Flexible Dining What's Your Opinion On Carnival

I'm curious to find out how everybody feels about Carnival's Flexible Dining plan? Do you like it? Hate it? Haven't tried it? Personally, I haven't sailed on a ship that offers it yet so I'm curious how people who have tried it, like it.

I sailed the Carnival Legend on Aug. 17, 2008. I requested the flexible dining. I was in a group of 4 other people. The flexible dining worked as long as not everyone in our group ate in the dining room. They can't handle seating a party of 5 for flexible dining. The first formal night we waited 2 hours for a table. That is not acceptable. On the second formal night we called to make reservations and were told they could not seat a party of 5 that night.

I have also sailed NCL. There was no problem with their anytime dining. Never a wait and was never told we could not eat there.

So, it seems to me that Carnival should either do away with flexible dining all together or make it all flexible dining.

I've tried flex dining on a few lines, it's just not for me, I'll take traditional dining any time!

We've done it with Princess and NCL. Loved it on Princess, hated it on NCL. We'll be trying it on RCCL this month.

Hi,
we much prefer traditional dining on Carnival. When we tried the flex dining, we didn't think we got the same attentiveness from the waitstaff, and the meals took much longer to finish.
stephaniem