Outerdog

That is a public-facing policy as the Crew Appreciation and Service Charges apply to the passenger. It is not a compensation policy, employment contract, or anything similar. What it does say is that the revenues collected from these charges are pooled across the fleet and use for compensation and bonuses. In other words, the charges are revenues just like any other fare revenue and are used to fulfill employment contracts, the contents of which are not known to most passengers. Whether they are paid a la carte or as part of a package, they are just cash as far as Princess is concerned. There is nothing special about those dollars compared to anything else.

It's either the crew appreciation charge or it's built into the fare. Either way, you're paying it. Funding to pay the crew comes from passenger revenues, not magic beans.

I hadn't really noticed this problem before. But last trip on Ruby... Piazza was really bad. In one particular instance, the game was some variation of corn hole or whatever which involved pax tossing balls into a target. Each and every throw resulted in the host screaming loud OOOOHHHs into the microphone whenever the player missed. It went on for half an hour. It is so bad, the bartenders were complaining with customers and visibly annoyed. They couldn't work like that. Second to this has got to be that annoying cocktail performance they make the bartenders do at Good Spirits. No one cares. No one. If you're not familiar, every day around 5:00 pm while everyone is getting a drink before dinner, the bartending stops while several cocktails are demonstrated and presented with frequent loud interruptions by a canned travel show playing on the monitors and loudspeaker. It's dumb. We sat through several of these mostly because we were seated at the bar. You could easily see the bartender was just over the whole extravaganza.

The bridge can see onto most of the balconies on either side of the ship. Important info if you are planning nefarious activities.

If you're gonna go once, go to Glacier Bay. Endicott Arm is beautiful and the viewing of Dawes Glacier is sublime, but the Glacier Bay itinerary brings you to 3 glaciers. Glacier Bay lacks the fjord cruising that Endicott Arm (or Tracy Arm) brings. But Endicott is not without its magic. Here are some shots of Endicott Arm and Dawes Glacier from this past September:

And sometimes this means going the self-insured route... "eat the loss" in other words. I personally don't bother insuring low-cost voyages. The little 3 and 5 day ones, for example. I *do* insure the ones that take me deep south into Mexico. Does travel insurance cover bribes in Mexico??? /s

Based on your location, I assume you will be sailing from Pier 27 in SF. I would recommend you take advantage of wheelchair assist to get through security. You will see assist folks at the curb with blue vests and a wheelchair logo on the back. I realize you're not confined to a wheelchair but that's not what this service is for. It is for folks with limited mobility. They will wheel you through the process and onto the ship. There will be no special access to your stateroom. They open for you when they open for all. Usually before 1 PM. If you're not sailing out of SF, I'm sure the shoreside services are very similar elsewhere.

The Shorex page frequently comes up blank when accessing it through an existing booking. This has been happening for months. Reloading the page (and trying again 4 times) or getting at it with another browser usually works. Walking away in frustration and coming back the next day also seems to work.

You know what I think? A cruise card doesn't solve either of the issues the poster brought up. 1) Without Medallions in the room, the system will still show the room as having no one inside. 2) The problem with bogus charges on the folio is the result of busy bartenders making mistakes and has next to nothing to do with the Medallions. Arguably, the less than perfect function of the Medallions may contribute to this. But bartenders were writing down wrong cabin numbers and making all sorts of errors long before Medallions existed. So what obtaining a cruise card get me in these scenarios?

No.

The porters have a passenger manifest on them and are expected to sift through 2000 line items to find your cabin at the curb?

El Arco has been there for thousands and thousands of years.

I would expect cabin assignments to be done by now -- 9 days out. Although I've never done a GTY but this seems like cutting it close. Perhaps worth a call or chat w/ Princess or your TA?

Above is correct. Leaving PV now bound for LAX. Gonna be a rough one...

If you are asking whether there is some sort of discount for paying early versus paying on board with your folio, then no. In a typical closed-loop US cruise, the amount is the same whether pre-paid or on the folio.

I can see someone unfamiliar with the Princess fare packages being curious about what a group chooses to do with them. If a majority of posters indicated that they find value in them, that might be good info for someone starting their research and planning. On the other hand, if a majority seems to think it's a total ripoff, well, that might inform some decisions too. The dynamics of a forum make getting a good sample challenging. Here's a data point for OP: We get the Plus package on 7 or 10 day voyages. We have a couple of 5 day trips in the books and planned and no packages for those.

Have a look at the deck plans: https://www.princess.com/deckPlans.do?shipCode=EX&version=1

Agreed. But you know how these things go. It's an easy $3k in revenue to drag 15 or 20 pax around the ship and down a couple of crew corridors. I do know that years before covid, NCL nix'd the bridge tour portion of their Behind the Scenes tour, citing "security reasons". I wasn't following along with Princess closely enough to know if they were still showing the bridge up until the covid stop or not. I'd be surprised if the bridge portion came back. To me, that alone is worth the price of admission. Although I will admit the 150 preparations of potato I witnessed on the last galley tour I mentioned above was pretty impressive!

100% this.

Shorex is where we've historically purchased the ship tours. I'm not a fan of "never" but dude at Shorex knew what the tour was and couldn't say if it would ever be back. He did not seem optimistic. Like all things covid, perhaps Princess will re-evaluate the ship tour when they realize there is money they can squeeze out.

Nope, gone. I asked the Shorex desk about it a few weeks back. As R&J points out, some of the demonstrations include a brief galley tour (the Italian one they do in the Theater comes to mind).

There are a couple of bags in your stateroom. You place your laundry in the bags. There is a little ticket you fill out with a count of your items. Place all of this on the bed when you go out for breakfast and the stew will pick up. Expect it back in the next day or two. There are some timelines for next-day, but I would be prepared not to get it next-day even if you hit the timeline. A charge will appear on your folio, then a credit, like so: This is not them giving you tokens to doit yourself!

I canceled one a couple of weeks ago and the agent put me on hold to talk to a supervisor. When she came back, she stated the supervisor had approved the cancellation. Bizarre.

Off Ruby a couple weeks ago and Sunday was game day for sure. Games all day in Explorer's Lounge. It was a party in there, bar open, people wearing jerseys, sports bar vibe. Thursday Night Football on MUTS.

Thanks for the reply. It was port side. Port aft corner where the ship struck the dock in San Francisco. They completed a repair to allow the ship to sail, but it still needed the finishing touches. Damage: "Repair":