Scenic Anmeldelser 

This cruise line bears no resemblance to its marketing and advertisement. It's an absolute garbage barge. I've sailed on Crystal, Silversea, Regent, Seabourn, Oceania, Celebrity and Scenic. Scenic is the very worst.

The problem is that its corporate office does not care about passengers' experiences and instead focus almost exclusively on courting travel agents. On my recent cruise with Scenic, at nearly every port travel agents were escorted through the ship and given priority over passengers. Scenic would roll out the red carpet for them (champagne, cold towels and so on) but would refuse to do the same for paasengers.

They also do absolutely nothing about bad passenger behavior including allowing passengers to yell homophonic slurs at a gay couple and threaten violence on others. They simply did not care. Now if you are an unruly passenger who enjoys slurs and threats, this may be a good line for you.

The excursions are a total joke. Things get cancelled without notice and without any real attempt to give passengers another option. For example, after we missed two ports over several days, we got a letter from Scenic advising us that we missed the ports...days after the fact.

The ship seemingly has deferred maintenance and a lot of things were not operative (air conditioning on deck 5, stabilizers, propulsion system, etc.) but Scenic didn't divulge that to passengers. Instead we found out the hard way. Scenic frankly was less than forthcoming when we asked. It was Cruise Industry News that actually disclosed the truth - the ship was headed for dry dock for repairs.

Time and again corporate's response was a condescending dismissal of numerous passengers' concerns. The corporate view is passengers are lucky to be on Scenic. They also remove negative comments from their Facebook page to ensure potential passengers never see the truth. It's a deceptive practice.
On our cruise, passengers were given surveys but when so many started to came back negative, oddly other passengers started noting the "sumbit" button was malfunctioning. Coincidence...maybe.

The best thing that could happen to this line is for it to go insolvent and be sold to a company that doesn't hate passengers.

Totally deceptive company. Stay far away! They'll lure new clients / Travel Agents in with glossy marketing materials and slick Instagram videos, however, I'm here to tell you the real-life experience is absolutely nothing like what's advertised. Not "6-star" as they repeatedly claim. This isn't even a 4-star line on its best day. Total misrepresentation. They'll tell you they have helicopters, submarines, and Zodiacs. What they won't tell you is that they're rarely, if ever used as they're routinely broken, or, when they are, they're reserved for Travel Agents. Scenic prioritizes Travel Agents over paying guests by parading hoards of travel advisors through a ship that paying passengers are on. On what planet is that "6-star"? Scenic allows them to board / tour the ship before paying guests. The A/C system in a majority of the ship does not work--tons of deferred maintenance (a majority of cabins and common areas were without A/C), however, we were told it was due to the fact the ship wasn't moving. Another blatant lie. Scenic knew about this as well. In addition, Scenic knew that the propulsion system wasn't working properly which made for an extremely uncomfortable voyage as the ship was constantly bouncing around. The outdoor bar on the sun deck is self-serve and never staffed. Also not 6-star. Scenic operates the company as a ponzi scheme of sorts: courting new-to-Scenic cruisers and Travel Advisors who were foolish enough to fall for their deceptive advertising only to realize that the onboard experience is a far cry from what was promised. The corporate customer service team is non-existent and guests will receive an auto-reply email stating their matter will be responded to in "seven business days". Buyer beware! The Cruise Critic and TripAdvisor reviews don't lie and I encourage you to read them all. This is a very expensive cruise vacation and I don't want to see anyone else taken advantage of by this duplicitous organization. Book with ANY other cruise company. They do not stand behind their product and treat paying guests as a burden. They do, however, roll out the red carpet for Travel Advisors: free helicopter tours, cold towels, champagne (paying guests receive none of these things)--it's all a farce. As the saying goes from the Wizard of Oz: pay no attention to what's going on behind the curtain. I wouldn't recommend this cruise company to my worst enemy. Pathetic.

Pros
Comfortable ship though jaded
Good service by reception bar & waiting staff.
Cruise director tried hard to make things run as smoothly as possible under the circumstances

Cons
1
We were doing back to back cruises Lyon to Lyon & second one from Porto. Scenic in their wisdom booked us on a 640am flight from Lyon & had our transport booked for 345am
When we arrived at Lyon airport check in the staff were bemused that we were booked on that flight which then had a 4 hour waiting time in Madrid to connect to Porto. Total time from leaving Lyon cruise to arriving at Porto cruise was 11 hours.
On checking Iberian airlines timetable we found there was another 1225 pm flight that day that arrived in Porto at 4pm the same day!!! Travelling time of 6hrs still not ideal but a better option that getting up at 3am.

2.
While we understand that scenic has no power over the weather we feel decisions were not made in the best interests & comfort of the guests

3.
After 4 nights in Avignon instead of the scheduled 2 we were finally transported back to Lyon as the boat was unable to leave the port. The bus trip was 3.5 hours after which we were deposited at a large square in the city centre
We were left for 3hours to get lunch before being transported to our accommodation. There were a number of infirm people who could not walk very far so choices for lunch were virtually non existent for them

4
We were told that once we arrived at our accommodation our luggage would be in our room
Not the case, luggage was everywhere in the foyer
Radisson blu had two lifts to get all 140 pax to reception on 32nd floor!
The distribution of keys was a complete farce with 2 people calling names for at the same time. It was pure chaos. The were 2 hotel lifts from 32nd floor for 200 rooms over 5 floors. Total time from Lyon to getting keys for room 8 hours.

5
The provided dinner on Saturday night in Lyon was disgusting. Considering it was a last minute booking for 140 people we were not surprised

We had been very tolerant to scenic decisions but ran out of patience with such poor management choices
Considering we paid over $20,000 for this cruise it is without doubt one of the most disappointing and badly managed cruises we’ve ever been on (we’ve done 10 different cruises)
While cruise director worked hard for the guests she was obviously hampered by decisions made by scenic management
These decisions were not in the best interest or comfort considering the age demographic of the pax

Conclusion
All in all the Lyon cruise was not going to be what we’d hoped after we were delayed 2 days in Lyon
In Avignon we watched the Avalon ship beside us disembark their pax before the rain hit Avignon on Thursday
All in all a much better decision for their pax

Scenic needs to kindly explain why many Canadian travellers are offered a deal for a couple to only pay for 1 pax after only doing one previous cruise!

Australians who had done several cruises had never been offered such discount & had paid full price for both pax!!!!!!!!
Could not in all honesty recommend a Scenic Rhone river Cruise after this experience.

Scenic cruise InjuryUsing Scenic bikes - be wary
I sustained a serious injury that became infected because a Scenic supplied bike was not safe to use. No first aid kit or FA people on board to help manage. I incurred medical costs and could not participate in booked activities because of the injury. Scenic will not accept any responsibility nor compensate for the $ loss I have incurred.... incredible weasel words in all correspondence. The fact the incident occurred is one thing, how it is responded to is what shows character - in this case Scenic have failed badly.

Using Scenic bikes - be wary

I was waiting from Chelsea from Newcastle NSW after job application and interview. She said they were expanding. Hiring 5 staff. Did online interview and advised after morning meeting the next day shall be advised after lunch. At 5.55 pm got a message. I was less experienced. Seriously. I have a commendable record. This is so disheartening. I believe in doing what you say you shall do. Glad I know better than rely on her next cruise. Lies and all that 👍

Booking this trip was not a pleasant experience. The agent I dealt with seemed to go out of his way to be as awkward as possible. I was all for cancelling at that point. Plus every time there was even a minor change we got stacks of the same paperwork sent to us.
So I started this trip in a pretty negative frame of mind which was frustrating due to the pretty hefty price tag of this holiday.
The flights were fine, although we ended up paying far more than if id booked them myself. When I pointed this out to the scenic agent, the response was tough, that's the deal their flight team had.

Arrival at the airport was a little hectic but someone was there to greet us and we got on the bus ok to the ship. If you fly in earlier, we were advised that no later transfer would be done. It was only by chance the boat couldn't make it to Basle so we joined up with the group at the airport for a bus transfer.
Very warm greeting on our arrival. I did feel special which was nice. This was our first river cruise after many ocean cruises.The Pearl was a little dated but it looked well cared for and clean. The room was small and the balcony was separated from the next one by a metal screen, with large gaps all the way around. Not great for conversations. Our balcony door also wouldn't lock. We reported this first thing but nothing. Engine noise was occasionally annoying, and there was vibration. And we weren't near the back.
Mini fridge was stocked with a small bottle of wine, Gin, vodka, whisky one beer, orange, & apple juice and 2 or 3 cokes. I asked for Drambuie and Sprite to be included but was advised I had to go to the bar for those.
What made this holiday so good. The people we met, the gorgeous scenery and the staff working so very hard. Having sailed on many ocean cruise lines, this service was miles better. You were constantly asked if you needed anything. We saw little Butler service. That was fine. Not something we felt we needed anyway although the odd check from him would have been nice. Our cabin Steward did a great job keeping the room clean. Food was a mixture. Sometimes excellent and other times like pub food. Lack of consistency was strange.The bar staff were absolutely outstanding as were the waiting staff in the restaurant.
Entertainment was generally ok if uninspiring. The entertainment manager was a very good singer but he was up for three nights of the seven. The rest of the entertainment was bordering on amateur hour. This aspect was really disappointing. Only one night due to the itinerary could you get a shore to appreciate local entertainment.
Security measures were pretty much not seen. Perhaps they had hidden measures. I forgot to tag back in one night. Only realized next morning but no one checked. People seemed to wander on and off the ship.
Trips were generally good, but too short. Far too little time to explore some of the gorgeous towns and cities we visited. Some of the guides English was also a challenge. Occasional welcome home drinks were nice, and cold flannels were occasionally offered.
We did the e-bikes on board which was great fun and the most strenuous tour offered. It was a shame that no water based activity was offered.

So despite the really poor customer service during the booking process which I think needs to be addressed as a matter of urgency, the crew on Pearl turned my very negative views into a real positive.

Would we sail with scenic again? Jury still out especially reading about too little/ too much water and scenics handling of these issues with unhappy customers.

We have just had the BEST holiday.We have just done the castles & vineyards trip down the Rhine.
Basically if I could give Scenic 10 stars I would.It was indeed 5 star luxury from the start!The ship was fabulous as were ALL staff.Nothing was too much trouble. Food,fabulous!!
All basically beyond our expectations.

Was thinking about booking a danube river cruise but after reading these reviews I am now not going to. I notice none of these reviews have been answered by Scenic. That tells you something else. Pity because on their website the cruises looked good. Thank you everybody for your reviews

we have always had the best holidays with Scenic and today I rang on 2 different numbers to enquire about the New Zealand holiday and waited for over 1 hr on 2 different lines and had to eventually hang up, very disappointed.

Seasoned cruise traveller, first time Scenic River cruise - never again. The only thing 5*star about this company is their marketing - over promise and under deliver. Pleasant staff but this must work within very rigid guidelines - I have never encountered a more non guest friendly cruise company. Had a junior suite, a butler is mere figment of their marketing BS - decor was chrome and mirrors and the food and wine and embarrassment.

Very difficult company to deal with. After two failed attempts at going on a cruise due to Covid. (nobodys fault). I was given an undertaking that I could have my cruise payments refunded at 30 June 2023. Some 2 years after the second cancelation. Good luck getting Scenic to honour that commitment, they just continue to make empty promises. Unfortunately I will have to take legal action against them to recover my money.

I recently did the Jewels of Europe tour on the Scenic Jewel which began in Amsterdam on 28th of July and brought my son and his family. Altogether there were 7 of us.
I have also booked for 17 people December 2014 for the 7 night Christmas market tour.

Please take this feedback in the manner it is intended and I hope it will be helpful for future planning.

First of all the staff were absolutely amazing. Nothing was too much trouble and this helped make our trip very enjoyable.

Now some areas that could be definitely improved.
1) The food for the evening meal was not good. I understand they have a small kitchen but there is very little variety and whenever we ordered the options of salmon, steak or chicken, they were always well over cooked and dry even when we asked for it to be rare or medium rare.
2) Bread rolls were so tiny and tasteless, Nice large bread rolls would be great
3) One day we had just been in beautiful German wine country where we all got a chair lift over miles and miles of vineyards. That evening we were offered Australian and American wine. I asked if it was possible to have wine from the region we had just visited, and they said sure, but this should have been standard practice and we should not have been offered Australian and American wine.
4) It would be nice to have table cloths at night. We were often tied up next to other boats and could see they had table cloths which made the meal more special
5) Portobellos was closed half the time meaning we only had one turn in there. Suggest opening every night as the meal quality was much better and that way everyone could get 2 opportunities to eat a higher quality meal

6) The machines to talk to listen to the tour guides were terrible. We spent 20 minutes of each tour trying to get them working In the end I just stayed close to the guide so I could hear what they were saying. My brother did same cruise 2 weeks before me and he agreed, Everyone on his trip had same problem. Even the tour guides said other companies use much better and more modern systems, so would be great to replace these.

7) Even though it is small, the massage/facial room is still charging top prices for a treatment but the ambiance was not good. This small space needs to be made a lot more relaxing and spa like. ( Im in the beauty training industry so this really bugged me as we work with small rooms and it is easy to do, good bed, battery candles etc, nice things on wall.

8) I also suggest a dress code for the evening meal, jacket for men, long pants, women well dressed.This raises the level.we were on the trip of a lifetime, and having people in thongs at dinner and shorts ( men and women) lowered the quality

As I said, the staff were amazing. I could not fault them, but the suggestions above would be easy to implement and raise the professionalism and quality of Scenic experiences

My Fiancé and I were booked to travel to the Antarctic in December this year. I had to cancel as I have a diagnosis of Liver Cirrhosis and need to have scans etc. They wrote to me and said that we would be refunded in 8 weeks. I thought that was a little bit of a long time but never the less waited. After the 9th week I got in touch. After agreeing the refund, they then wanted proof of my illness! This is private information but I obliged. I was told that the refund would be in my account within 3 days. A week later there was still no refund. I made a good 8 calls over the following 4 weeks to address this issue. They said to me that they wanted proof of bills that I had to pay. Then in my last recorded (with their knowledge) call they wouldn’t let me have their customer complaints email address. I wrote yet another email and said that I would take this to Consumer Affairs and A Current Affair. The refund was for $36,000.00. It was only then that they got in touch by email and processed my refund. Finally. 13 weeks after they agreed it. I’ve read on reviews of people waiting 3 years for the same. The abject lack of understanding and customer care with this company is simply non existent. You can never get past the people on their general number - they simply wont put you through. I will never sail with them anywhere. Be warned. They will hang on to your money even if you are ill and need the refund. Disgusting behaviour.

After visiting Antartic in 2020 with Scenic, they canceled two other trips that year. Scenic decide to keep the tour payment in full for the first trip. Booking those canceled trips in 2022, Scenic canceled both tours within weeks of the departure dates, without reasons given. Now in june 2023, after months going on a year of refund requests, Scenic refunded the 2020 tour payment. Scenic kept the 2 years of earned interest on our money.

River cruise ran late. Scenic promised a partial refund under their "guarantee". Since January Scenic has concocted excuse after excuse to delay our refund. Be vary wary travelling with Scenic.
We were loyal to Scenic, taking multiple river cruises and land tour, but not anymore. Prices remain premium, but quality and service are now bargain basement.

This particular cruise ship lacks entertainment for guests. No small band, no comics, no shows, no casino. The tours are also very short timeframe and the ship usually docks in the afternoon in mosts cities leaving very little time for guests to leave the ship and enjoy the places you are visiting. Not much information is provided by cruise regarding tours, times, docking etc. everything is a guessing game

I personally would not book this cruise line again

From absolutely loving Scenic, in the past, to now being utterly disappointed in their untrustworthiness. Shame on Scenic. Our twice deferred trip finally went ahead, then before departure was curtailed due to inability to supply the tour extension content. We were encouraged to make our own accommodation arrangements for being stuck in a destination three more days than Scenic were able to accommodate us on the understanding we would be reimbursed by Scenic for the three days of hanging around. That was a joke. In the end, the reimbursement made, did not even cover part of one night of the hotel costs in the very hotel that they would have used could they have secured the booking. Money is owed to us and I doubt we will ever see it. We had this offer from Scenic in writing, which subsequently their staff choose to ignore. We were always willing to spend on on Scenic, booking Royal/Owners/Panorama cabins, This a back to back cruise and pre and post tour extensions. We shall not be availing ourselves the displeasure of Scenic again. Shame because we were thinking of booking Scenic Eclipse before this happened. So very disappointing. We shall take our money elsewhere now.

Our booking experience was horrendous. Apparently Their website had been hacked making it impossible to contact anyone as all numbers we called just rang out. We did get in touch with someone after being on hold for over 3 hours. We booked our trip of a life time and we were very excited. We received our booking via email only to find our names spelt wrong so we spent hours trying to contact your booking department to get that changed. We received our invoice promptly we paid and then didn't receive a receipt for a week later and several emails and phone calls later. Not once did your staff apologizes for the delays just ignored our complaints. Very poor service

We chose Scenic as they advertised 5 star cruising, top service and luxury. We didn't get that.

On arriving at the airport we were a bit unsure where to go - Viking had staff at every gate and several at the meeting place (Amsterdam) we actually asked the Viking representative where the Scenic representative was ! We met up with other passengers and waited, our one representative turned up 30min late ! (with no apology)

On boarding our boat -Crystal- was disappointing, she was old, tiered and smelt of sewage. this smell stayed around for 4 days and then the whole boats toilet and shower system went down for a few hours !! Spider webs, bugs, leaking showers, ripped seats, missing chess pieces - Not very luxurious.

To get a drink at night was a drama it took at least 30 min to get served. To Scenic's credit the food was amazing.

24 hour butler service! Well we did get to meet our butler who introduced themselves to us when we boarded. We were ill two nights and decided to eat in our room. I rang our butler service to get our dinner delivered to our room only to be told that they where very busy and would get to us when they could, the second night we ordered again only to be told the same thing they where busy -I'm sorry what happen to 24 hour butler service to get you anything you need!! that night we only received one meal I rang to see where the other meal was only to be told very rudely that what I ordered wasn't on the menu - it was as I was looking at the menu on the TV - I was told that they would see what they could do - nothing arrived.

To top of all off the cruise was cancelled due to low water But to Scenics credit they did refund us which we appreciate. I am writing this to let you know that we where looking forward this trip
That I personally have dreamed of doing for years and we bitterly disappointed and I'm sorry I will not recommend Scenic to anyone thinking of doing a Europe river cruise

We paid 5 star price for a 3 star cruise

Have just been informed that our fully paid Europe River Cruise for July 2023 has been brought forward by two days! With flights and other travel arrangements locked in, this means either missing the first day or two of an 8 night cruise or paying a large sum to change flights at the second busiest time of the year. Scenic have “generously” offered to pay just half the cost of the changed flights leaving me well out of pocket and with a very poor opinion of this travel company. Are they on a downward spiral with their treatment of customers?

I have been trying to contact them for several days to make changes to a booking. Wait times are anywhere from 40 minutes to over an hour. They can’t answer questions and place you on hold. They have written and stated they would make contact on a day with an update and they don’t. This is beyond frustrating when you are charged a premium for the cruise. This companies customer service and engagement is nonexistent.