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Disgruntled Carnival customers band together in a high-tech, grass roots effort to get "millennium cruise'' refunds.
By JEFF HARRINGTON
© St. Petersburg Times, published February 5, 2000
Getting to know fellow passengers from around the world can be one of the pleasures of an ocean cruise. But many of those who sailed on Carnival Cruise Lines' special "millennium cruise" on the Paradise have developed a rare and special bond.
It's a bond of bitterness, anger and determination to win redress from the Miami-based cruise line for what went wrong on the New Year's cruise of the year-old ship.
Creating a Web site as their rallying point, they are downloading pre-formatted complaint letters to send to legislators, the Federal Trade Commission and maritime regulators. An ad hoc committee is keeping in touch via e-mail, assigning different passengers to work with media in different states and to prepare documents for a class-action suit. More than 1,600 have signed a petition demanding at least half their money back.
Even for complaint-prone Carnival, the nature of the "electronic protest" has been an eye-opener. "We have not seen this before," acknowledged Tim Gallagher, a spokesman in Carnival's Miami headquarters.
Over the last year, Carnival has battled episodes with a fire, a hurricane and stopped-up toilets on its cruises. Its executives may have thought they had seen it all dealing with irate passengers.
That was before the Paradise set sail Dec. 26 and quickly ran into engine troubles. Before the seven-day voyage was over, hundreds of determined and disgruntled passengers had begun cobbling together an old-fashioned protest using some decidedly new-fashioned means.
"They underestimated what a bunch of angry passengers could do in the age of the Internet and with the right passenger mix," said Mark Rosenblit, a Paradise passenger and Connecticut attorney who has given Carnival a Feb. 10 deadline to offer passengers greater remuneration before filing suit.
Even before the 70,000-ton Paradise left Miami, it was obvious this was not going to be a typical cruise.
Many of its 2,600 passengers had booked the "once-in-a-lifetime" millennium cruise more than two years in advance. Some paid upward of $2,700 apiece, two or three times the typical fare.
Dorothea and Ed Zysko of Naples (or Cabin E-91, as they identify themselves in electronic postings), had been looking forward to the cruise for 21/2 years, ever since plopping down a $500 deposit. Ed Zysko even left his information-technology job for another last June after he was ordered to work Y2K duty over the New Year's holiday and it appeared their dream cruise was in jeopardy.
Early the morning of Dec. 27, one day into the voyage, their dream was shattered. A technical problem in a propulsion unit forced the Paradise to turn back north and dock for repairs. Bypassing Miami, it sailed to Freeport in the Bahamas.
The ship's cruise director told passengers the itinerary was changed, canceling port calls in San Juan, St. Thomas, Virgin Gorda and Tortola. Stops were added instead in the Bahamas and Cozumel.
Itinerary changes are not uncommon in an industry that frequently has to adjust to mechanical or weather problems. And Carnival notes its right to make changes on the back of tickets. As compensation, the cruise operator gave each cabin a 25 percent future cruise discount and $100 worth of shipboard credits.
Gallagher, the company spokesman, noted passengers still had all the other special perks and parties promised with the millennium cruise, down to a $110 bottle of champagne and hand-painted glasses in each cabin. It wasn't enough.
Some passengers had their eastern Caribbean plans thrown into disarray. The roster included a couple who planned to be married in the Caribbean and a 7-year-old boy being brought to a family reunion in Puerto Rico.
An angry group of a few hundred stormed to see the captain.
"It got so bad . . . it bordered on a riot," said Russ Rodgers, a commercial real estate broker from Clearwater who was on board. "I thought I was going to be part of a mutiny."
The captain capitulated. Carnival would waive its rights and give the complaining passengers most of their money back if they disembarked in Freeport on Dec. 27 or Nassau on Dec. 28.
Carnival said more than 100 passengers took the offer, disembarking in the Bahamas and flying back to Miami courtesy of the cruise line. They were given up to six-sevenths of their fare back. Carnival said the same offer was relayed over a public announcement system, but organizers of the protest vehemently disagree.
"They got rid of the noisiest passengers under the assumption that everybody else was apathetic," said Rosenblit, the Connecticut attorney. "But what happened was a vacuum developed. People stepped into it and a natural leadership evolved."
The remaining passengers were a cross-section -- business owners, teachers, doctors, lawyers and others from across the United States and as far away as South Africa and Great Britain.
Based on interviews with several passengers, many in the eclectic group quickly put their backgrounds and skills to work.
A social worker from Long Island was among the early organizers, assessing the expertise of her fellow travelers. A fraud investigator from St. Louis and a criminal prosecutor from Arizona offered insights.
One passenger, a TV news executive from New York, used a digital video camera to send film to a TV station with hopes it would be picked up by CNN.
A Web site developer from Chicago experienced in mass e-mailings offered to set up an Internet site once he returned to solid ground.
And perhaps to no one's surprise, a goodly number of attorneys stepped forward to offer their services -- some of them with contacts or experience in class-action and maritime law.
After the first organizing sessions, the "No Paradise Steering Committee" rounded up $300 in contributions from fellow passengers. At their next port of call, in Nassau, a small group scrounged up protest supplies. Equipped with purple poster board and green Magic Markers, the protesters made pickets for a dockside press conference.
On board again, they stuffed 2,300 fliers under passengers' doors and began holding 8 a.m. meetings inside a nightclub lounge to plot strategy. Arriving back in Miami, they staged another dockside press conference.
The movement has stayed alive since largely through its Internet site (http://www.starshiptravel.com/noparadise-main.htm).
The No Paradise site, which blares out circus music, steers passengers to complaint sites at the Federal Trade Commission, Canada Consumer Connection, and state attorneys general plus House and Senate officeholders. With a click, passengers can dash off pre-formatted letters to Carnival or state or federal authorities.
Not all the passengers are unified behind the Web site initiative.
Mike Campbell, a South Miami attorney, isn't waiting for Carnival to respond to pressure from passengers or legislators. He has already filed suit in federal court on behalf of an Illinois couple on the cruise and is seeking class-action status.
Both Campbell and Rosenblit argue the issue goes beyond breach of contract to one of deceptive trade practices. If successful on those grounds, passengers could be awarded punitive damages.
Carnival remains adamant that it did its best, saying it won't cave in even if the protesters are better organized than most.
"We apologize to them for the inconvenience, (but) if you consider the facts of the entire situation there really is no basis for a lawsuit," Gallagher said.