Will P&O now delay announcements for future cruise pauses?

[SarahHben]

I've just had the same email for our 19th June cruise.

[grapau27]

13 minutes ago, frogsgirl said:

Hi Graham, booked directly with P&O.

I’m with you on the likelihood of cancellation, this move from P&O is of benefit to us in that we are unlikely to lose our deposit now (which wasn’t huge but still ££),

We have definitely decided not to travel in the highly unlikely event it does go ahead.

 

Andrea

Thank you  Andrea.

I'm pleased for you and you are making a wise decision.

Normally we would have 2-3 cruises booked a year in advance and we have nothing booked yet for this year although we have a £300 FCC for Royal Caribbean to be used by April 2022.

Last year we had 2 cruises and a hotel visit to Orlando cancelled and had all the hassle getting refunds.

Graham.

[grapau27]

8 minutes ago, SarahHben said:

I've just had the same email for our 19th June cruise.

That's great news Sarah.

By leaving final payment to 30 days is a great move to stop people cancelling themselves before P&O cancel.

Let's hope the vaccine and this lockdown means by June it is safe to cruise.

Graham.

 

[Castle25]

Interesting move by P&O.  They will certainly save the the extra FCC being given away by people not paying the full balance.  In terms of 'paperwork' it is the same amount of work

[yorkshirephil]

2 hours ago, frogsgirl said:

Just received an email from P&O and it does take the pressure off now, this is for Iona 24th April 21 cruise:

 

We hope that you are looking forward to your forthcoming cruise and we know that as your holiday approaches there are many things to consider. 

When you made your booking we would have advised you that the full balance for your holiday is due 90 days before departure. However in light of the on-going situation regarding COVID-19 and the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office guidance on cruising, we wanted to reassure you that we will only recommence sailing when it is the right time to do so. We have therefore taken the decision to relax our balance due payments terms on this holiday to 30 days prior to departure, meaning you now have a little more time before you have to pay your final balance.

If you would like to understand more about our enhanced health and well-being measures on board, please visit our website.  And remember, you can manage your booking by logging into My P&O Cruises. Here you’ll be able to personalise your holiday to suit you, plus find out everything you need to know before you embark. 

This looks like a smart move from P&O, there must be thousands of people including me getting twichy as to whether to commit several thousand pounds to a holiday that may not happen and then have to fight tooth and nail to get back. I am hoping Tui do the same or I will be changing my June 21 to next year, or losing the deposit 

Edited January 7, 2021 by yorkshirephil
not required

[Adawn47]

2 hours ago, davecttr said:

Same for me, final payment date for my May cruise reduced to 30 days, will still cancel though if I have not had my second jab and that is probably in June

Just received ours too for June 25th cruise. We should know much more by the end of May re: jabs by then. I feel much more relaxed now there's some breathing space.

Avril

Edited January 7, 2021 by Adawn47
added text

[lindylooellalouise]

Just noticed on the Cunard page someone has a similar email from Cunard for their June cruise, we have a Cunard one booked for June and unfortunately through our favourite T A so another hassle for us.

[tring]

Post deleted, my question answered elsewhere.

Edited January 7, 2021 by tring

[arlowood]

On 1/7/2021 at 1:06 PM, Adawn47 said:

Just received ours too for June 25th cruise. We should know much more by the end of May re: jabs by then. I feel much more relaxed now there's some breathing space.

Avril

That's strange. We are booked on Aurora departing 1st May and have heard nothing so far. Our booking is through a TA though so that may explain the absence of any notification. I will email the TA today to check if they have had any info on the change of final payment date for our cruise. It would certainly ease some of the worry over potentially committing funds to a cruise only to find it has been cancelled after the final payment date. We already have a cruise booked on Aurora mid-August and also an FCC from Viking for a cancelled cruise last year.

 

I did see some musings that P&O might not be doing any sailings in their smaller ships this year (Aurora, Arcadia and possibly Ventura) due to the difficulties of maintaining social distancing. Cutting the passenger numbers on the smaller ships would not make it financially viable to run the cruises. It does make sense to some degree but is obviously going to disappoint many who prefer the small ship environment.

[Adawn47]

20 minutes ago, arlowood said:

That's strange. We are booked on Aurora departing 1st May and have heard nothing so far. Our booking is through a TA though so that may explain the absence of any notification. I will email the TA today to check if they have had any info on the change of final payment date for our cruise. It would certainly ease some of the worry over potentially committing funds to a cruise only to find it has been cancelled after the final payment date. We already have a cruise booked on Aurora mid-August and also an FCC from Viking for a cancelled cruise last year.

 

I did see some musings that P&O might not be doing any sailings in their smaller ships this year (Aurora, Arcadia and possibly Ventura) due to the difficulties of maintaining social distancing. Cutting the passenger numbers on the smaller ships would not make it financially viable to run the cruises. It does make sense to some degree but is obviously going to disappoint many who prefer the small ship environment.

We always book direct with P&O so maybe that's why we received the email. When you book via a TA all communications from P&O are direct to your TA. I've also seen that the smaller ships may not be used and if that's the case we won't be happy. I did think though that because the cost of cruises on the smaller ships have increased so much,  double in most cases, that could be the way that P&O can reduce the passenger numbers but not lose revenue. There could be many like me that would rather cancel than sail on the larger ships.

Avril

Edited January 11, 2021 by Adawn47
added text

[yorkshirephil]

29 minutes ago, arlowood said:

That's strange. We are booked on Aurora departing 1st May and have heard nothing so far. Our booking is through a TA though so that may explain the absence of any notification. I will email the TA today to check if they have had any info on the change of final payment date for our cruise.

Call me an old cynic but based on past experience and other peoples stories I wouldn't put it past some of the TA's to not tell you about the new terms and keep your money in their bank. One thing I do know is that Ig!u have been informed of the P&O terms, as the lady I spoke to last week told me.

[Adawn47]

1 hour ago, yorkshirephil said:

Call me an old cynic but based on past experience and other peoples stories I wouldn't put it past some of the TA's to not tell you about the new terms and keep your money in their bank. One thing I do know is that Ig!u have been informed of the P&O terms, as the lady I spoke to last week told me.

You old cynic you😊 I was thinking the same as I was replying to Arlwood's post. The late balance payment date will be for everyone  due to cruise during that time frame regardless of who you booked with. When I once booked  through a TA any letters sent to them from P&O  regarding our cruise were then posted on to me. 

Avril

[lindylooellalouise]

1 hour ago, yorkshirephil said:

Call me an old cynic but based on past experience and other peoples stories I wouldn't put it past some of the TA's to not tell you about the new terms and keep your money in their bank. One thing I do know is that Ig!u have been informed of the P&O terms, as the lady I spoke to last week told me.

Just found out our TA has not passed our 5 cruise deposits on.

[yorkshirephil]

11 minutes ago, lindylooellalouise said:

Just found out our TA has not passed our 5 cruise deposits on.

A lot of stuff has come out of the woodwork over the past 10 months regarding how TA's handle the money you pay to them, some a bit unsavoury to say the least. I suppose most of us didn't really show much interest as we paid our money took our holiday, end of story, if you didn't have any issues no reason to know. As with anything you have to take some things with a pinch of salt as people make assumptions or believe things they probably shouldn't. It would be interesting to hear from a TA's just how the money is handled, as it has become clear they don't all follow the same process.

[mercury7289]

17 minutes ago, Adawn47 said:

You old cynic you😊 I was thinking the same as I was replying to Arlwood's post. The late balance payment date will be for everyone  due to cruise during that time frame regardless of who you booked with. When I once booked  through a TA any letters sent to them from P&O  regarding our cruise were then posted on to me. 

Avril

Just had a reminder to pay the balance for 1st May cruise from TA. Gently reminded them that they have not replied to queries raised by me in 2 sent e-mails, first sent in December.and also that P&O had shortened the final payment date from 90 to 30 days. But Hay, these things happen when offices are closed and staff are working from home.

[lindylooellalouise]

2 minutes ago, mercury7289 said:

Just had a reminder to pay the balance for 1st May cruise from TA. Gently reminded them that they have not replied to queries raised by me in 2 sent e-mails, first sent in December.and also that P&O had shortened the final payment date from 90 to 30 days. But Hay, these things happen when offices are closed and staff are working from home.

We’ve had a final demand from TA for an already cancelled cruise and they stated that we will lose all monies paid.

[yorkshirephil]

52 minutes ago, lindylooellalouise said:

We’ve had a final demand from TA for an already cancelled cruise and they stated that we will lose all monies paid.

That is just the sort of thing that is happening, why are they making the same mistakes over and over, regardless of where they are working from, they have access to the same information through the cruise lines or their company intranet system. Doe's this mean that a flag has come up for them to remind you to pay and they haven't checked, or has a mistake been made with the booking. It is hardly going to give you confidence to use them again. 

[lindylooellalouise]

Apparently it’s the company policy to keep deposits we paid all our cruises with the £50 on board future cruise deposits the TA asked for further amounts which they duly kept and would have paid them  to cruise companies at a later date but because of the covid situation cancellations and  now being offered 125% fcc  fo our cancelled cruises it’s come to light, cruise company offered me 125% of my £50 paid and have no record of my other deposit amount paid. Massive lesson learned by us and will never touch TA with a barge pole,now getting a final reminder to pay the full balance for my cancelled cruise or else we will lose all monies paid you couldn’t make this up, working from home or not this is really bad customer service

[arlowood]

3 hours ago, yorkshirephil said:

Call me an old cynic but based on past experience and other peoples stories I wouldn't put it past some of the TA's to not tell you about the new terms and keep your money in their bank. One thing I do know is that Ig!u have been informed of the P&O terms, as the lady I spoke to last week told me.

I did contact them just after Christmas with my concerns about paying the full balance on the date they normally require it (early January) when the 90 day official date is end of January. They responded that they would relax their deadline until the 27th January and could relax it further depending on the circumstances at the time.

I will now press them with the knowledge that P&O have revised their final payment policy to 30 days before departure and see what response I get.

[terrierjohn]

1 hour ago, lindylooellalouise said:

Apparently it’s the company policy to keep deposits we paid all our cruises with the £50 on board future cruise deposits the TA asked for further amounts which they duly kept and would have paid them  to cruise companies at a later date but because of the covid situation cancellations and  now being offered 125% fcc  fo our cancelled cruises it’s come to light, cruise company offered me 125% of my £50 paid and have no record of my other deposit amount paid. Massive lesson learned by us and will never touch TA with a barge pole,now getting a final reminder to pay the full balance for my cancelled cruise or else we will lose all monies paid you couldn’t make this up, working from home or not this is really bad customer service

We have only booked once on board, which was at brochure launch with a reduced deposit, but when we transferred the booking to our usual large on-line TA, named after a Derbyshire castle, there was no extra to pay.  Additionally the deposits on all our usual bookings are always shown as from P&O on our credit card account.

I would suggest you switch to a more suitable TA in future.

[lindylooellalouise]

2 minutes ago, terrierjohn said:

We have only booked once on board, which was at brochure launch with a reduced deposit, but when we transferred the booking to our usual large on-line TA, named after a Derbyshire castle, there was no extra to pay.  Additionally the deposits on all our usual bookings are always shown as from P&O on our credit card account.

I would suggest you switch to a more suitable TA in future.

Absolutely reluctant to use TA think we will book direct in the future 

[yorkshirephil]

1 minute ago, terrierjohn said:

We have only booked once on board, which was at brochure launch with a reduced deposit, but when we transferred the booking to our usual large on-line TA, named after a Derbyshire castle, there was no extra to pay.  Additionally the deposits on all our usual bookings are always shown as from P&O on our credit card account.

I would suggest you switch to a more suitable TA in future.

I have never been asked for any further deposit from any TA having booked on board and paid £50 deposit. The first time we ever booked on board we were led to believe that we were booking directly with P&O, after a couple of months we hadn't had any notification from P&O so I rang them, to be told that the booking had been transferred to the TA of the cruise we were on when we booked the new cruise and this was how it worked. I then contacted the TA and was told the same and that they now had the booking. After a brief discussion they offered me an extra £100 OBC to stay with them. 

[purplesea]

When we last booked on board we were asked if we wanted to the booking transfered to the TA that I had used to book the one we on. It wasn't done automatically.

[molecrochip]

A couple of points:

 

the contract you make is with your TA. You do not contract direct with P&O unless you book with them. If you TA contract says 4 months out as the payment date that doesn’t have to change when P&O change their payment date. That said. I’m sure P&O are leaning heavily on TAs to do so.

 

second, Carnival Corp announced today that they expect all their ships from all their fleets back in service by 30/11/21.

[arlowood]

1 hour ago, arlowood said:

I did contact them just after Christmas with my concerns about paying the full balance on the date they normally require it (early January) when the 90 day official date is end of January. They responded that they would relax their deadline until the 27th January and could relax it further depending on the circumstances at the time.

I will now press them with the knowledge that P&O have revised their final payment policy to 30 days before departure and see what response I get.

Emailed them earlier and they have just come back and confirmed that they knew about the change of policy. Have now had it confirmed that they need the balance payed 40 days before the departure date to allow them enough time to get the money to P&O within the 30 day cut off. So we don't need to worry now until 22nd March which is good to know.