azbirdmom

Looks like a beautiful day in Cobh. Can't wait to get there!

Yes, we may well do that. We have already booked West Quay from Heathrow to Southampton. Have done National Express bus before but nothing like a man with sign greeting you at the airport after a long overnight flight.

Thank you so much! Seems a little steep but it is what it is.

@Btimmer - not sure if you saw my post yesterday but would appreciate it if you could let me know the answer. Thanks, and sorry about Guernsey.

Thanks for posting that. We will see if this makes any difference in the consumer experience but I'm not holding my breath!

I'm following along as we will be flying out to Southampton to take a similar cruise in three weeks (British Isles with Liverpool). Would appreciate it if someone on the ship could post if they are selling airport transfers. I have heard that one some cruises you can only add transfers pre-cruise. We always used to purchase them when on the ship which allows the use of OBC and are really hoping that they are still doing that. Thanks in advance and have a great cruise!

Sorry I fell behind on reading you posts but have fully caught up now. Did you have the opportunity to purchase the transfer on the ship? They used to always offer it during the sailing but I've heard reports here and there that they are sometimes requiring them to be purchased in advance these days. Thanks for sharing so much detail. It's making me even more excited for our trip in a few short weeks. And I'm happy to hear that your wife had her wits about her and fended off the criminals. Awful that had to happen but at least it was a good ending.

Did you try to put in another bid?

If you have status with a land based casino you MAY be able to get a status match with Carnival to receive offers from them. For example I have heard that it typically works if you are Diamond level or above with Caesar's. You need to apply and the info is here: https://www.carnival.com/Registration/Promotions/casino-funmatch.aspx

You're welcome. I used the contacts listed here: https://www.elliott.org/company-contacts/princess-cruise-lines/ . I do think that a lot more folks have been complaining to them and it might take a while to hear back. Hoping that the more they hear about issues with the casino bookings the more likely it becomes that they will implement a fix for these reservations once and for all. Good luck!

The cruise that I provided the screen shot for is in June. Our other one is in December. Both are paid in full. I had some issues with the casino reservations area that I had to escalate to senior management and in both cases they sent me a Booking Confirmation showing that the cruises were paid in full. They also said that going forward that customers would not see a balance due which would solve the whole problem when the casino misses final payment. Unfortunately that turned out to be the case as they are processing these the old way and as a result causing much angst for passengers (and worse when the casino doesn't pay and everything cancels). I wish you luck getting it all straightened out!

For my upcoming cruise that I booked using a comped CBS offer I see this listed on the Onboard Services page in the Cruise Personalizer (Princess Website): I see something similar on another comped cruise that wasn't CBS. If you don't see this tell them about it. And the fact that you didn't pay it in USD should be raised too. As for the notices, they used to tell you to ignore the messages about the cruise not being paid in full. However recently there have been some folks again reporting that their cruise has been cancelled due to non payment of the cruise. This has been happening days before embarkation. I would ask now that they pay the balance so that you won't have to worry about a last minute cancellation.

So true! Folks on Royal's Odyssey OTS recently missed all ports in Israel, the main attraction on that cruise and received pitiful compensation https://www.cruisehive.com/major-changes-for-unique-royal-caribbean-itinerary/101087#:~:text=Royal Caribbean's Odyssey of the,itinerary due to local unrest.&text=Guests aboard Odyssey of the,changes to the scheduled itinerary . So the moral of the story is if the destination is of prime importance, take a land trip.

FWIW, the executive contacts in the USA are listed here: https://www.elliott.org/company-contacts/princess-cruise-lines/ . Emails to this group used to receive swift responses but I'm hearing lately that it's taking a while these days. ETA: There are multiple email addresses for Jan Swartz too: Jan Swartz Group President of Holland America Group 450 Third Avenue West Seattle, WA 98119 (206) 281-3535 jswartz@hollandamerica.com jgswartz@yahoo.com jswartz@princesscruises.com

The same thing started happening to me when trying to access my Cox.net email on my iPhone while using the ship's Wifi. Except that it only started happening on the new ships (or it could be a date when things went haywire, our most recent cruises have all been on new ships). Since the restart we sailed on the Majestic, Regal and Caribbean Princess with no issues. Then on the Discovery in July we were no longer able to access the Cox server to get email. Same thing on the Discovery in October and the Enchanted in December. Got a variety of excuses from the Internet Managers on the ships and the first one we spoke to promised to report it to shoreside as he did seem to think it was a problem on their end. The others weren't that helpful. One said try it on the desktop computer, it might work (it didn't). If anyone has a solution for an iPhone I would be grateful!

I just checked without logging in and I see the same thing that you are seeing. I thought it might be the "Low Fares You Love" sale but lots of other cruises that are part of that promo have refundable deposits when you select "you choose" your cabin. Agree that it's best to call about it - TAs and Princess have the ability to quote different options than the canned ones that underlie the Princess website booking engine.

It had been functioning such that if you chose to let Princess choose your cabin you would see a slightly lower fare with a non-refundable deposit. And if you selected to choose your own cabin you would see a slightly higher fare with a refundable deposit. By any chance did you select the "Princess Chooses" option?

It's there for me and I'm not logged in. Filter on "Start / End Port" and you'll see it on the next screen.

Thinking you mean 2024? We are on an Australian cruise this December and when I input our booking number here are no restrictions shown which is in line with what I had been told about the testing requirement having been withdrawn https://www.princess.com/protocol/ . But the FAQs for Australian cruises on the Princess website seems to be out of date as it still shows testing required. That's probably what generated the email that you received and in typical Princess fashion it takes them time to make website updates. It's a long way off and lots can change before then but as of right now testing isn't necessary.

So happy to read your review of the tour with Tours of Guernsey. We are going on the same tour with them next month. I know what you mean about filling your camera with remnants of the war not seeming right. We felt the same while viewing some of the remnants of the Vietnam war while on an excursion in Ho Chi Minh City. Will have to brace myself for reminders of the horrors of WWII but it's history and cannot be forgotten.

Here is the list of folks that I sent the email to - good luck: https://www.elliott.org/company-contacts/princess-cruise-lines/

I booked online the day the feature appeared on their website. These are the problems I encountered: 1) While I was booking the fare showed as inclusive of Princess Plus. But the comped Princess Plus did not appear anywhere on the documents that I received after booking. Casino reservations folks weren't helpful, ended up sending an email to the executive group (about this and other issues with the reservation) and they added it for me. This has happened to some other folks but recently I've heard that if your email / snail mail offers indicated that Plus was comped that it came though on the booking. Princess has also added a pop-up box on the screen that appears right after the cruise search that allows you to see if Princess Plus is included in the offer so I think this error may not happen as frequently now. 2) If you have multiple offers for free play, VIP / Ultimate VIP, etc. you can't tell which one of these offers underlies your booking until after you've booked. The amount of free play will then appear on the Travel Summary and Onboard Services screen. Note that you can't book CBS offers online, you need to go through Princess for these. 3) The Princess systems did not recognize my husband's Captain's Circle status after I entered his name and birthdate. This resulted in an overcharge for Princess Vacation Protection as the booking process thought he was a new member. And when I contacted Princess to correct the booking to include his Captain's Circle number the PVP cost was corrected but it kicked up a $100 charge for changing passengers. I was unable to correct this through casino reservations and this is something else that was corrected following my reach out to management. I recommended to Princess that the passenger #2 screen should be modified to either allow the option for entering a Captain's Circle number or include a dropdown to allow selection of a passenger that you've cruised with in the past. Some have reported no problems with booking online but as you can tell I ran into multiple issues with my experience. I tend to use the online process now for modeling purposes and will call if I decide to book.

If they intend to upgrade the quality of the surf and turf served free in the dining room it would benefit all and would justify the extra charge for those wanting extra helpings. I hope that is the case but if it isn't this policy won't bother me. With all of the courses, there's plenty to eat in the MDR.

Yes. For some cruises you can actually get a significantly discounted upcharge for a full suite, we're taking one of those in December. But for most I cruises I don't see any discount for a full suite, and I can tell not only because of the higher cost, but also on the payment screen there's no $200 nonrefundable casino deposit displayed.

You can check it by logging into princess.com then searching for your cruise and doing a mock booking. You should see $0 for inside and then the amounts that you would pay per person for categories above that. If you see the same amount as they quoted you then it could be that the casino space for the higher categories is sold out and when that happens the amount shown is the undiscounted fare. That will happen on more popular cruises.