Buying FCC Terrible Customer Service.

[thinfool]

I am going to guess that the gem of a person you were dealing with also did not tell you that you can buy FCD's for other Princess passengers whether they are on the ship with you or not.

[PrincessLuver]

I question about someone having to see your card first. I’ve been on some BVE’s where I filled out the form & left it in the box & never had any problems.

 

We always put the FCC forms in the box and usually we receive and email within 48 hours from the Cruise Consultant

showing that our order has been processed and attached copies of each FCC we bought.

 

It has our experience that they are often bombarded with all kinds of questions about future cruises and spend time helping other passengers book cruises. It seems like the FCC orders are things that they process after office hours.

 

This is more of a currency issue to me then anything wrong with the Cruise Consultants. As usual, it seems that

if people do not get treated like they are "entitled" on a Princess cruise it will certainly become a major rant on CC...

[Lucky TGO]

I agree, that is bad!

Do write Princess and make them aware.

 

Ditto.

Tony

[dstables]

We always put the FCC forms in the box and usually we receive and email within 48 hours from the Cruise Consultant

showing that our order has been processed and attached copies of each FCC we bought.

 

It has our experience that they are often bombarded with all kinds of questions about future cruises and spend time helping other passengers book cruises. It seems like the FCC orders are things that they process after office hours.

 

This is more of a currency issue to me then anything wrong with the Cruise Consultants. As usual, it seems that

if people do not get treated like they are "entitled" on a Princess cruise it will certainly become a major rant on CC...

Wow! No where in my OP did I express that I was “entitled” or feel I need to be treated as such. My complaint was that I filled out a FCC form and put it in the box just like you and most other passengers do and ecoected the consultant to process the form. This was not done because the consultant needed to see my credit card as it was different than the one on file. I am not saying Princess is wrong in needing to see the credit card nor I am asking anyone to bend the rules for me. But what I expect is some customer service. This consultant told me that he had no intention of processing my application nor advising me that there was a problem with my application. Ignoring the application because there is a mistake on it is not very good customer service. I expressed this concern to the consultant and he admitted that I was right that he probably should have contacted me about needing to see my credit card to process the payment.

I suspect that Princess created the drop off box for the FCC so passengers didn’t need to spend their holiday time standing in a line to pay for FCC. As well they now have the option to purchase them on line while on the ship. These are great for passengers paying with their credit card on file but they are many passengers from Canada who use an American credit card for their on board account and Princess needs to come up with a better option to process these FCC’s that are using a different card than standing in line for a couple of hours to pay. This is not entitlement to expect the same service as other passengers nor to have you FCC application processed. It’s called good Customer Service!

My post was to give fellow passengers a heads up that just because you fill out a form for FCC don’t assume that consultant will automatically process your form. You need to follow up on it before you leave the ship.

[moki'smommy]

I don't see any way these people stay busy for all the hours they are not having "office hours," and they don't strike me as high enough on the food chain to have any really important functions on the ship. At least the dude in the internet cafe is funny and helpful...and I imagine that his job of dealing with computer illiterates can get frustrating.

 

How long can it take to process one of those 20 forms in the box? 10 minutes max, and more like 5? I'm sure the "office hours" are filled with people with questions about various cruises and ships, but simply processing the forms is a no brainer How long does it take to process a credit card purchase in a shoreside store? Just a minute, right? Processing that form isn't much more involved.

[geoherb]

Yes, the OP received poor service. I hope Princess will train the cruise consultants better.

[moki'smommy]

They are not working for free. They are receiving a salary that they have agreed to and in addition receive room and board on the ship. Whether they are happy with their salary or not, they did accept the position and the amount. If they are not happy, they should seek employment elsewhere. It is not a complex, difficult job. Most of us could be trained to do it in less than a day since we have a huge amount of the background.

 

And regardless, there is no reason for these individuals to be rude to customers. The ONLY negative interaction I've had with a Princess employee was the FCC guy on my first cruise when I asked a question and he actually yelled at me, saying that the info was wrong. And yes, the info was partially wrong, but I had to figure that out for myself; he didn't explain it. It was also partially RIGHT...and he didn't explain that either.

 

I've been ignored by Princess people and had them not respond to my e-mails...but this was the only time one behaved inappropriately in person.

[moki'smommy]

 

If your current employer reduced your earnings by about 30%, but insisted that you happily continue to perform your current workload, what would YOU do?

I'd quit, but then I was in a position to do so. In my case, it was government regulations increasing overhead and thus decreasing the bottom line. I reached a point where the job and income wasn't worth the time and stress.

[caribill]

Best way to buy your future cruise credit is to do it my way.

I open the browser on my phone for princess@sea while waiting to disembark. Click the number of credits and for whom and within 2 minutes got an email from princess corporate with our credits. The charge then shows up on the credit card given to them previously.

Easy, no form just a couple of clicks.

 

The OP wanted to use a different credit card.

[caribill]

They definitely need at least another person, or at least part-time help to do the data entry.

 

On another cruise line last year there were five future cruise consultants, each with his/her own desk and computer terminal. The wait to see one of them was minimal. Not all five were there all the time, but the office, located in a high traffic area, was open up to 12 hours a day (9 AM to 9 PM) most days and even seven hours (9 AM-noon and 5 PM-9PM) on a port day I checked.

[caribill]

I question about someone having to see your card first. I’ve been on some BVE’s where I filled out the form & left it in the box & never had any problems. I think that issue is a reason to contact Princess Corporate.

 

Even for a BVE you had to register a credit card for any on-board purchases such as a beverage. When you left the form in the box, it was processed using the credit card you had already provided for the BVE.

 

 

Since you did not indicate on the form (as the OP did) that you wanted to use a different credit card for the FCD, there was no need to show your card to anyone.

[caribill]

Does anyone know what other duties the Captain Circle Host and Future Cruise Consultant have on the ship, that they can only be in their office 2-3 hrs a day???? What are they doing the other 10-12 hrs?? :confused:

 

The CC host has quite of bit a work to do outside of office hours. Some of the work:

a) Preparing all the invitations to the Captain's Circle parties for returning guests.

b) Preparing the invitations for the MTP event and dealing with the responses.

c) Preparing all the mailings for passengers who will move up in the Captain's Circle at the end of the cruise.

d) Hosting the Captain's Circle parties and the MTP event.

[Griller]

You should see some of the onboard Captain's Circle hosts they have.

On our Nov 2016 LA-Hawaii-South Pacific 28-day cruise, the onboard CC hostess was so bad, they let

her off the ship in Papeete and for the rest of the cruise the FCC filled in for her.

 

Fred

 

Who was that? With one exception I have always had stellar service from them.

[558]

Who was that? With one exception I have always had stellar service from them.

 

Her name was Michelle!

By the end of Day 2 of the cruise out of LA, a ship's officer had confided in me that she had already logged close to 90 complaints against her by passengers. She told a passenger we had teamed up with for trivia that she couldn't wait o get back to LA to quit her job so that she doesn't "have to deal with people like you!"

I was actually surprised that Princess waited till we got to Tahiti to let her go, I surely thought she would have

been let go as soon as we made landfall in Hawaii.

In 52 cruises, I have never seen anything this like taking place.

[hokiefans]

The CC host has quite of bit a work to do outside of office hours. Some of the work:

 

c) Preparing all the mailings for passengers who will move up in the Captain's Circle at the end of the cruise.

 

The Hostess on the Royal told me they only do these for people moving to Platinum or Elite now.

[Griller]

Her name was Michelle!

By the end of Day 2 of the cruise out of LA, a ship's officer had confided in me that she had already logged close to 90 complaints against her by passengers. She told a passenger we had teamed up with for trivia that she couldn't wait o get back to LA to quit her job so that she doesn't "have to deal with people like you!"

I was actually surprised that Princess waited till we got to Tahiti to let her go, I surely thought she would have

been let go as soon as we made landfall in Hawaii.

In 52 cruises, I have never seen anything this like taking place.

 

Don't think I ever came across Michelle. Bernadette was the one I didn't find too wonderful. She was promoted from the shops. My favorite is Sandy Gunder, patient and helpful, goes the extra yard.

 

As far as what some Princess passengers can be like I didn't really see them for what some of them are until recently I cruised on a small ship on a different and more expensive line - and found myself thinking what nice people the passengers were compared to Princess.

 

No pushing and shoving, no saving seats or sunbeds, no pushing into elevators, no food scattered around in the buffet,need I go on?

It was much more pleasant generally. Also there really wasn't anything to complain about on the ship at all.

 

Not to say I have given up on Princess for the right itinerary at the right cost, and I can put up with all that stuff.

[PrincessLuver]

Wow! No where in my OP did I express that I was “entitled” or feel I need to be treated as such. My complaint was that I filled out a FCC form and put it in the box just like you and most other passengers do and ecoected the consultant to process the form. This was not done because the consultant needed to see my credit card as it was different than the one on file. I am not saying Princess is wrong in needing to see the credit card nor I am asking anyone to bend the rules for me. But what I expect is some customer service. This consultant told me that he had no intention of processing my application nor advising me that there was a problem with my application. Ignoring the application because there is a mistake on it is not very good customer service. I expressed this concern to the consultant and he admitted that I was right that he probably should have contacted me about needing to see my credit card to process the payment.

I suspect that Princess created the drop off box for the FCC so passengers didn’t need to spend their holiday time standing in a line to pay for FCC. As well they now have the option to purchase them on line while on the ship. These are great for passengers paying with their credit card on file but they are many passengers from Canada who use an American credit card for their on board account and Princess needs to come up with a better option to process these FCC’s that are using a different card than standing in line for a couple of hours to pay. This is not entitlement to expect the same service as other passengers nor to have you FCC application processed. It’s called good Customer Service!

My post was to give fellow passengers a heads up that just because you fill out a form for FCC don’t assume that consultant will automatically process your form. You need to follow up on it before you leave the ship.

 

Transactions on Princess ships are done in USD....you feel entitled that you need to be treated different.....almost any business wants to verify a credit card if it is different from the one on record....you have no idea how much credit card fraud Princess might deal with on a given cruise....it is not Princess who has the problem IMHO.....:cool:

[Sacto Rick]

I don't know what it is about FCC's. They always seem a little "snotty" for some strange reason. Maybe they're overworked or just fed up with some of those "More special than thou" passengers. ( you know who you are.;))

 

However, our last cruise on the Grand, our FCC was Anne who did a great job and was very helpful! (y)

 

Perhaps things have changed.

[dstables]

Transactions on Princess ships are done in USD....you feel entitled that you need to be treated different.....almost any business wants to verify a credit card if it is different from the one on record....you have no idea how much credit card fraud Princess might deal with on a given cruise....it is not Princess who has the problem IMHO.....:cool:

You missed the whole point of my OP. I had no problem with the consultant needing to see my credit card. My complaint was that he received my form, there was a problem with my form and he was just going to ignore the application for purchase. Any business would have called my room or left a message letting me know that there was a problem with the application and to bring me credit card in to finalize the purchase. Also a simple IT fix on their on line form to purchase FCC on The Princess at Sea app to add another credit card for purchases of these FCCs would save a lot of people their time in standing in line to purchase these FCC.

[voljeep]

You missed the whole point of my OP. I had no problem with the consultant needing to see my credit card. My complaint was that he received my form, there was a problem with my form and he was just going to ignore the application for purchase. Any business would have called my room or left a message letting me know that there was a problem with the application and to bring me credit card in to finalize the purchase. Also a simple IT fix on their on line form to purchase FCC on The Princess at Sea app to add another credit card for purchases of these FCCs would save a lot of people their time in standing in line to purchase these FCC.

 

sorry, but no..."simple IT fix" and Princess does not compute...please try again later as your call is VERY impotent to us...this is a recording...;p

[CDay]

The CC host has quite of bit a work to do outside of office hours. Some of the work:

a) Preparing all the invitations to the Captain's Circle parties for returning guests.

All computerized and can be done in a matter of minutes with simple mail merge programs.

b) Preparing the invitations for the MTP event and dealing with the responses.

Only 40, again computerized.

c) Preparing all the mailings for passengers who will move up in the Captain's Circle at the end of the cruise.

What? Put a name on a packet? Again computerized.

d) Hosting the Captain's Circle parties and the MTP event.

It's not like it is different every cruise. This is done as a matter of rote.

 

Data entry of FCD's should take minutes a day. Maybe they have a bad attitude because we are interrupting their paid vacation? :confused::eek:;)

[Optotronics]

I'm sure they are hard working and kept busy at all times. If you think all they do is print invitations and such, you're nuts!

They are bound to have several other jobs behind the scenes or???

Princess gives every crew member more than enough work to keep them busy 10-12hrs a day 7 days a week.

In fact their other duties beside captains circle are probably their main job.

[moki'smommy]

I'm sure they are hard working and kept busy at all times. If you think all they do is print invitations and such, you're nuts!

They are bound to have several other jobs behind the scenes or???

Princess gives every crew member more than enough work to keep them busy 10-12hrs a day 7 days a week.

In fact their other duties beside captains circle are probably their main job.

Some of them get really "hard" additional duties like going on excursions with the group to evaluate the quality of the excursion. I've seen that several times, mostly on the excursions in Japan. It may have been that these were less common ports so had not been officially evaluated as much as maybe Caribbean ports. We even joked with the crew member about her tough job for the day. Of course, when we got back, we could relax. She had to put on heels and be on duty.

[Pierlesscruisers]

Data entry of FCD's should take minutes a day. Maybe they have a bad attitude because we are interrupting their paid vacation? :confused::eek:;)

 

If it's that easy a job, maybe you should apply for the position! Or, as an old saying goes, "Nothing is impossible to the person who doesn't have the mission."

 

Tom

[CDay]

If it's that easy a job, maybe you should apply for the position! Or, as an old saying goes, "Nothing is impossible to the person who doesn't have the mission."

 

Tom

Are you kidding??? I would LOVE to have either of those jobs. Unfortunately I don't think my husband or children would appreciate me running off to sea! Besides, I have never seen either of those jobs posted on the Princess site.