Summer 2025

[Selbourne]

13 hours ago, TigerB said:

 

For us, that less another £200!

#Yorkshire!😉

 

Seriously though, pre-covid we would do a long RV holiday in the US or Canada each year; we were just about to start one when Trump closed the borders. Now that things are getting back to as they once were, we have been looking at completing that planned trip. RV hire now has almost tripled, and with other increases over there such as food, fuel, site fees, together with the poor exchange rate, such a trip would now cost us about £370+ a day; that includes all expenses, the flights too.

So, paying £250 per day or less for a cruise, and getting OBC too, is a no-brainer for us. We will continue with cruising for quite a while, and the land based holidays we used to enjoy could be some way in the future.

Just to be 100% clear, the £450 a night that I refer to is for a Saga cruise (balcony cabin, total cost for 2 persons). By all accounts, Saga offer a far more upmarket product than P&O and their prices are fully all inclusive (unlimited drinks package, wi fi, excursions, taxi to and from port etc). By contrast, with the ‘new’ P&O I am currently setting a limit that I would be prepared to pay of £200 a night (net of OBC) unless it’s a blinder of an itinerary. I might revise that figure upwards if we have a very good experience on our 2 P&O cruises this year (our first since Covid).

 

It’s back to the issue that often gets misunderstood by some on this forum, namely that ‘price’ and ‘value’ are entirely different things. Whilst Saga cruises are undoubtedly expensive (on a price per night basis), if their product is as good as everyone says, then I would consider £450 a night to be good value. Equally, following the market repositioning of P&O cruises, we might consider that £250 a night on P&O is poor value. 

 

Sadly, due to my wife’s disability, we can no longer fly. If we could there are no end of holidays that I would much prefer to do than any cruise!

 

Edited March 22, 2023 by Selbourne

[TigerB]

 

21 minutes ago, zap99 said:

On Azura in February, we left behind about £3. Next month we are back on with no OBC. No doubt P&O will have my £3 waiting on my account. They won't forget will they ?

 

£3? I would have had that spent. Don't a small bag of Maltesers in the shop cost about that much?😉

[zap99]

1 minute ago, TigerB said:

 

 

£3? I would have had that spent. Don't a small bag of Maltesers in the shop cost about that much?😉

Do they sell Matesers in Valletta?. 🤔

[Selbourne]

4 hours ago, Host Sharon said:

I've paid £175 pp pn all inclusive, but only by pre-registering. You don't have to make a snap decision as they will hold a cabin overnight - important for me as I have to discuss with my friend with whom I share. Also, even if you go ahead and book, there is a 14 day cooling off period when you ask for a full refund. Don't forget Oceania and Azamara may be a similar standard but do not include everything. Saga is the only line I have walked off with a £0 bill.

 

That’s very useful information - thank you. £350 per night (for 2) would have secured our first Saga booking, but the cheapest we were offered was well over £500 a night, even on pre-registration. Perhaps they don’t want us 😂 

[majortom10]

42 minutes ago, gsmt47471015 said:

We came off a 65 night cruise last week on Aurora with £2.25 unspent OBC , we also came off a HAL cruise and they owed us $100 , to our amazement they paid it back into our bank account !!!! Never have been able to work that one out?

Some cruise lines have refundable and non refundable OBC for differing applications. Princess also have refundable OBC but never heard of P&O or Cunard doing it more like spend it or lose it. That is why I was wandering around Iona last Friday trying to find something useful to purchase with remaining OBC.

[SummmerInKefalonia]

P&O's 2025 summer itineraries have appeared on some TA sites.

So they will probably launch soon on the official site too!

Edited March 22, 2023 by SummmerInKefalonia

[TigerB]

5 minutes ago, Selbourne said:

Just to be 100% clear, the £450 a night that I refer to is for a Saga cruise (balcony cabin, total cost for 2 persons). By all accounts, Saga offer a far more upmarket product than P&O and their prices are fully all inclusive (unlimited drinks package, wi fi, excursions, taxi to and from port etc). By contrast, with the ‘new’ P&O I am currently setting a limit that I would be prepared to pay of £200 a night (net of OBC) unless it’s a blinder of an itinerary. I might revise that figure upwards if we have a very good experience on our 2 P&O cruises this year (our first since Covid).

 

It’s back to the issue that often gets misunderstood by some on this forum, namely that ‘price’ and ‘value’ are entirely different things. Whilst Saga cruises are undoubtedly expensive (on a price per night basis), if their product is as good as everyone says, then I would consider £450 a night to be good value. Equally, following the market repositioning of P&O cruises, we might consider that £250 a night on P&O is poor value. 

 

Sadly, due to my wife’s disability, we can no longer fly. If we could there are no end of holidays that I would much prefer to do than any cruise!

 

 

I was being flippant in my first comment.😉  To be fair, we would be prepared to pay £450 per night for a Saga cruise, which is a more superior product than P&O offers. Trouble is, we are Saga virgins so cannot benefit from the advance booking option, and by the time we are able to do look at booking, the accessible cabins had either gone or cost far too much than we were prepared to pay.

 

£250 or less for a P&O balcony cabin or similar on a compatible cruise suits us but, like you, paying £200 or less would be more ideal.

 

[Selbourne]

11 minutes ago, TigerB said:

 

Trouble is, we are Saga virgins so cannot benefit from the advance booking option, and by the time we are able to do look at booking, the accessible cabins had either gone or cost far too much than we were prepared to pay.

 

You don’t need to have cruised with Saga before to do their pre-registration. We haven’t ever cruised with them. They have a very odd system that Wowzz alerted me to some time ago. You pay £90 per person for the right to be on the pre-registration list. They email those who have pre-registered a list of all the new cruises (itineraries but no prices). They then phone everyone on the pre-registration list in the order that they joined the list. The first to be called may be offered the maximum discount (35%). Depending on how sales go, percentage discounts by cruise then start to drop so, by the time your turn comes, you might only be offered 5 or 10% on popular cruises, even though you are on the pre-registration list!
 

If you don’t book, you can either have your £90 per person fully refunded, or ask them to carry it forward to a future batch of releases. In our case, we asked them to carry it over to the Summer 2025 launch, as by then we will be much higher up the list than we were this time (where we had only pre-registered a month before).

[TigerB]

24 minutes ago, Selbourne said:

You don’t need to have cruised with Saga before to do their pre-registration. We haven’t ever cruised with them. They have a very odd system that Wowzz alerted me to some time ago. You pay £90 per person for the right to be on the pre-registration list. They email those who have pre-registered a list of all the new cruises (itineraries but no prices). They then phone everyone on the pre-registration list in the order that they joined the list. The first to be called may be offered the maximum discount (35%). Depending on how sales go, percentage discounts by cruise then start to drop so, by the time your turn comes, you might only be offered 5 or 10% on popular cruises, even though you are on the pre-registration list!
 

If you don’t book, you can either have your £90 per person fully refunded, or ask them to carry it forward to a future batch of releases. In our case, we asked them to carry it over to the Summer 2025 launch, as by then we will be much higher up the list than we were this time (where we had only pre-registered a month before).

 

Ah, thanks for that.👍 I recall there being a fee involved but didn't think it was refundable.

I'll look into it now.

[Selbourne]

12 minutes ago, TigerB said:

 

Ah, thanks for that.👍 I recall there being a fee involved but didn't think it was refundable.

I'll look into it now.

I should have also said that 3 of the 4 cruises that we were interested in still had at least one of the two standard accessible balcony cabins left when they called us. It was just the high prices that stopped us booking. 

[Denarius]

45 minutes ago, Selbourne said:

You don’t need to have cruised with Saga before to do their pre-registration. We haven’t ever cruised with them. They have a very odd system that Wowzz alerted me to some time ago. You pay £90 per person for the right to be on the pre-registration list. They email those who have pre-registered a list of all the new cruises (itineraries but no prices). They then phone everyone on the pre-registration list in the order that they joined the list. The first to be called may be offered the maximum discount (35%). Depending on how sales go, percentage discounts by cruise then start to drop so, by the time your turn comes, you might only be offered 5 or 10% on popular cruises, even though you are on the pre-registration list!
 

If you don’t book, you can either have your £90 per person fully refunded, or ask them to carry it forward to a future batch of releases. In our case, we asked them to carry it over to the Summer 2025 launch, as by then we will be much higher up the list than we were this time (where we had only pre-registered a month before).

The Saga early booking discount is grade specific rather than universal. ie, each cabin grade is treated separately. So the discount on popular grades may reduce whilst those on less popular ones remain higher.

[TigerB]

10 minutes ago, Selbourne said:

I should have also said that 3 of the 4 cruises that we were interested in still had at least one of the two standard accessible balcony cabins left when they called us. It was just the high prices that stopped us booking. 

 

I can't find anything on the Saga site for pre-registration. Google results suggest it may only be open at a particular time of year, and then by phone call. Is that correct?

[Selbourne]

3 minutes ago, Denarius said:

The Saga early booking discount is grade specific rather than universal. ie, each cabin grade is treated separately. So the discount on popular grades may reduce whilst those on less popular ones remain higher.

That’s interesting to know. Thanks. However, the price differential to the next grade up is vast (certainly with the accessible cabins - the next grade up is around double the price), so even with the maximum % discount they would still be way more expensive than the cheapest grade standard balcony cabin with no discount. It might work better with regular cabins where there is more choice?

[Selbourne]

3 minutes ago, TigerB said:

 

I can't find anything on the Saga site for pre-registration. Google results suggest it may only be open at a particular time of year, and then by phone call. Is that correct?

No, you can do it any time. Just call them. 

[TigerB]

6 minutes ago, Selbourne said:

No, you can do it any time. Just call them. 

Thanks, doing that now🙂

[TigerB]

1 hour ago, Selbourne said:

No, you can do it any time. Just call them. 

 

Once again Selbourne, many thanks for the advice.👍  I have just come off the phone with a lovely young lady from Saga, and paid our pre-registration for both 2025 seasons; and while I was at it, I also paid for both 2026 seasons.🙂

[Selbourne]

8 minutes ago, TigerB said:

 

Once again Selbourne, many thanks for the advice.👍  I have just come off the phone with a lovely young lady from Saga, and paid our pre-registration for both 2025 seasons; and while I was at it, I also paid for both 2026 seasons.🙂

You’re welcome. You will be ahead of us in the queue for the two accessible balcony cabins in 2026 then! As I don’t know if we will ever cruise with Saga, I just couldn’t bring myself to splash out multiple £180s on the off chance, even though it’s fully refundable. The lady I spoke to told me that some people pre-register many years out, so you aren’t alone! 

[Selbourne]

3 hours ago, SummmerInKefalonia said:

P&O's 2025 summer itineraries have appeared on some TA sites.

So they will probably launch soon on the official site too!

Just to bring this thread back to P&O, without providing a link to a TA or even naming them, if this is true can anyone post the itineraries? I’m surprised that nobody has commented if summer 2025 itineraries are indeed available. 

[TigerB]

1 minute ago, Selbourne said:

You’re welcome. You will be ahead of us in the queue for the two accessible balcony cabins in 2026 then! As I don’t know if we will ever cruise with Saga, I just couldn’t bring myself to splash out multiple £180s on the off chance, even though it’s fully refundable. The lady I spoke to told me that some people pre-register many years out, so you aren’t alone! 

 

She said the same to us.

I had half a mind to register for the first season of 2028, which is when I turn 60 and we could justify pushing the boat out (pun intended!)😉

[cruisefan2012]

5 hours ago, SummmerInKefalonia said:

P&O's 2025 summer itineraries have appeared on some TA sites.

So they will probably launch soon on the official site too!

 

Can you find out which ship/s are doing Iceland, what dates, where and when please?

 

I have 2x cruises booked for 2024 and I`m eager to get my 2025 planned

 

Thank you so much x

[sogne]

18 hours ago, SummmerInKefalonia said:

P&O's 2025 summer itineraries have appeared on some TA sites.

So they will probably launch soon on the official site too!

can you list Arcadia and Aurora if available please

 

am on board soon

[Presto2]

I am just amazed that they may be available any time soon ----- am I the only one who thinks booking 2 years in advance is a LOOOONNNNGGG time. (Said as a couple who have sometimes booked up to 18 months in advance). I suppose it is each to their own but the older I get, 2 years seems a long time.

Perhaps I am turning in to my mum 😉

[Selbourne]

1 hour ago, Presto2 said:

I am just amazed that they may be available any time soon ----- am I the only one who thinks booking 2 years in advance is a LOOOONNNNGGG time. (Said as a couple who have sometimes booked up to 18 months in advance). I suppose it is each to their own but the older I get, 2 years seems a long time.

Perhaps I am turning in to my mum 😉

Now that the cheapest prices seem to be between balance due date and sailing, rather than at launch as it always used to be, there’s no way that we would book so far in advance if we didn’t need an accessible balcony cabin. If we could use a standard balcony cabin we would be booking cruises 10-12 weeks before sailing now!

[tesni]

I love to daydream over what potential cruises might be coming up.

[TigerB]

2 hours ago, Presto2 said:

I am just amazed that they may be available any time soon ----- am I the only one who thinks booking 2 years in advance is a LOOOONNNNGGG time. (Said as a couple who have sometimes booked up to 18 months in advance). I suppose it is each to their own but the older I get, 2 years seems a long time.

Perhaps I am turning in to my mum 😉

Unfortunately, we're in the same boat as Selbourne, and others who require an accessible cabin. If there is a cruise we really want to do, we have no option but to book a loooonnnnggg time in advance, more often than not when the cruise is released. I wish we didn't have to do so, but that is the way it is.