Beware Princess last minute air add-ons. Emerald Princess 8/16/2008

[pooh219]

Following is an excerpt of a letter I wrote to Princess Customer Relations in September. I waited until now to post it because I had several people working to help us get an apology or something from Princess, but now I'm pretty sure that is not going to happen, so I am living up to my word that I would let people know what happened to us, so hopefully it will never happen again. I normally don't book cruises and air at the last minute. (within 90 days) and I usually book my own air so as to arrive the day before the cruise leaves so things like this won't happen. The Emerald was scheduled to leave Venice at 8:00am the day after we were to arrive at 8:30am. It's long, but detailed:

 

My mother and I just returned from a 12 day Mediterranean Cruise on your line. We had a terrible experience getting to the embarkation port using the Princess air add-on. I must premise my concerns by telling you that my husband and I cruised the Eastern Mediterranean on the Star Princess in 2004 and had a wonderful experience. With that in mind, my mother sent me a low fare on a Royal Caribbean cruise in the Eastern Med and asked if I’d like to cruise with her this summer. I was pondering this when a low past passenger rate on Princess came to me via e-mail. It included “low airfare add-on”. I sent this to my mother suggesting that we cruise Princess instead. She agreed and we made the booking on July 9th, 2008 and took the Princess air out of Indianapolis. The first flight schedule I received had us flying from Indianapolis to Washington/Dulles with a long connection to the international flight. On Aug 8th I received a schedule change from Princess air stating that we were now flying to Chicago O’Hare to make our international connection. I know ( I was a travel agent many years ago) schedule changes are not unusual, but what concerned me about this schedule was the 36 minutes we had to connect from a commuter plane to a large international flight at one of the largest airports in the world. I simply didn’t think this was possible. I called the international carrier, Lufthansa, to get our seat assignments and expressed my concerns to their agent. Initially, she didn’t think it was possible either, but checked the connecting times for Chicago and told me that 35 minutes is the LEGAL connection time for these flights. I looked at the O’Hare airport map and both flights were supposed to be in the same terminal, so if everything went right, it might be ok. But, it didn’t go right. Our flight from Indianapolis was 10 minutes late arriving and therefore we were 10 minutes late departing. I pretty much knew then and there that we would miss our flight in Chicago. Our plane did not arrive in the same terminal either, but my mother and I gave it the old college try and ran (my mother had double partial knee replacements in the last year and isn’t supposed to run) to the far away gate for the international flight only to find that it was leaving on time and they had just closed the door. Imagine our frustration.

The Lufthansa agent booked us on a United flight (UA940) to Frankfort that departed at 6:30pm. We waited around and got on that flight only to sit on the plane at the gate for 4 hours while they tried to fix a radio problem. But from here on out, we are not alone in our frustrations. There were several people on this flight that were going on the Princess cruise. We all missed our connection to Venice in Frankfort and had to wait in a long line to get our rebookings that Lufthansa was doing while we were in route. When we got to the agent in Frankfort, she said she didn’t have us in her system as continuing on to Venice, so therefore we hadn’t been rebooked. She said the best she could do was a flight through Vienna that was to arrive in Venice at 9:30pm. We arrive at last in Venice at 9:30pm only to find that our luggage has (not surprisingly) lost us. After filling out the necessary “lost luggage” paperwork and transferring to the port, we finally check in onto the ship at 11:30pm absolutely exhausted. If we had just made that flight in Chicago, we would have been in Venice at 8:30am and probably with our luggage. The thing that I am most angry about is not the lost luggage, it’s that we missed Venice entirely. And while I have been there before, I was so looking forward to showing it to my mother. Because of the tide, the ship left at 5am instead of 8am so we couldn’t even see us depart Venice, which I remember was a highlight of my cruise four years ago. The next morning, I stood in line at the passenger service desk and tried to speak with the manager. They would not let me see her, but I did get a call later and she said there was nothing she could do and that I would have to write to the customer relations department after the cruise. They were more concerned with the lost luggage and didn’t seem to care anything about my other frustration. I found out that we had to fill out a lost luggage report with Princess also, something the agent that greeted us at the airport failed to mention. While I know that I can make no claim against Princess for all this mishap, I had expected more customer concern and care. But we got nothing but a $125 discount on our onboard account for the delayed luggage. We did get our luggage in Athens after 2 days at sea including a formal night. But again, the delayed baggage isn’t and wasn’t my main concern. PLEASE, if you can’t do anything for us to mend our relations with Princess, don’t ever let your air department book anyone else on a short connection in a very large airport!! It just isn’t right to start a vacation with the sort of horrible experience we had. I tried to make the best of it for the rest of the cruise, but I had a bad taste in my mouth about Princess the whole time. As a side note, we also missed Mykonos because of wind (rightly so) and Barcelona because the Princess air department booked a flight too early for us to go on a tour of the city.

 

 

Overall, the ship was nice, and the ports we went to had nice excursions.

[chrysalis]

Sorry to hear about your problems.

 

What happened in your case only confirms my belief that arriving a day or two early is highly advisable. There are just way too many factors that can mess up arriving the day the cruise departs.

[quincytoo]

That is too bad and I feel badly for your mother but I would have insisted on flying even two days earlier especially because you wanted to show your mother the city. I couldn't imagine flying in at 8:30AM and then touring all over a city.

 

I am sorry that you had such a bad taste in your mouth about Princess for the rest of the cruise but I am not thinking this is their fault beyond that they could have tried for better flight times??

 

You didn't fly Princess Air, you flew Lufthansa Air and Princess merely acts as a booking agent (like a Travel Agent ) you could and SHOULD have said no to the flight times.

[DaisyRose]

I feel for your disappointment. I agree with other posters that whenever possible, it is best to arrive a day or two early, but I also know that that can add a lot of cost to an already expensive trip that not everyone can afford. I would have been very worried about only 35 minutes between connecting flights. I probably would have asked if I could pay the $75 custom air fee to pick other flights. But, since you said you were offered a discount air add on, they may not have let you. I guess not all bargains are true bargains. I find that with each trip I take, I learn a bit more about the best way to handle things. I hope your future trips will work out better.

[spongerob]

How much did the air add-on cost?

[nho9504]

Unfortunately, this sounds too much like You get what you pay for type of scenario.

 

OP should have refused the flights booked and demanded better connection regardless what LH agent said it was legal connection time.

 

Booking last minute cruise can be really cheap, but only when the air portion can be arranged, by yourself, not by the cruiseline.

 

On Emerald's later Transatlantic crossing we met a couple who booked that sailing just 5 days before sailing with great price of course. But they had the air in place already, because they had the remaining 1/2 of award tickets they used for a transatlantic in Spring. They were going to throw away the 2nd half but saw the bargain price of the Emerald cruise and said Why Not - so they flew to Frankfurt on the 2nd half of those tickets, get a one-way rental car and drove to Milan. From where they took 7 hour train ride to Venice. So there, that was not an easy way to get to Venice, but at least they had matters in their own hands and planned everything (how to get to Venice from Frankfurt) before leaving and made it according to their plan.

[Coral]

So sorry about your trip. Unfortunately - this type of thing can happen with any cruise line/airline. It is sad that airlines allow a 35 minute connection in an airport like O'Hare (or any airport for that matter).

 

I am also one of those people who always tries to fly in early also but have to admit, the two cruises I have flown the farthest for, I have flown in the day of the cruise. Last year, I flew to Russia the day of the cruise and couldn't believe I agreed to do that (due to visa issues). The ship was in port for 3 days so I would not have missed the ship but would have missed the port.

 

I sure hope your next trip is as smooth as possible!

[robgvic]

I am surprised that you , as a one time travel agent, went directly to the airline and not to princess. I'm sure they would have done more for you. Lufthansa would have not been able to do much, as you found out. Plese don't blame princess for this unfortunate situation

[chasetf]

Once again..... the OP gives us a testimonial of why it is smart not to fly in the day of embarkation. :o With that many connections, there is a greater possibility things will not go as scheduled. ;)

 

Plus the OP (ex TA) knew the Chicago connection was iffy and still went with it. :rolleyes:

[pooh219]

Thank you for your comments on our unfortunate situation. I too would have preferred to plan things far ahead of time and book a pre-cruise hotel and a post cruise for that matter. I don't know how last minute cruisers do it. As an ex-TA, I did discuss as many options with Princess Air department and then with Lufthansa as I could think of, including me meeting my mother on the east coast and then flying over, but they couldn't guarantee me we would be on the same flight. I thought of meeting her in Chicago and then flying over, but the low fare wasn't available out of Chicago even though that is where our connection ended up being. Keep in mind that we received the schedule change 1 week before our flight left. Maybe I was wrong for not refusing the schedule change, but I can tell you it would've been a long 12 days in Indianapolis if I had! BTW,the airfare cost more than the 12 day cruise! If I book any last minute cruises in the future, I will make sure they are ones I can drive to.

[momphoto]

Our friends received their air from Princess and changed it immediately. They are flying from Toronto to Ft. Lauderdale and they had them go via NY with only a 40 minute transfer time.....we knew this was WAY to short and being March the chances of winter weather delays is still high. They are now flying down the day before with much better flights and their flight home is now direct, instead of the 3.5 hour layover in Montreal. All it cost them was the change fee which was well worth it to get much better flights.

[moffl]

Our friends received their air from Princess and changed it immediately. They are flying from Toronto to Ft. Lauderdale and they had them go via NY with only a 40 minute transfer time......

 

This happened to me last year on a Holland cruise. Holland booked our air and we only had 1 hr and 20 min to go get our luggage, clear customs get to basically the other end of the airport. When i questioned this the Holland rep says that the standard rule is 1 hr between flights.

[yorky]

I would not have excepted that limited time between flights, it was just a recipe for disaster.

[griswalds]

Pooh as you have discovered like the rest of us, flights with the cruise line can be a challenge. Princess certainly could and should do better when booking their cruise passengers. We have only used Princess "Air" once and it was also one of those nightmare trips and this was many years ago. One would have thought that Princess would have tried to improve on their flight booking service over the years but they have accepted this as their way of doing business. We now do all our bookings on our own and always travel at least one day in advance.

 

I don't believe you should have to "rebook" your flights. Instead Princes should set some reasonable standards regarding transfers, numerous flights and overnight specials when they book the flights in the first place. One can only hope they will catch on one day.

 

I would have tried to make the transfers just like you tried.

 

Happy cruising.

 

Griswalds

[caribill]

It is not only last minute bookings that end up with extremely short connection times to international flights.

 

I was once also given a 35 minute connection in Chicago by Princess several months before the sailing for a trip to Europe.

 

Luckily (in my case) they has used the wrong city for a starting point. Once this was pointed out to them and they then booked the air starting in the correct city, we no longer were flying via Chicago and had a reasonable connecting time in our connection city.

 

I put part of the blame on any airline that considers a 35 minute connection in Chicago to be legal, even for a domestic flight.

[spongerob]

We had a similar experience at O'Hare. Due to weather problems in Dallas, our flight from OKC to Chicago was late arriving. As the minutes ticked past, the time we had to make our connection for a flight to London dwindled down from 2-1/2 hours to next to nothing. When we finally arrived at ORD, our London flight was already boarding. We made it from our arrival gate in another terminal to the international terminal in 20 minutes. If we had a shorter connection time, we would have been out of luck after all that.

 

I'm actually quite impressed that the OP was able to make the arrangements to get to the ship. That feat alone deserves some credit. What bothers me is that upon finding out about the 35 minute connection time, why would anyone would accept that? Get an earlier flight, fly to Chicago a day early, something...anything would have been better than going through all this.

[Sea Hag]

Wow what a hassle!

[sunviking82]

I had a similar close connection, called Princess and my flights were changed. If your uncomfortable, you or your travel agent should have call the Princess.

 

The part I do not understand is the airline is required by law to have you aboard any international flight 30 minutes prior to departure, so they would not have book the flight this way. Usually they allow 2-3 hours for international connections.

[happy cruzer]

Folks who use Cruise Air mostly pay and get the air deviation so that they can be select the flights and days of travel. It does have a fee and the air may cost more because of your selection. Princess like all other cruiselines and cruise agents book you on "legal" flights and trust the airports and airlines to do their jobs. That's the business model.

[DanJ]

If the air in this scenario was a cheap add-on and it was still more than a 12 day cruise, what does cruise air usually cost for this itineray? Wow.

 

I'm not really sure why the OP feels Princess owes them any money (I know they didn't come right out and say that, but what else does "do something to mend our relations with Princess" mean?). The OP says the part that they really missed was the day in Venice prior to boarding the cruise. Heck, if they offered compensation for that, then every person who books cruise air to Ft Lauderdale would complain they didn't have time to take a tour before boarding. And then to say the flight home was too early to take a tour after the cruise? Come on. Can you imagine if they had a later flight, and ended up missing a connection coming home?

 

All Princess can do is go by the guidelines that the airlines give them. It's not up to a clerk in an office somewhere in Princess HQ to say that the airline doesn't know what it's talking about. This clerk also probably has a supervisor telling him they have a budget to work with and can't just move people around to more expensive flights if the times don't look right even if it fits the definitons set by the airline. If the clerk even notices with all the bookings they have to take care of.

[entropyorganizer]

We had a similar problem when connecting in LAX from IAH to AKL. We had a 4 hour connection. When Continental delayed our outgoing flight they e-mailed us that the plane was 5 hours late. Princess told us that we were "on our own" to get to AKL. Gee thanks Princess! Well, as it turns out Continental was only obligated to get us to LAX...period. It seems that Pricess booked both legs (IAH to LAX and LAX to AKL) as separate tickets. Talking to the airlines about this mis-connect (Princess's advice) was useless. Continental could not see our Qantas flight to AKL and Qantas could not see our IAH to LAX flight. Two bookings in a vacuum. As it turned out the flight was only 1.5 hours delayed and we made the connection.

 

Make sure that Princess books your flight as ONE flight! Not individual segments.