Chair hogging, walkie talkies, cash games – cruise lines crack down with fresh bans 

  • Cruise lines are constantly adjusting their lists of prohibited items to take onboard and tinkering with onboard policies.
  • Some recent changes include the banning of walkie-talkies by Norwegian Cruise Line and the limit on chair-hogging placed by Carnival Cruise Line.
  • These changes often have mixed reactions from cruisers.

Cruise lines such as Carnival Cruises and Norwegian Cruise Line have been banning cruise practices and items, such as chair-hogging, walking talkies, and more, drawing divided reactions from the cruise community.

Each cruise line has specific items that guests aren’t allowed to bring on board, and many cruise lines appear to be growing their lists coming into 2025. Some bans seem to bring a sigh of relief, but others such as Carnival’s recent decision to ban Bluetooth speakers, can draw a more mixed reaction from cruisers. 

Chair-hogging

Carnival’s newest policy on ‘chair-hogging’ at the pool, appears to have knocked it out of the park. The new rule is that if the crew notices a deck chair that has been unattended for a few minutes, they’ll put down a little red flag, and if the chair hasn’t been claimed within 40 minutes, their items will be removed. 

This policy has the idea of preventing people from leaving a towel or other items on a deck chair for hours, and coming back to it whenever they please. 

John Heald Carnival Cruise Line ambassador recognised it’s not a perfected system, but is the beginning of a crackdown on the behaviour.

“If they are not back by that time, we will remove it. It’s only fair to make it that way. Ever since I’ve worked on cruise ships, there’ve been people desperate to get the chairs. We are doing our very best. It’s not a perfect system, it would be silly of me to suggest otherwise. But it is something we need to do.”

The sentiment amongst cruisers towards the new rule is definitely a positive one, however, cruisers do want to see the policy extended and have more ideas to make sharing of the pool space more fair.

One Reddit user wrote: “Please make it an industry standard. When I was on Nieuw Amsterdam last year, a couple of veteran cruisers had their names on chair-hogging bands.

I’d also like to see a rule about one human holding an entire row. “I’m sorry, my entire family is using these 12 seats”

Another Reddit user has another idea for how to stop the practice.

“I think what would be most effective is to have cubbies/lockers for people to store things and say no seats are saved unless you are actually sitting in it.

“Put stuff in a cubby, go swim, get your stuff, and sit down in one of the many open chairs.”

family about to cruise
Lots of families use walkie-talkies on cruises.

Walkie-talkies

Many families and travel parties use walkie-talkies on cruises as a means of staying in touch while on different parts of the ships. However, it’s constantly debated amongst the cruise community whether this should be allowed, as other passengers can find it annoying. 

Many cruisers complain that they cause too many disturbances, as they make loud beeps and sounds, and passengers generally have to speak forcefully or yell to be heard. 

Norwegian Cruise Line has taken a hard-line stance on this, adding them to their prohibited items list. However, other cruise lines such as Royal Caribbean and Carnival still allow them onboard. 

It should also be noted that the practice of taking walkie-talkies onboard is becoming less necessary as cruise lines improve their onboard applications and the internal communication messaging systems attached. 

Though for the time being, cruisers remain divided on whether walkie-talkies should or shouldn’t be allowed onboard. 

Cash games

Carnival has confirmed an outlawing of any cash-based games outside of the Casino.

Heald wrote: “Well, we’ve never allowed it. It’s never been allowed, as is the case with any game that involves the exchange of money or gambling outside of the casino. You can play for no money, but I’m afraid that, because of very important rules and regulations, we do not allow guests to gamble outside of the casino. Thank you so much. I hope you can still play this, and I hope you have a wonderful time.”

This means that any games that involve an exchange of cash, no matter how small or friendly, aren’t permitted on Carnival Cruises.

Some cruisers feel this is just a tactic to drive more people to the casino and an unnecessary restriction of onboard freedoms. The policy proves to be less popular than some of Carnival’s other recent decisions.

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