Pre cruise hotel through Princess

Hi. Hoping someone might be able to help.

We are booked on an Australian Cruisetour through Princess next March. We have just looked into extending the hotel in Sydney prior to the tour which starts with one night at the Hyatt Regency Darling Harbour. We were quoted a price and wanted to judge the cost through Princess in comparison to booking direct. We asked what room category the price was for but were told that as it’s a block booking it wasn’t possible to say.

My question is whether anyone has experience of pre cruise hotels through Princess (specifically the Hyatt in Sydney if at all possible) and whether the category of room through Princess was of the lowest available.

Thanks in advance for any help.

Princess always provides rooms in high end hotels and could be basically anywhere in the hotel, ie harbor view, city view, but I doubt that it will be Regency Club. Princess charges per person/night for extra night stays, and their prices are usually higher than you can book yourself. We have had success, once at the hotel and speaking with the front desk, to stay in the same room.

By the way, excellent hotel in excellent location.

I have looked into pre and post hotels stays, but here in US. I found the prices to be two to three times as much as if you book it on your own. Yes, they book blocks, but they don't give you the best rooms for the rate they are charging you. I would pass on booking through Princess and find something on your own

The price quote from Princess for a one night precruise hotel stay was going to be equal to one half of the price of our actual cruise. I declined the Princess offer and made our own hotel arrangements for the one night precruise hotel stay at a nice hotel at a much more economical price.

It is almost always a better deal to book your hotel (and transfers, for that matter), on your own.

It used to be (not sure if still true) that cruise line bookings could be what was called "run of the hotel", which meant any room could be assigned to you. However, with loyalty programs having guaranteed upgrades and similar programs, those nicer rooms are likely to go to loyalty program elites.

We only use cruise line hotels and transfers when there are extreme circumstances...like a 11:30 pm arrival in Lima Peru.

you always do better booking yourself, otherwise thru Princess or any cruise you will pay double.

Thanks for the responses thus far.

Prices through Princess are comparable to booking direct at today’s £ to AUD exchange rate. For three additional nights, Princess is about £20 more expensive based on the cheapest room available. I wanted to judge whether we’d be paying this £20 for the convenience or could potentially save money if the room through Princess was a higher grade one. We were originally looking to book a Regency Club room directly which was of course substantially higher in price.

If people do have experience of booking through Princess and the category of room they received, I’d like to hear from them :D

I can't comment on room types. My experience is that in the US, the hotels give discounts to the cruise line in exchange for filling rooms, so the rooms are typical cheaper than booking on your own. Of course, that depends on what sort of discount code you can use on your own. Princess is less than AAA, AARP, etc. but often more than corporate rates.

Outside of the US, we've found Princess rates to be far higher than what we can get on our own. We got quotes on Princess rates at 3 hotels in Tokyo. We booked a superior twin room for about half of what we were quoted when we stayed for a week after a cruise. We just smiled when we saw all the people with Princess tags lined up in the lobby a week later as we were leaving. On our arrival night we booked a hotel near the airport for 1/3 of the Princess quote--and had a very nice hotel with breakfast. It wasn't a 5* hotel, but it was at least a 3* and we really just wanted a place to sleep.

Does the price include cost of transfers etc?

Does the price include cost of transfers etc?

Thanks for the responses thus far.

 

Prices through Princess are comparable to booking direct at today’s £ to AUD exchange rate. For three additional nights, Princess is about £20 more expensive based on the cheapest room available. I wanted to judge whether we’d be paying this £20 for the convenience or could potentially save money if the room through Princess was a higher grade one. We were originally looking to book a Regency Club room directly which was of course substantially higher in price.

 

If people do have experience of booking through Princess and the category of room they received, I’d like to hear from them :D

Double check this. Cruise lines typically charge per person for the room, where hotels typically charge for the room, double occupancy.

For our 5 night pre-cruise we had chosen and just about booked a mid priced Downtown Vancouver hotel in a desirable location for us but after adding in costs for transfers, Victoria/Butchart excursion package , a better location in a more up-market Hotel and with overall convenience and peace of mind we went with the Princess package which was not all that more expensive . We don't know if we'll get a city view/water view room but not really concerned about that. To personally book a water view room would have added heaps of $$.

Worked for us but probably depends on country/location I'm guessing.

ALWAYS assume it's the lowest category of room (or flight, or whatever) unless it SPECIFICALLY says it is an upgraded to View/Suite/First Class or whatever in the documentation. Depending on the ports, distance from airports, convenience of transit options etc. an included transfer can be a great deal or a total ripoff (e.g. Vancouver, where the pp cost of transfers to hotel from airport are literally as or more expensive than a whole taxi each, and transfer from hotel to pier could involve actually walking downstairs!)

Cruiselines are not in the business of saving US money! I've yet to find any pre or post cruise package that I could not get at least two out of a) better hotel, b) better location, c) cheaper price, d) faster/more convenient transfers when booking for a couple. Singles often win from these packages - they are indeed priced per person most commonly - but those singles are being subsidised by the rest who overpay!

rowrow - be aware that your Butchart day is a really, REALLY long one from Vancouver and most of it (at least 8 hours of the 12-14) will be on a bus and ferry - same route both ways - rather than actually having time to wander about. Unless you are being flown at least one way, you will also have very limited time on the Island - 2 hours in Butchart is the most I've ever heard of on these packages and it's frankly not enough even if you skip afternoon tea at the gardens.

With 5 days available it would be a significantly better qualitative experience for you to instead bump one of those nights to a hotel in Victoria instead - ideally fly into YYJ to start your vacation, do at least a night there to see more of the city let alone more of the Island, then transfer just once across to Vancouver for your remaining 4 nights precruise. Depending on your flight routing this may actually be of minimal extra time in flight (if your long flight leg is to e.g. LAX or SFO you can fly to YYJ instead of YVR without much hassle, it is a full international airport - if you're flying nonstop into YVR then a rental car for a couple of days and ferry tickets is probably the most efficient thing to do though).

Thank you Martincath.... yes we realise the journey to and from Victoria on bus and ferry is longish but we are using that as one of our few rest times over there. Our package includes overnight in The Empress so it won't be as rushed as a normal one day excursion.

Thank you Martincath.... yes we realise the journey to and from Victoria on bus and ferry is longish but we are using that as one of our few rest times over there. Our package includes overnight in The Empress so it won't be as rushed as a normal one day excursion.

An included overnight is a whole different ballgame (and a better one!)

Sign up for Fairmont hotel membership before you come - it'll get you free internet from day one. They're pretty good about customer service (see recent story of having rescinded ban on the chap who caused the infamous 'seagull incident' - but also we've had packages including Fairmont rooms booked in blocks and still been able to get full member perks just by speaking to the front desk).

To those of you who are saying the cost through Princess will be higher potentially double, can you confirm whether this is for the same hotel or generally compared to what you could pay in the area. Also is this from personal experience. Just confused as it doesn’t seem to match my experience as their price is only slightly higher for the exact same hotel. Also I have factored in that Princess is charging per person and not per room. That would be a silly thing to overlook.

When we visit somewhere 'new' to us, (South America in January 2018) and we are unsure of city, we book Cruiseline hotel with transfers. When we leave from a port we are familiar with, we book our own.

Booking with Cruiseline takes the strain of the unknown away. Breakfast is usually included. Rooms are usually lowest grade. There is usually a Cruiseline host based at the hotel for a day or so, pre and post cruise for help with tours...although concierge will help with directions and recommend cheaper tours. We book Cruiseline transfers to port.

We find we pay more for hotels when booking with any Cruiseline. They are going to take a 'cut' . Passengers are prepared to pay for this service, so sadly it's a case of supply and demand.

Bon voyage!

To those of you who are saying the cost through Princess will be higher potentially double, can you confirm whether this is for the same hotel or generally compared to what you could pay in the area. Also is this from personal experience. Just confused as it doesn’t seem to match my experience as their price is only slightly higher for the exact same hotel. Also I have factored in that Princess is charging per person and not per room. That would be a silly thing to overlook.

You'd be surprised what 'silly' things get overlooked. I've come across more than one person who booked a hotel in Vancouver, WA instead of BC (and countless who booked in North Vancouver thinking it was part of Vancouver rather than a different city separated by a body of water) and it's ridiculous how many people get confused about where Victoria is;-)

Whenever I consider booking any package - whether it's a long coach tour or a short weekend thing, a combo flights plus resort, or just pre- or post-cruise accommodation, I always check the exact hotels offered on their own website and a big online consolidator/TA like Expedia, map the hotels on Google. I also figure out transit/taxi costs to good restos in the city and not-already-included sightseeing that I know we will want to do from the hotels, as well as to/from airport for the first & last stops. Basically I want to compare the value of ALL inclusions against what we could do independently - it's of minimal work for cruises as you really only have the first and last ports to do research on compared to land tours where every single city needs routes between them, trains, car rentals, and even internal flights all considered.

Cruiselines in my experience - which is so far all North America related - jack up pricing even more than other package vacation sellers do to extend your vacation with a pre- or post-tour stay: I have frequently ended up making a package booking of flights/accommodation instead of doing it ourselves; we've taken multiple coach tours rather than traveling on land independently because overall the value was better than a DIY version; occasionally, though not often, even added nights before/after some land tours had pricing better than booking independently; but I have never found any pre- or post-cruise package that was even the same price within 'rounding currency exchange errors' let alone cheaper anywhere we've sailed out of/into (mostly Vancouver/Seattle, but also NYC, Fort Lauderdale, Miami, San Francisco).

I've also checked a lot of hotel prices here for folks asking on the boards, so I can say very confidently that the odds of a pre-cruise in Vancouver being even close to the independent price is slim. The one consistent exception is solo travelers because of the Per Person pricing - assuming that you would have actually booked the Pan Pacific for example, even the insanely jacked-up transfer pricing that's included in a pre-cruise night keeps the total price lower than an independent booking. But for two - who can pay CAD$35 total for a cab from the airport in transfer costs, compared to US$29pp built into the hotel pricing - indy is always cheaper when I check. That obscene transfer rate is what makes it virtually impossible for cruiseline hotels to be good value here - the same ludicrous rate applies from hotels to pier, and that's an even bigger ripoff since a cab between any downtown hotel and Canada Place will work out less than US$10 total!

If you've done your comparison - and NB: check the TRANSFER cost independently too, not just the actual hotel room! - and end up with a price only a few quid more - great, book the add-on and be happy that you have paid very little and gained some convenience/peace of mind. I totally believe there are times and places where cruiseline addons are indeed very fair value - it's just never happened to me yet;-)

When we visit somewhere 'new' to us, (South America in January 2018) and we are unsure of city, we book Cruiseline hotel with transfers. When we leave from a port we are familiar with, we book our own.

 

Booking with Cruiseline takes the strain of the unknown away. Breakfast is usually included. Rooms are usually lowest grade. There is usually a Cruiseline host based at the hotel for a day or so, pre and post cruise for help with tours...although concierge will help with directions and recommend cheaper tours. We book Cruiseline transfers to port.

 

We find we pay more for hotels when booking with any Cruiseline. They are going to take a 'cut' . Passengers are prepared to pay for this service, so sadly it's a case of supply and demand.

 

Bon voyage!

We've done it both ways, through the cruise lines and on our own. We're getting to a age now that we like having it done for us and feel safer that way. The hotels have always been high end and the transfers handy, I have no complaints and the price isn't that much difference for what we get/

Question to those who have booked a pre-cruise hotel with Princess - Does the hotel show up on your cruise personalizer? We are doing a cruise-tour with Princess starting in Budapest. We are flying in a day early. We have booked the hotel Princess has us in for the night before and the hotel graciously will keep us in the same room for the whole stay. Princess is not sure whether or not they can book us for the day before. I know they will notify us if they can. I'm just wondering if it will show up in the personalizer. Thanks.

Question to those who have booked a pre-cruise hotel with Princess - Does the hotel show up on your cruise personalizer? We are doing a cruise-tour with Princess starting in Budapest. We are flying in a day early. We have booked the hotel Princess has us in for the night before and the hotel graciously will keep us in the same room for the whole stay. Princess is not sure whether or not they can book us for the day before. I know they will notify us if they can. I'm just wondering if it will show up in the personalizer. Thanks.

Yes, it should show up on the page that shows the day by day Itinerary. If you look at the tabs across the top of the personalizer page, I think it shows up in the one called something like planning your cruise. That should give you information about the hotel and about meeting the Princess rep at the airport for the transfer.

We've done it both ways, through the cruise lines and on our own. We're getting to a age now that we like having it done for us and feel safer that way. The hotels have always been high end and the transfers handy, I have no complaints and the price isn't that much difference for what we get/

Agree......

Not having to handle bags quite so much helps too !

Yes, it should show up on the page that shows the day by day Itinerary. If you look at the tabs across the top of the personalizer page, I think it shows up in the one called something like planning your cruise. That should give you information about the hotel and about meeting the Princess rep at the airport for the transfer.

Question to those who have booked a pre-cruise hotel with Princess - Does the hotel show up on your cruise personalizer? We are doing a cruise-tour with Princess starting in Budapest. We are flying in a day early. We have booked the hotel Princess has us in for the night before and the hotel graciously will keep us in the same room for the whole stay. Princess is not sure whether or not they can book us for the day before. I know they will notify us if they can. I'm just wondering if it will show up in the personalizer. Thanks.

Go into your cruise personalizer and click on top tab that says Calendar and Planning. It will be in the detail of city you are staying in.

Go into your cruise personalizer and click on top tab that says Calendar and Planning. It will be in the detail of city you are staying in.

The only information I have in that tab, is the port information, address, directions and such