 1 white, 1 red & 1 Rose wine available. The waitress suggested I go down 10 decks to the Dim-Sum bar which I was told was “a sort of wine bar” for the wine we asked for. When I suggested a member of staff go, or arrange to have the drinks sent up as we were already eating, we were told “ sorry, that is not possible”. One of the staff in a baradmitted to us that many of the advertised wines were not even on board.
Evening before final disembarkation we saw customer services to explain we needed to get off the boat at 7.ooAM ( the ship had docked at 6.00 AM) rather than the 8.00AM earliest disembarkation we were told. We explained we had a private transfer arranged to Cairo. We were told no problem, but we h

Would have to take our own cases down. We struggled down next morning, eventually disembarked despite the unhelpful security staff, only to find that the shuttle buses from what is a secured commercial freight port , to the Immigration hall some 3 kms away (the nearest point to where taxis etc can get to the cruise ship) did not start until 8.00AM. We found out later that this was well known to customer services but they couldnt be bothered to tell us, or maybe thought it would be a bit of fun to have us waiting for an hour. My wife was very distressed & we approached several MSC employees on the port but none were interested in helping - only in herding passengers to their excursion coaches. The first shuttle bus did not leave the port until 8.45, so our driver was waiting for us for over 2 hours, which we had to pay for of course.
Finally the excursions - again a rip-off, average 6 hours round trip coach journeys for extremely limited time at the venue that people actually book & pay to see ( especially the excursion to Medina), but of course there is plenty of time for them to take clients to commission- generating indifferent restaurants for lunch and crappy tacky retail outlets for shopping for made in China souvenirs etc.
Rant over, we will never go with MSC again and would never recommend them. By the way, we went on a Gulf MSC cruise in January 2020, and while it was the most inferior of the 8 cruises we had previously been on it wasn’t too bad and was ok-fine. This last one spoiled our holiday big time.

I’ve subscribed to your channel and I must say I love it. I’m from Canada and we have 33 cruises under our belt and probably more than half are with Celebrity and then Princess and HAL. Your reviews are very honest and informative, not to mention your accent, which I love. Keep up the good work!

Have you tried them since then? I just booked. There was a great deal. An 11 night for $709 plus taxes and fees. I heard they made a lot of improvements.

Not even on the MSC Meraviglia ship yet and already I can see this going downhill (I will write another review if ship turns out okay) however this is a review about MSC customer service (or lack thereof).

So we book 2 cabins (3 young kids 2 parents) with MSC (first time with MSC however many cruises with all other lines). I find out they booked us on different floors (nevermind adjoining as we asked). We are told $500 extra if you need adjoining cause you have to upgrade. Okay so next hurdle was check-in. I go to their website I am able to check in my booking number/cabin but not my wifes and daughters(unable to link and unable to register separately). I call MSC, wait the customary 20 minutes for an answer and after an hour of hold/off hold I am told I booked with a travel agent I need to go back to my travel agent in order to make MSC's website work so I can check in the 2nd cabin! Balderdash! I tell her calmly that a 3rd party travel agent has no business making YOUR website work so I can check in my 2nd cabin to comply with your demands?? After I offer to give her my username and pw so she can replicate issue and her refusal I ask if I can I speak to a technical person. She puts me on hold again 5 more minutes comes back and gives me an email to contact ([email protected]). Again I calmly advise that she is now insulting my intelligence as this is a customer service email which is the same as calling customer service and speaking to you! So basically she just wanted me to get off the phone. I ask for a Supervisor, after another 5-6 minute wait she says I will now transfer you to my supervisor "Lori" and proceeds to hand up on me. An hour and 15 minutes I will never get back. Obviously this person was poorly trained and I will have to manually check in when we get to embarkation. This was a huge disappointment for me and I only ever give a retail est. once chance to impress and they blew that. First and last voyage on MSC unfortunately.

MSC was awful. I went solo at the end a March this year (2022). The only good thing were their shows which were amazing—minus the magician show. No activities other than outdoor aerobics, a salsa dance class, and trivia. This was a very boring cruise. I had been warned, but did not listen. Food was bland and boring in the dining—the buffet was better. I agree, the French toast was good.
The worst part for me was that we were supposed to port overnight in Puerto Rico (the reason I booked this particular cruise was because I was paying to visit and spend the night with family) and once on board we found out that we would be there only from 5p to 11p…and most places were closed since it was a Monday night. Another huge awful experience was that we were late porting onto their private island—supposedly because of winds…which were not apparent to passenger—and when finally getting on the island, there was no food! They told us that because we got on the island late, there was no time to set up the food. On top of that, they told us we could get food from food trucks on the island—come to find out there were only TWO trucks, AND ONE OF THEM WAS NOT OPEN!! This is crazy when you think of it…there must’ve been alt least 3,000 people on this cruise and most of us got off the ship to spend the day on the island!
Also, besides the shows, there was nothing to do at night other than going to the casino, which is not my thing at all.
I had the same experience with checking in. Sailing was for 4p and I was assigned to be there at 10a and sat around for hours waiting to get on the ship.
I wouldn’t recommend MSC to my enemies.

We will be on Grandeur of the Seas Jan22-29. You said you're on Royal in January, would we see you?

You simply had an indifferent experience. I can comprehend that you are dissatisfied. However, in defense of MSC as far as the seating is concerned, just imagine if all passengers on board demands to have the first seating, or even the last seating for that matter. It is morally impossible to accommodate all passengers at the same seating. There simply is not enough space to just have one seating. We never had such experience with MSC. On every cruise we have undertaken we had the choice of which seating we would prefer, and they were very accommodating without fail.

Thanks for the info on MSC. I’ll be taking my fav NCL, were all the food was hot, tasty and everything we wanted...

Man, the experience you had with the main dining was what we had with the NCL Jade. Total roller coaster and service was bad in the "nice dining room" vs the service was awesome in the "casual dining room".

Bottom line, they broke the two cardinal rules of cruising, top food and top service. This will be the 3rd video while I’m literally in the middle about to hit the ‘book’ button for an MSC cruise. You just gave me a moment of pause and my hand is no longer on the button. No matter how beautiful the ship, it’s all about the experience that ‘you’ pay for. I think I’ve seen enough. I think I’ll give MSC a pass and look into the other lines.

There are two things that I think they are dependent on being a foreign (Italian?) company. Them not having comedy may be to the fact that if you have different nationalities on board, only the ones whose language is being used on the particular language will understand the main guy. Then on MSC saying "boarding time being 3:30pm" maybe they meant "no later than 3:30pm" AGAIN it being a foreign company. I'm foreign born and such things are obvious to me.

Zach, that's your subjective opinion based on your own expectations which you are entitled to.

We've cruised 16 times on MSC and have never had a bad cruise. Travellers should not be put off by this. We were booked on an NCL cruise a few years back and read a some bad reviews prior to our cruise which had us quite worried about what to expect. However, once onboard, we could not understand what all the negativity was about and ended up having a fabulous cruise. Seems many Americans love complaining.

Enjoy MSC, they are now a serious contender in the world of cruising

Oh boy. We are booked for a 14 day on the same ship. Now I don’t know what to expect. The mobile website is horrible, the desktop site is a little better. It wasn’t cheap so I’m hoping I get what I paid for! We are gold with Carnival so they did match our loyalty status which is good for us. So far so good, I just hope that continues.

Great report. You are 100% right to be upset about the $160. WOW. So happy that you reported this! And I am totally with you about solo dining. I enjoy sitting by myself and watching a video on my iPad. End of the day and tired. CELEBRITY bends over backwards to accommodate me! CELEBRITY treats passengers SO WELL! Six star restaurant service.

I was on the "Enchanted Princess" this past April. They owed me a refund. It was impossible to get someone on the phone and emails were not answered. It took 90 days to get my refund. It still was a wonderful cruise. Living in South Florida there was allot of PR on MSC expanding into the American market. There were many issues with American tourists sailing on the Divina that they were going to address. Some which you covered on this posting. "Customer Service" was a big problem. It seems they have done little to improve the situation. Like many have posted, you get what you pay for. I am going to stick to Celebrity. Thanks for posting.

I'm thinking of booking with them,through cruise 1st,but hearing bad things about them,I will give it a miss and stick with NCL,great food and services

MSC seems to be the cruise line that you either love it or hate it. I've seen many vloggers that love MSC and probably just as many that hate it. It's very interesting the differing opinions. The overcharge/refund is definitely a negative hopefully by now you received your refund. I wonder if it's more about the ship you're on than the cruise line itself. Enjoying your vlogs

I have been in yacht club on the Divina and on the Seashore and have had nothing but amazing service and food. MSCs food is definitely different. It’s not over processed American standard food. And I think that’s where people go wrong with MSC. If you want food like NCL, go on NCL and pay twice the price. But if you want to try something different, go MSC. Yacht club food is far superior to any food on the ship, including butchers cut and tapinyaki. Our food was amazing.
As far as the money. I had the same exact issue and am waiting for a $300 refund right now that should have been on board credit. I will be getting it, it just takes 30-60 days. My travel agent has email correspondence with management on MSC to guarantee I’ll get it back.
They are getting better. They just hired over 100 Americans and they are working on fixing their customer service hierarchy (or anarchy whichever you want to think of it lol). They know it’s a problem. And I really feel like it will get better with time.
Consider giving them another shot in a year or so, and I highly suggest Yacht Club. Worth every penny.

It’s this simple. If you cruise the bottom tier on MSC, which costs you next to nothing, be prepared to be disappointed. If you’re willing to spend a few bucks, Book the yacht club and you will have the best cruising experience ever. Private dining room, private lounges and 24/7 butler service. Priority everything, boarding, show seats, eat in the private dining room at whatever time you want for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Plus, all of your liquor is included when you book the yacht club. MSC is a perfect example of you get what you pay for.

Just sailed on MSC for the first time to try them out and see how they compare with Royal, Carnival and NCL, and boy was I disappointed, terrible food and bar experience, some of the staff were even a little bit rude and most of them seemed to be lost or overwhelmed. Like I said was trying them out to decide about my next cruise to the Mediterranean and I think I now know which cruise line to pick.

I went on a 3 day MSC Meraviglia Cruise 2 weeks ago, mostly terrible. It was a full ship with 5,200 people and MSC clearly wasn't prepared. My MDR experience wasn't good, the breakfast and dinner were terrible. I did Specialty dining the rest of the time which was fabulous. Chef's table was fantastic and mediocre at the same time. Really good food, but for $100 there was no wine pairing, Chef didn't come out and explain the dishes, all it was, was an elevated Steak/Seafood meal. Teppanaki experience was fantastic and fun as heck. I didn't like everything as I'm not a sushi person but overall fabulous. Mexican restaurant was the best Mexican I've had in a year, however when I returned on Saturday they had run out of most of their menu items.

Entertainment was AMAZING. 5 big time production shows on a 3 night cruise meant I was never bored at night and always went to bed happy.

Ship was gorgeous, onboarding was a broken mess, I was part of the first group so wasn't as bad for me as it only took me 2 1/2 hrs - the terminal opened 2 hrs late, I'm not going to blame MSC for that. But that delayed things to the point where everyone else was waiting for 3 and 4 hrs to get on the ship. To get off the ship people were waiting for 2 and 3 hrs. We didn't leave until 9pm. The mustard drill was nonsense. Absolutely no information given until a 1/2 hr before it started and it isn't like you can hear the announcements in your cabin. So they said watch the video and call to confirm. Ok. I did that and thought it was done. Then 20 minutes later they make an announcement telling everyone they have to go to the mustard station. This was a FULL cruise, over 5,000 people. So there was a "mad" dash and half the passengers were still trying to get onboard at 6pm.

Staff was just bad. My room steward didn't really listen to anything I asked, and all I wanted was a bucket of ICE. He didn't deliver the daily planner, disembarkment info, etc. Room Service and Hospitality staff didn't answer their phones so no room service or anything. Couldn't get my free breakfast because room stewart didn't give me the breakfast menu hanger the first day and the 2nd day he didn't pick it up.

I had a room with a Jacuzzi, it was broken the first day, 2nd day I was at the port, 3rd day when I was finally able to use it, they decided to power wash my Deck at noon so my deck was wet until it dried off at 4pm, it ticked me off. What's drove me crazy is people in various forums who weren't there are trying to blame all the issues on passengers and NOT MSC.

I like to think that was an exception and not the norm for MSC.

The food is microwaved. The desserts are brought in. It’s a scam.

I can't imagine Italians serving bad pizza.

I literally just got home from a MSC cruise and it was horrible!! Stood in line for 5 hours just to get on the ship!! Not to mention the extra charges for things that were purchased by someone other than me!!

Great job!...thanks for you're feedback. MSC do have that poor reputation.

They watch these channels, and they have improved. The most recent videos show it has improved, so it shows that these honest reviews are worth it.

Just started to watch video due to curiosity because it says you'll never cruise with MSC again... I am about to go tomorow for a mediteranean cruise with MSC Splendida. This is my second time on Splendida and I can say it is a nice ship... I have done 4-5 cruises with MSC and one with Royal Caribean. For me MSC is way better than Royal because you can do whatever you want when you want but in Royal you cannot because most of the places have so weird working schedule. On MSC you can go to get some food 20 hours out of 24. Also in MSC you can choose to go early or late in the restaurant for dining and you have same table and chair as long as same waiter but in Royal you dont have that and have to wait sometimes to be seated somewhere which is so annoyng ! I can speak more but now I have to watch your video :)

Thank you so much for the video, I almost booked with MSC. I love the Carnival but I'm looking for something adult or just less kids.

The food in MDR sucks! Loaded with salt too

Just got off my first MSC and probably my last MSC cruise. I was assigned a 6:15 pm dinner which was far earlier Than I requested as a gold member. The crowds on the Mediterranean cruise were by far the worst I've ever experienced ever. I've done NCL and RCCL in Mediterranean and nowhere near as horrible people.