Megabear2

I think you misunderstand me. I completed both forms online myself. The agent making my booking for Aurora asked the mandatory question about mobility and walking aids and said that my husband would require one to one assistance as the very minimum. When my booking confirmation came through it was there in big letters at the top and indicating I should complete the form immediately. The other booking for Britannia (a fly cruise) the booking agent asked the mandatory question, asked if we needed airport assistance and when I explained my husband's illness just said I should complete the form due to the walking stick. When that confirmation came through it was not marked as one to one assistance being mandatory, in fact there was absolutely nothing on it indicating it was not a straightforward normal booking. My cruise personaliser/itinerary was also not marked. When I completed the form with identical information it was accepted and marked beside my husband's name "Form submitted "x" date" but there was no indication as to what action if any, the submission had triggered. I monitored this for quite a while and nothing changed, then all these problems started to appear on CC and in the press and conscious of it being I fly cruise where denied boarding would be in Barbados, I emailed the Carnival team to ask for confirmation that sufficient help was being allocated under their rules. The reply stated I should resubmit the form requesting one to one. On doing this a new confirmation was triggered which states Mandatory one to one assistance in an emergency.

The agent who took my booking marked it as mandatory - my confirmation invoice states it too. Once I completed the form it appeared in about 24 hours. However my one not marked as mandatory did not show anything at first save the form being submitted. This discrepancy is what I was talking about above. I've now submitted new forms for December stating we require one to one in emergency and it appeared about a day later.

If you login to your booking and click in to Your Itinerary on the first day it will show your special request. Mine shows my husband's name and then 121 ASSISTANCE Things To Know 121 assistance required in an emergency

Thanks for the info. I was referring to the price quoted by CountryStyleMe for the Deluxe package. I have this booked on Britannia in December as P&O very kindly gave me all my remaining OBC from when I was I'll on my cruise earlier this year. At that time it was a 20% discount on the classic plus a top up of £252 for the upgrade. I have another P&O booking in October as a single. The offer was £615 for the classic with 10% off plus £126 for the upgrade, total £741. These are the current prices before sailing I believe and the one quoted was for buy onboard? My Cunard package is a gift from my husband and at tye exchange rate last week was £808, hence my comment. I hope that explains.

Thank you so much.

It's been a long night! Went to bed early as I felt very tired and then woke at 3.00am for the cat to go on his nightly explore. Couldn't get back to sleep after that busy packing and repacking my suitcase in my head as I'm so stressed about the weather going forward. Then after having a panic about this I caught up on the Cunard CC thread and gave myself something new to worry about as to what's above my allocated cabin. I clearly never learn! To compound it the blue sky at 4.00am has now disappeared and its grey and muggy making a very depressing start to the day. We have some gardening to do before I go away on Friday including digging out a rose bBush to put it in hospital for this season. To cheer me up my husband is taking me to the garden centre to buy another one.

Yes. The upgrades started being allocated weeks ago, there are some on the roll call who were upgraded as soon as they bid.. I was offered one immediately on booking. It was about £1,000 less than making a new booking to go from inside to outside. An outside when I booked was £3,700 or thereabouts whereas my upgrade bids started at £325pp so £650 for one. I did weigh it up and it's actually still open to me but in the end decided to stick. Queen Anne is going to be expensive for solo travellers on first booking so if I like her it will most likely be late offerings for me. I booked on a whim as we had cancelled our September cruise on her to sail on P&O Aurora with our entire family in August instead. I wanted to say I travelled all four Queens in one year and this was the easiest solution.

On this occasion it was a take it or leave it cabin. At the time I booked at the end of March the offer was on a guarantee basis only. Annoyingly this changed shortly after and a considerable number of Cunard fares opened up but by then too late for me. The only grade consistently sold out has been as normal Queen's Grill. Interestingly as at yesterday only insides are sold out with availability at all other levels including Queens Grill. My guess is that the dreadful UK weather has scared a lot of the British off and as a result lower level cabins have not been taken up by those as a result. In my experience international guests seem to prefer the higher grade rooms and I'd guess this is reflected in the lack of take up below Club Balcony. The last few insides were on sale at £999 two days ago, as a solo I paid £1779 at the end of March. At that price I'm more than happy to take my chances and in my experience Cunard are much more likely to be sympathetic if I have a problem.

Thank you for the suggestion. Courtesy of Mr Amazon I now have one arriving tomorrow!

Cruising in Alaska on any line is normally very relaxed hence the lack of formal wear. There are even discussions on the Cunard board about how dressed down people can be, shock horror. The queues look pretty dreadful sorry you're having to deal with all that. From my nightmare Arvia experience last year you have every bit of my sympathy! I do not understand how the management of these ships think this is acceptable and rather than just treating it as the norm should at least acknowledge their existence and apologise. Personally I've always found Princess very formulaic, ie every ship has the same vibe and entertainment etc. Americans in particular seem to like that, familiarity making them comfortable. Clearly your inner David Attenborough is getting another great treat with the whales. After the white rhino sighting in Africa in January could I suggest you book a cruise taking in India in an effort to add a Bengal tiger to your list of rare animal sightings? I'm glad that the wonders of Alaska and Canada are offering you a sight of someone other than the backs and behinds of the US residents onboard !

That's more than I've just paid Cunard and their price includes a gratuity of 15%.

All good ideas. I'm very nervous about it being some noisy after my Arvia nightmare. I think I really would not be able to cope a second time. Still at least I'd be in the UK and could get off without the flight complications!

Just had an interesting time researching these on Queen Anne. I'm intrigued by Deck 8 forward where there are two inside cabins 8019 and 8023 all by themselves. What is in that big white area, I'm particularly interested as I've been allocated a cabin immediately below it on Deck 7.

We.must be of the same.mindset! My front garden is lined with my Mum and Dad's roses and a couple are over 70 years old. They never need a lot of care a wash down with Fairy Liquid a couple of times a year. I started my collection when we first got married in our small maisonette garden and they sort of multiplied. I keep saying I've no room but still find room when the impulse takes me. I seek out roses with names of family members and for some reason the family keeps growing - two more babies due in June and September so no doubt two more no room roses.

They are "Eye" Rose's. Yellow one is Eye of the Tiger, mauve one is In Your Eyes and the last one is Eyes on You. I have a climber not yet out which is called For Your Eyes Only. You are correct on Blue for You. Mine is a standard too. We love standard roses and have twelve of them. The earliest to flower is a very old variety Canary Bird and it is a weeping standard.

We are awaiting thunderstorms from Wales with a yellow warning. Nice and warm at the moment and grass has been mowed and weeding completed for the first time in 3 weeks! I have over 100 roses in the gardens and the earliest bloom is normally the first week in April - Grandpa Dickson. We always have roses in bloom as I've learned which bloom later to ensure lots of blooms until early November.

So I can't order a glass of wine and a bottle of water together? I drink water alongside the wine as a habit I picked up in Austria.

Presumably if you are two you need to show two cruise cards? Many years ago I recall what was Disney World's nightclub venue insisting two wristbands to buy a drink so if you gad a table or seat you lost it. I assume Cunard's waiters will be proactive unlike on my P&O cruise where a Wetherspoon approach was adopted on outside decks, ie queue at the bar to order and then queue to collect your drinks!

Roses, someone wanted roses. I can offer you these currently in my garden!

As a matter of interest how can you find out which cabins have the "landscape" layout?

Yes, I'd thought they were errors and my husband got very uptight about being told he needed assistance, you may recall I started a thread when it first started. However both cruise lines will not remove the requirement for one to one from the bookings stating they consider it mandatory, hence I resubmitted for the other two saying yes. I felt we would be damned if we did and damned if we didn't. The tender test sounds much better.

I agree but there are four cruises, 2 P&O and 2 Cunard. One P&O and one Cunard state required one to one the other on each line says not required. I have subsequently filled in new forms for the other two cruises stating we need it. Interestingly it is the two oldest bookings saying it is compulsory whereas the newer ones state not mandatory. The first of these sailings is not until August on Aurora so we shall see. As an aside Cunard require a tender test which will be carried out privately once onboard P&O however say unnecessary.

It may indeed say this but I have out of four bookings two bookings as stated elsewhere in the thread which the booking agent at P&O has marked our reservation as minimum requirement one to one assistance. This is for a man who uses a stick no more than two or three times a year. I queried why the other bookings do not have this requirement and the answer is neither P&O or Cunard can explain why the same passenger with the same mobility/illness is required to have one to one assistance on one cruise but not another. Hence my personal interest in all this as I have personal concerns about the confusions arising on this issue.

The trouble is that for the OP the problem did exist. My devil's advocate question about insurance cover was simply that, to highlight there is a very grey area with the situation. Most of the stories hitting the press are due to the passengers not filling in the forms and unfortunately that's their own fault. I don't doubt for one moment that in my pretend scenario pressure could be put on the insurer to get them to pay out but that would most likely end up being time consuming and stressful for the person involved. On the other hand if P&O are applying very strict rules the information should be in plain and simple language. The current form is confusing to many. For instance, while walking sticks etc are mobility aids most people do not have that description spring to mind and may not believe they need to complete the form in such a way that one to one assistance is required, and yet that apparently is what P&O feel is the minimum level that walking stick users should request. I have looked back at the form provided to us by Celebrity for our December cruise. It is far better and more importantly easy to understand. Celebrity-Guest-Special-Needs-Form.pdf

So we are back to Mr Edinburgh and I'm sorry this is a P&o rule and we don't cover that. Sorry P... off .... So are they actually telling these people sorry we won't carry you????