RJChatsworth

That’s interesting. We are just back too and had a turn down service every evening except the first. Perhaps it’s a perk for being in a suite! We were surprised to see the same bits on the carpet for two weeks. Not ‘hoovered’ once in that time.

Having to make advance bookings for the theatre might be a precursor to paying for this venue in the future. It might mean cutting the number of shows from three to two each evening but I don’t see that as an issue.

Thanks. We are well. As a precaution we didn’t go to Headliners on Thursday evening and went to a quiet Beach House Friday evening. I hate to think what it might have been like with another 1,000 on board. We were told there were 700 single passengers who were in double cabins for half the price they would normally have paid. A special offer. Don’t know whether this is true or not but we were aware of large numbers of single passengers. I don’t expect we’ll go on it again. Not the kind of experience we want. it was like travelling in a floating shopping mall!

We were on this cruise and agree Eglesbrech’s report to be accurate, thorough and excellent. We were in a rear suite comprising a sitting room, bedroom, bathroom and huge balcony. As such we were invited to take breakfast in the Epicurean. The food was good but very restricted like no Eggs Benedict, no porridge, no hash browns, no beans etc etc. They did do bacon, eggs, mushrooms and tomatoes. They even cut the crusts off the toast and it took time to get used to the idea we wanted them on. We avoided the place regularly. Passing through Customs this morning was interesting. We have been through dozens of times, generally off Cunard, the last time being off Queen Victoria in November. We have rarely seen any border officers although they are probably watching from somewhere. I don’t know what has changed but the place was heaving with them this morning. It’s the first time I’d seen passengers pulled over and from one they had extracted dozens of cartoons of what I assumed were cigarettes. Had they been alerted by the large amounts of onboard credit on this cruise or is it a reflection on some of those cruising on P&O? Or are there other reasons I haven’t thought about eg spot check? I wouldn’t wish to guess!

Error: Access cunard.co.uk

We are currently crossing Biscay on ‘British’ P&O Cruises ship Iona towards the Mediterranean. I am trying to access cunard.co.uk on Iona’s internet site. Every time I do I end up on Cunard’s US site cunard.com where everything is in dollars. Does anyone know how to access cunard.com from a ‘British’ ship, please? This situation is ridiculous and I am totally exasperated with such nonsense!!

We have requested tables for 2 in Club dining on both P&O and Cunard and not failed to get one for at least 15 years.

With all these 45 minute queues I am reading about, do they have rows of chairs for oldies who can’t stand for that long? Also, this queuing must detract from holiday enjoyment - it would for me! Another question for those in the know; if you are in a suite with a butler, the P&O blurb states that the butler will make the bookings for you. How does that work? If you say to him/her book me a table for two in freedom dining at 7pm this evening will he be able to or will he be continually telling you they are ‘full’? Does he have some leverage with maitre d’? If butler does manage to book you a table for two at, say, 7pm for that evening do you still have to queue?

Hi Barbara - perhaps I’m the stupid one, too many cruises and assuming everyone else knows all about them. It did occur to me later that maybe you’d not been on P&O. The first time we did freedom dining soon after it was introduced you could book a table by turning up at 0750 every morning. They only had a few tables to book and it was a scramble. Nowadays I can only stand for about 5 minutes before pain takes over, thus I try to avoid such dining. We go Cunard most of the time now as they are more user friendly where dining is concerned, in our opinion.

Thanks for replies. We are going on Iona, no Club dining, shortly and wondering whether we have made a huge mistake. When you are well into your 80s the last thing you need is to spend holiday time on a computer trying to book restaurants. Must be like a bed sit in Margate and trying to book a restaurant each night in the town! Ah well, we’ll see what it’s like. I feel after taking our money for 40 odd years we don’t feature in the plans when it comes to new ships! C’est la vie!

Fionboard - you having to explain Club dining on a P&O site perhaps explains the trend!!

Are they going to phase it out on those ships that currently have Club dining? All the talk is about Freedom dining and speciality restaurants. I would hate to see Club dining phased out. Are new ships, Iona and Arvia setting a new trend?

CORRECTION: I meant Club dining. Thanks.

Just spent some time on the Internet trying to determine the dining arrangement on P&O ships. There is much talk about Freedom dining but little about Club dining. Which ships still have Freedom dining room, please?

I have found being on a wait-list a bit of a joke on more than one occasion recently. Even though being on the wait-list I have checked the Cunard website daily and have seen cabins I am wait-listed for come up. I have immediately rung Cunard and booked the cabin. Cunard had told me previously that there were others ahead of me for the category I had requested. They agreed that by checking the website I had jumped the queue. When I asked how this could be I was told that when passengers cancelled a booking the section processing the cancellation regularly posted the vacant cabin back on to the Cunard website without checking the wait list. Reservations seemed well-aware of this practice and offered no excuse.

We had a QA Med 2024 cruise cancelled by email on I think 9th November. I received a cheque through the post for the deposit last Saturday expecting it to be returned via the Amex card I’d originally used to pay the deposit. I rang in about the FCC (10% of original deposit) and was told that it would take another 2 to 3 weeks to appear against my account. I had booked directly with Cunard. Last time I wished to book a voyage using an unprocessed FCC there was no problem booking directly with Cunard. I paid a deposit less the FCC and received Booking Confirmation on this basis. The FCC was processed some weeks later.

Question about the suites please? Can the butler be relied upon to make dinner bookings for a table for two in the different venues? Does it work or do you end up in long queues please?

Currently on QV going round the Iberian Peninsula. Wednesday night in Biscay the weather was horrendous. The seas were 25 feet. The main problem however was juddering in the direction of travel and the side to side juddering throwing you off your feet in the cabin. First time in 51 voyages on Cunard we thought it prudent to miss dinner and order room service. Long wait but ok. Later told our PG restaurant was deserted! That was a side issue. The navigation channel has been updated for the worse. Three pages of blue seas with no ship on them, then a map of the world on which you’d be hard pushed to spot the ship if you didn’t know where it was, and then a page with a straight line on it with a ship icon in the front with nor reference land points. Finally you get to the info page with speed, track etc but a blank against every line. The stat figures then appear as the page disappears so you spend time going round again with the same effect. Why did Cunard change the system for something much worse? Why fix a nav channel that doesn’t need fixing?! To finish on a positive note, the cabin Wi-Fi is now great and works all the time.

Many thanks @bluemarble for your easy to understand explanation. I wish the Cunard website had been of such clarity, unless of course the problem was mine! I have been looking at the 3rd January eastbound crossing.

Is it true that if you embark QM-2 at Red Hook you are no longer required to show evidence of a negative Antigen COVID test taken in the three days prior to embarkation? I was confused by the Cunard web site so I phoned them directly and was given this information by an agent. It took a bit of time to find so thought I would double check!

HH - Sorry to read about your Covid issues. I think Cunard has a real problem. When my wife and I got Covid on QM-2 in July the medics told me they didn’t know how much Covid was onboard as those having it wouldn’t own up because they didn’t want isolation. Furthermore, all the paracetamol in the shop was bought up as passengers tried to hide their Covid.

PS. Are you sure you need a PCR test I thought an antigen test with certificate was acceptable?

I don’t think CVS or the street testing stations accept foreign nationals. Similarly, Walmart. This was the case when we were in New York in July. I asked at all these places even though we were on a B2B. However, I was advised that Bloom Labs on about 32nd Street did accept foreign nationals. Hope it helps.

57eric - that’s encouraging news. Good to know as we don’t normally hear about passengers who are taken off by helicopter. Or by ambulance as it happens! I remember an evacuation by helicopter off South Carolina a few years ago. It transpired that the passenger had been advised not to travel by his doctor and he had no insurance. I often wonder what happened to him, medically and financially!

Before the pandemic I was under the impression that Cunard guaranteed the crew a percentage of the collectible tips/service charge even if this amount was not achieved because of the number of passengers deleting the charges when onboard. Could it be that Cunard has now reflected this in the crew contracts as a matter of course? If so this might give the impression that all the charges now go to the company.