We had a beautiful day today. Sunny and not too warm. So no chance of haziness appearing that might make our life miserable. It was nearly wind still and thus we could clearly see the ocean swell running in from the south. If there is a bit of wind then the swell can easily be mixed in with the waves produced by the wind, making it harder to discern what is what. Today there was no wind and thus the only thing that made the sea move was the swell. Two swells today, one from the South East and one from the South West. The one from the south East was short in time period and had been caused by the wind we had the day before yesterday. The swell from the south west was higher but also longer in time period. It must have originated all the way down in the Japan area. By the late afternoon it became really pronounced and the ship moved a little bit; even with the stabilizers in operation. But this was a gentle movement and no doubt it helped everybody have a good nights rest.
Today we had something new to look at. The company is in the progress of changing its comment on board form system. All who have sailed with us in the past, know that on the last day of the cruise a Comment On board form (COB) comes to the cabin with the request to rate the past cruise. Those forms are then scanned in and this results in a total overview of the ratings. Ratings made by all the guests on board for the various parts of our product. For us here on the ship it is always an important moment as it gives a good indication of how well we did, or not; and if there are any area’s where we can improve. It was not a fail safe system, as it was standard that with a bad weather cruise the ratings would go down a little bit, even for items that had nothing to do with the weather. Still it gave a very good indication and it was a good tool to help maintain the level of service and even improve upon it.
Now the company is going electronic. No more COB’s in the cabins. When the guest arrives home from the cruise, there will be an email with a link in it, inviting the guest to complete the COB on line. For us it will mean that it will take longer before we get the compiled results to review. For the guests it is a lot easier as it does not have to be done on board during the final day, when everybody is very busy anyway. And of course it will save a lot of paper as well.
Saving paper is one of the keystones of the company’s green policies. We estimate that in the last five years we managed to reduce the paper consumption on board by at least 50%. It took a concerted effort to do this, as the self-regulation because of the arrival of the electronic age did not really work. When the computers appeared there was the consensus that the amount of paper used would now go down. It did not, because attached to the computer was a printer and thus everybody wanted a hard copy. Then email arrived and also on the ships there was the instant expectation that the amount of paper used would go down; it really did not as there were too many people without an email connection and they needed a hard copy again.
Since then the company has focused on getting the communication streams on board adjusted in such a way that the amount of paper used is going down. And it did. Now we have arrived at the point that policy decisions are needed to further reduce paper consumption. The internet is now a common good and most guests are on email and thus we can go paperless with the COB’s. More of these improvements will follow and I would not be amazed if we will see Electronic Tablets appearing in the dining room instead of the paper menus. Instead of your dining room waiter taking your order, he/she will now be there to advise you and to serve; You tap in your choice yourself. It might take a few years but will appear on the cruise ships eventually.
We will be in Glacier Bay tomorrow and the weather looks quite good. No rain has been forecast although there is always a chance of an early morning shower, as the clouds tend to bounce back from the Fairweather Mountain Range. We will be at the Ranger Station at 10 am. and from there move up the Bay.
August 20, 2013 at 9:32 pm
Love your blog and have been following you for years. Just a few thoughts on the electronic comment forms…
Not everyone has a computer or is computer literate, especially some of the elderly. Is there going to be an option for them to express their opinion?
I suspect that you will also see scores lower as people “remember” the negatives and are not still living the positives. Also, naming staff will reduce as people forget names. Finally, I suspect the amount of surveys that you receive back will decrease.
I am all for saving trees, but we still need to be sensitive to the fact not all people are plugged in, nor do they want to be.
August 21, 2013 at 10:00 pm
good morning,
Those are valid concerns, the program is still in its initial phase and I am waiting to see how the follow up will be from the input of all our guests. As with every program, there will be some fine tuning in response to the concerns voiced by our guests.
thank you for reading my blog.
Capt. Albert
August 20, 2013 at 9:53 pm
Interesting about having having tablets in the dining room for ordering our meals. Another way to save paper (and so many of us are wishing for this!): being able to pull up our on-board accounts on our stateroom TVs to monitor charges instead of going to the front desk to get a printout every few days. Also, instead of printing all the photos the ship photographers take, would love to be able to see those on a monitor or TV so I could pick & choose the ones I want, then only those ones would be printed or put on a CD for us (is this an outside contractor?). I suspect we’ll see these before too long!
August 21, 2013 at 2:31 pm
I like the idea regarding the photographs as there must be an awful amount of wastage of photographic paper as not all photographs are bought. This may also help to reduce the costs of the photograph thus possible increased sales i.i.2 for price of 1..
September 14, 2013 at 11:20 pm
The paper issue is interesting and I realize that the HAL is doing everything to lower the overhead, but some amenities were always a nice feature, such as getting your daily abbreviated New York Times. I know they’re still available, but the cabin delivery was a nice touch. Oddly, what used to come to your cabin mail bin has been replaced and it’s now overloaded with “junk mail”; jewelry, art, spa treatments, etc. I know the vendors pay for this, but it’s still wasteful and annoying.