RDJ

13 hours ago, MacMadame said:

Yes, but I'm not. There was apparently a window when anyone could make reservations but it's closed. It was probably a bug, tbh.

Oh wow I had no idea! Well let’s hope that bug is the one bug they don’t fix lol

1 hour ago, MacMadame said:

Also.

 

It didn't say anything we didn't already know. 😄 

 

My reservations are still there. I will check tomorrow which is when I think they were supposed to start canceling them.

 

What I am wondering is whether or not I will be able to make new reservations as I supposedly wasn't supposed to be able to make them the first time. (I haven't made the final payment.) Note: I know no one here will be able to answer this. I'm just speculating.

If you are elite or platinum then you don’t have to wait for final payment to make your reservations, you get early access!

On 4/13/2024 at 7:02 AM, chamima said:

 

I received an email from Princess saying this same thing today. 

Like some others have said, we miss the old Princess too, but all cruise lines have evolved. They obviously have reasons for changing their business model and we have to adjust and grow with it if we want to keep cruising. We remember even a few years before Covid feeling like cruises already started nickel and diming. Prices have really gone up which is hard, but they have for everything right? We went to Vegas a few months ago and found no servers taking cocktail orders walking around. Lots of things have changed including cruises. We still feel it’s one of the best ways to travel, unpack once, see lots of places, food and entertainment is included, etc. We’ve found if you reach out to make personal connections with staff, they return the connection with personal service. Vacation and travel is all what you make it!

15 minutes ago, mgcharleston said:

Glad you got yours fixed! I am going through this exact thing right now. We are cruising to the UK in July, cruise is PIF, have the premiere package and booked in a suite. I have two specialty dining reservations made- one on embarkation night (which should be complimentary because of the suite) and one on another night. It wants to charge me for the 2nd specialty dinner. All I can figure is the computer thinks the first night is included in my package and not complimentary. I have called them, chatted with them, they have filed an IT ticket just like for you, all to no avail. Its just frustrating watching the time slots slip away but I guess I will have to deal with it on board! Enjoy your cruise!!

It did take 3 calls and some patience! I’m surprised how they can’t just make the reservation on our behalf as a work around for the flawed system. Enjoy your UK trip, we are doing that next year!

We like the Plus package. We are drinkers and we by no means worry about the 15 drink limit or feel like we have to drink more to justify. What we like is that we get to try different drinks, things we don’t normally drink or try at home. We can try it and if we don’t like it then we order something else! One day might be no alcohol and one day might be 10 drinks. When we did the math we found that as long as we averaged a certain amount overall, it would at least be a wash. Sometimes there’s not a savings, but the benefit is the cruise feels more all inclusive with the package. Without it we felt guilty on the days we chose to drink more. Now with that being said we only do that on Princess! The drink packages on other cruises we’ve tried cost way more than the Plus deal (just learned that lesson on Carnival).

Update! Sure enough after trying twice a day, just now I was able to finally make the dining rez for crown (without paying the cruise balance). My 3rd call to Princess last weekend said to give it some time as they were going to fix on their side and it did work! It finally saw the credit and got both nights booked!

The website says this as well, we qualify in the early access group which I assume why it lets me reserve now (issue is just that it wants to charge). I keep checking back daily to see if it’s changed lol

9 hours ago, daveo6313 said:

It looks like you can't make reservations until you have paid in full.  I saw this on the website.

 

I’ve seen that too. But I’ve made reservations for the many other non-specialty dining on other nights already (despite the mention of main dining in that snapshot). Nor has Princess stated that to me after my 3 phone calls. Plus it will let me reserve, if I’m willing to just pay for it.

4 hours ago, DallasGuy75219 said:

That has been standard on Carnival and Royal Caribbean for years.

It was new for us but Carnival isn’t our primary choice 

10 hours ago, Mud_Shark said:

The app is all gimped up for us on our current cruise.  Among other things I was unable to make any spec dinner reservations at all.  It just kept saying "error...".  Did that for many things.  I think we confused it because we had three in our room for the first leg of a back-to+back and two in the room for the second leg.

Anyway, when we arrived in our room on turn around day (after clearing customs), there was a note in our room with two spec dinner reservations made on our behalf for the premier package.  One was for Rudi's and the other for sabbatinis.  Pretty sure we could have asked for venue or timing changes, but we decided to just go with what they set up for us.  So far, worked out fine.  We ate at Rudi's tonight but have not yet done the sabbatinis night.

That’s interesting, we’ve already made reservations for our main dining on all other nights. We are specifically looking for the Crown grill on the remaining two nights. We paid for and ate at Sabbatinis once years ago and we disliked it, too much seafood for our tastes. 

21 hours ago, jagoffee said:

When are you cruising?

 

I was able to book mine on the AP with no charge.  There was a note stating that I have to credits.  It was after the Final payment.

 

It seems to work for some people and not others.

We are not due for final payment for a while yet. But in 3 calls to princess, no one has said that is a requirement.

12 hours ago, shiner6 said:

This happened to me on the Ruby on our Panama cruise in February. I made the reservations ahead of time (since I wanted a particular time slot) and got charged for both dinners.  When I boarded the ship, I explained my dilemma to guest services. I spent a minimum of 4-6 hours on this problem with no resolution. Just sucked it up after all that hassle.

This is my concern! Offer it as an included promotion but then make it too difficult to properly use.  

I have the premiere package which comes with 2 speciality dinners. When I try to make the first reservation, it’s wants to charge my credit card (the total is not $0.00). I have tried both the app and the web version of the app. I have called Princess 3 times and they haven’t been able to help. First they said they fixed it and I just needed to wait 24hrs, didn’t work. Then they said it’s because I wasn’t Ocean Ready so I did that, it still didn’t work. The last time they just said they’d put in a technical ticket with their IT team. I don’t want to miss out on the time slots, should I just pay now and deal with the refund later? I’ve read some had difficulty getting the refund, etc plus that’s not how I want to spend my first day onboard. Any one else have this happen and have Princess actually fix it? I don’t get why they just can’t make the reservation for us if the app isn’t working correctly.

6 hours ago, kwokpot said:

There's no matching loyalty status between any Carnival Corp.cruiseline.

That’s my understanding as well

2 hours ago, memoak said:

Have you tried eating at 8:00 or so and just walking up ?  

We have tried walking up and we have tried going when they first open and we always turned away. We have not tried walking up at 8, we’d never eat dinner that late lol

On 2/29/2024 at 11:19 AM, memoak said:

I am always amazed how people think they need to book in advance. We have been on 60 Princess cruises and have never ever had any issue with getting into the venues on the same day we decide to eat there. I have never seen any of the venues full after 7:30 or 8:00. We generally look at the dinner menu in the morning and if there is nothing that hits our fancy we get a reservation through the dine line. They never book every table in advance

We have been on several as well and so far have had zero luck getting into Crown Grill because we had no reservations! Maybe one day!

On 2/8/2024 at 9:45 AM, LyssaWorthy said:

Yes, exactly!  Thanks so much.

I have premiere but my total shows $78? I haven’t made any other reservations yet.

On 1/23/2024 at 1:24 PM, MJSailors said:

@MisterOJ2

While you have taken many Carnival cruises to the Caribbean, I might suggest that you consider a Princess cruise to the

British Isles.

Princess has been doing such cruises for quite some time. They offer various itineraries to different ports. You could consider choosing a particular cruise depending on ports to be visited. For example, many Princess cruises offer the port of Liverpool. Many passengers may want to get to this port because of their interest in the Beatles or history connected to the Titanic.

Other itineraries offer the opportunity to view the Royal Tattoo in Scotland.

I am not certain how long Carnival has offered the British Isles cruises or their experience in offering ports/excursions.

Since both Carnival and Princess are under the Carnival Corp company, you may get a loyalty level match on Princess with the loyalty level you have on Carnival. 
Whichever cruise line you choose, I think you realize that the British Isles cruise will be quite different than a Caribbean cruise.

Happy travels!

MJ

 

We have loyalty with Princess and was told Carnival will not match (but RC with Celebrity will) Have you found different than that? We have British Isles booked on Princess next year for our big anniversary and looking forward to it 

2 minutes ago, mikayla73 said:

They've been taking dessert orders at the same time as everything else on the last few cruises we've been on. I'm fine with it. It keeps dinner rolling and there's no delay in waiting for dessert when your done with your main. I'm sure it makes it easier for the waitstaff too, especially if someone wants something extra like PB with WCMC. They can grab it when it's convenient and have it ready when it's time for dessert.

We’ve been on 16 cruises (not typically carnival) and this was a first for us. I suppose next time we can say sorry we aren’t ready to order that yet. It seems like a waste because I don’t know if I have room for dessert at the beginning lol!

We did the best excursion in Ketchikan and it was amazing! We saw so many black bears including a momma and baby. They were snatching up the salmon run! If your budget allows, seeing glaciers from a helicopter is a completely different experience. 

We just got back from an 8 night Carnival cruise, we did the anytime dining. It was convenient for our large group of 10 because we could checkin with the app and wait in a lounge with drinks until ready. I will add we always would checkin on the app as soon as the app opened for dinner which was 5:30. However when a couple wanted to go at a different time, the app was annoying. There was a time we went for breakfast in the main dining room, the place was empty and no one waiting around. They simply would not seat us because the app had not assigned us a table number yet (it was delayed and glitchy). Even they (the staff) complained because it prevented them from seating us. You had to keep exiting the screen and go back in because there was no ‘refresh’. Many times they didn’t know where the table number was and we’d get a tour of the entire dining room. Also every time our group of 10 checked in, they would try to seat us at a table for 8 instead. Also, they made us order dessert at the same time as our main meal. On other lines we are used to them asking AFTER we’ve eaten dinner.

Before ‘Princess Plus’, we bought the drink package once and kept track of what we drank. We did not drink enough to offset the cost including coffees. But since ‘Princess Plus’ with the addition of wifi and gratuities, we’ve ran the numbers and we have found that we do drink enough for it to be worthwhile in our case. Also, we like the feeling of it being more ‘all inclusive’, we can try a new drink we might not have otherwise been willing to spend money on and order something else if we didn’t like it. We like not having to think about what the bill will be at the end of the cruise. If someone is only 1-2 drinks a day kind of person, then likely doesn’t make sense (specially if just beer/wine). If I had to guess it would be somewhere in the middle, half and half!

In my cruising experience so far, which is more Princess then other lines… it used to be traditionally formal… but in the last 10 years it continues to reduce. My husband and I look forward to dressing up for the dining room, but if my feet hurt then I’m changing right after and still continuing my night around the ship in jeans. I think what is formal or dressy is open to interpretation these days and that’s ok! The majority still make an effort to dress up and we like to see that 😊 and to those that don’t, enjoy your vacation however you want to! Times are changing, rule enforcement is lessoning, and people are allowed to be people! Now if only the cruise lines backed off on all the covid rules too 😉

I bring one of those hang on the door (bathroom) shoe holder plastic things and use it to store and organize all my toiletries and smaller items.