What is the scan the towel policy on Royal Caribbean?

[Macprincess]

Do we really have to check out towels at the pool and gang way when taking towels on shore and get charged $25 for each un-returned towel on Allure of the Seas? I'm thinking this is going to be a huge pain in the rear when cruising with four teens and my husband. I would love to say they will return them but I know my kids/husband. They are bound to get side tracked easily & forget. So either I get to spend my vacation time policing this or I have to pack beach towels and forbid the kids from checking them out... Just add this to the list of one more reason to be annoyed at myself for getting talked into a Royal Caribbean cruise. I should have fought harder to stick with DCL.

 

[richmo]

Yes, if you check out a towel, make sure you return it. They're fairly nice towels...I can see why they don't want to lose them.

 

[msjprincess]

I've never found it to be a big deal. Even my forgetful kids have never forgotten to return a towel. There used to reports that people would bring them ashore and just leave them on local beaches because they didn't want to be bothered bringing back wet sandy towels. It may be my imagination but it also seemed to help with chair hogs on my last cruise. If you're before final payment date you can still try to convince your travel mates to switch to DCL.

FYI You don't have to return them every day. You have until the last night of the cruise. And you can exchange the towels without having anything scanned.

 

[Denise W]

I don't find it a big deal at all.
Denise

 

[starvenger]

Like the others have said, it's not a big deal really. You check it out when you need them, check them back in when you're done, and the end of the cruise, if checked out > returned you pay the difference. The process seems to work.

fwiw, I tell my kids (7 and 10) that if they misplace a towel the money comes out of their pockets. I don't know if that will work with your teens though.

 

[OKgirl]

Although I was initially annoyed by this...... I REALLY appreciate it now! My first cruise was on Carnival and people would grab 10-30 towels to save pool chairs for their entire families (but only 6-8 out of 30 chairs would ever be used at one time). Grandma and grandpa would get up at 7:30 in the morning to save chairs. Realizing this, we would then get up at 7:30 to rush down to the pool to get chairs near the pool. Chairs would be gone by 10 AM. People were fighting and cursing at each other for saving chairs that were never used and the staff stayed out of all arguments. On Royal, you can only check out as many towels as there are people in your cabin. We have a family of 5 but only need 3 chairs at any one time (due to kids playing in the pool, etc). We have ALWAYS found 3 chairs together on Royal ships even if we go at 11 am or 1 pm. No more rude families saving 4 times more chairs than they need! We even asked this grandma if we could sit in 2 of her 30 chairs until they were needed and she told us "NO! We got here first!" There were no other chairs anywhere on the ship that we could find together on our Honeymoon. (At least we were happy to spend a lot of time in the room!) I think you'll appreciate it if you've ever been in that situation! (I also appreciate that Disney does this at Aulani for the same reasons). Have a great cruise!

 

[angelinaxox]

I can't stand this policy. I preferred it before they implemented this policy and then when they did away with the policy for awhile. You also have to check your account to make sure you don't get charged for returned towels as it does happen from time to time that they make mistakes.

 

[starvenger]

Valid point.

I haven't had an issue with accidental charging myself, but then again I'm a bit paranoid and try to ensure that the towel guys scan my cards for the correct number.

 

[HopperFan]

What we did for Labadee (our only beach day) is we took our oldest beach towels from home. We took them to the beach for the day. At the end of the day we folded them and placed them on chair right next to our beach "guy" and told him we would not be taking them with us, he could do with them as he wished. More room in our bags going home if we did any shopping.

On ship it wasn't difficult to keep track of our towels, but we are all adults.

 

[nkereina]

We didn't find it to be a big deal either. It's pretty easy for everyone to do a double check when they are leaving the beach or the pool for the day to make sure they have a towel in hand.

 

[lynch34]

This is not a big deal at all. You check out towels and bring them back. If someone else grabbed one or you are short one, you just dump the towels quickly in the bin and the people give you credit for all of them. It's not like they are counting them as you dump.

 

[MCazer]

Its not a big deal, but be proactive. We always returned our towels and always confirmed they were credited to our room, but on our last cruise on the Anthem, i had a charge of $50 for towels and had to call the front desk to have it removed.

 

[Frozen2014]

Agree with the above comments...it wasn't a big deal. For our port days, we often checked out clean towels the night before so they were with us when we grabbed our stuff form the room to head off to the beach.

 

[Canadian Disney Mom]

Add me to the not a big deal band wagon. I travel with a teen as well and never had an issue.

 

[HappyPeach]

It's not a big deal. Carnival works that way too.

I bought a set of turkish towels for us to take on cruises specifically for our excursions. They are thin (but absorbent) and take up little room in the beach bag or backpack. The Royal towels are pretty large.