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UPDATE: Since writing the above, I have received two more confirmations from Princess - each a little different. Now it all looks correct and everything is showing as it should, the FCC has been reapplied BUT I should be getting some kind of refund from what I paid when we both had Plus to the difference where DD has no package and I have Premiere. Out of that refund I will pay for the coffee/soda package and grats for DD. If it all works out, I ended up saving about $100 - worth it? Probably not. Should have just upgraded us both and been done with it. Lesson learned.

Standard, Plus, or Premiere: As the only adult travelling with kids, I always try to do the math before booking to figure out which fare would be in my favour. I like the drink package, not because I drink a ton but because I like not having to think about a bill at the end. Teens like the soda/coffee package, tween likes the soda package, we all need wifi, and obviously the crew appreciation will be paid whatever we go with. When I booked this sailing, the difference between the cost of standard and plus was definitely much more than $50 per day – not sure if it was some kind of website glitch or if the standard fare was some kind of promo/deal, but I went ahead and booked the standard and figured I would do the math to see if it was worth the upgrade to plus. After crunching the numbers, I decided to do plus for myself and DD (pax 1&2) and then purchase one coffee/soda package for BFF and one soda package for DS. The Elite price to upgrade wifi to 4 devices was $5 a day so that worked for wifi and then I would just need to pre-pay gratuities for BFF and DS. Doing it this way saved me around $150 over upgrading for all 4 of us. I called Princess and got the Plus added and then went ahead and made the purchases and pre paid grats. All looking good… Except just last week I started looking at the Premiere package – particularly the photo package. Back in the day, I also purchased the unlimited photo package and have so many amazing pictures from our many cruises. Sadly, that package has been discontinued, BUT it is part of the Premiere package. To upgrade myself and DD it would be an additional $350 and, honestly, the only added value would be the photos since all the drinks I enjoy are included in Plus and DD gets no added value on any of that as she is under drinking age. Admittedly, I had paid $101.50 for specialty dining, so I could deduct that and $35 for the upgraded wifi so I could deduct that. That would mean I was paying $214 for the photo package…maybe not worth it to most, but since my kiddos are getting to the point where they refuse to be in pictures these days I figured this might be the last time I could do this…Back on the phone to Princess and I was lucky to get a great rep because I casually mentioned that the upgrade probably wasn’t worth it given that pax 2 was a kid. She asked if I would like her to find out if it would be possible for just myself to upgrade – um, yes please. Unfortunately, as she put me on hold to check with a supervisor, I got disconnected. I figured that this was the universe telling me to hold on to that $350 and skip the upgrade. Imagine how surprised I was to receive a call back from the rep about half an hour later telling me that she had checked with her supervisor and the upgrade for just me was possible BUT in order to do that, they had to remove the package from DD AND there system was currently down so she couldn’t do it until it was back up and running. She offered to go ahead and process it when she could and then send me a confirmation. Sure, go for it. I wasn’t really expecting much, but Lo and Behold, an hour later I get a confirmation through. As I looked at it and got crazy confused, I began to wonder why I hadn’t just left well enough alone. DD no longer had any package. I had the Premiere package. Great. BUT the pricing looked really wonky. Nothing matched up with either the original booking with the standard fare or the upgraded booking with the plus fare and the difference in price went back to FCC, which was the sole reason I booked the cruise – to use those suckers up. As I was debating calling yet again to get this fixed, another confirmation came through. This one looked much better, kind of. This time the pricing matched in come ways, but the Premiere upgrade did not have gratuities added for me. In the Personalizer, it shows prepaid gratuities for DD but has the option for me to prepay…I think it should be the other way around? Plus, I still have a chunk of FCC back on my account, which I don’t think I should have. I’m guessing another call is in order to fix this, or maybe I just leave alone and figure it out onboard…

I don't think I have ever been asked to prove the kids had a package - even though they always did. Their drinks were always just put through on my package, unless they go to the bar and order themselves.

Mine never drank soda until they were teens, but those Choco-Bananas were worth getting the soda package for! Mind you, that was before it was a package and when it was just a sticker on the card!

If they want drinks for the kiddo it is far less to just add basic soda package and pay grats than to add Plus

With the new package addition came a change to the way you add Plus. It now only adds to guests 1 and 2 and you have to request it for 3 and 4 if wanted. So if perks aren’t showing for kiddo in personalizer then no perks are included for them.

It might look pretty, but still not sure how much it helps? Also, when using this function my phone gets REALLY hot!

Even Dine My Way seemed to cooperate this time...

It took a while, but that satisfaction at getting all checks and green lane ready...

You can add other folks as authorized credit card users under "manage my payment methods"

Pre-Cruise: I hate to be negative and complain before we even set foot on the ship but really Princess, what were you thinking with that app? I had sailed a few times on medallion class ships with the original app and quite enjoyed the experience, having zero issues with the app. However, this new and improved version is all kinds of words that would get me banned from this site. So let’s just say I’m not a fan. This all began way back when I had a vintage (to Princess) iphone 6. I loved this phone. Sure, it didn’t have the fancy camera or the face recognition or the filters to make me beautiful, but it worked perfectly as a phone (gasp), had a huge 256g storage, and pretty much did everything I needed it to do…as a phone. EXCEPT work with the new and improved medallion app. After many hours of frozen screens, white pages, crashing, and errors Princess finally told me that my phone was not compatible and to get an updated model. Ummm, what? At this time, there was no option to do any of the pre-cruise stuff any other way so I reluctantly bought a new phone. Only to find out, that the (insert curse words) app still didn’t work properly. OK, now that’s out of my system, let’s talk about the process and procedures to prepare for the cruise. Many of the check in requirements can now be accessed and completed on a computer rather than only on the app. I chose to complete as much as I could this way – partly because the app usually leads to be wanting to throw my phone at the nearest wall, and partly because my eyes are not as great as when I was a teenager and my fat fingers are not as nimble. Having said this, after many, many hours of blood, sweat, tears, and cursing I consider myself a bit of an expert when it comes to navigating the app. Surprisingly, for this sailing, it cooperated far better than on any of the previous attempts to use it. After completing the required travel documentation, uploading passport photos (strike one on the app – it doesn’t seem to like glossy…but aren’t all passports glossy?) seemed to take forever. At one point I was yelling so much that DD took over and managed, in one attempt, to successfully do what I had been trying to do for the past 30 minutes. Next up came the credit card for the onboard account. Now this is where the app gets tricky. I save it in my account but it doesn’t save for the kids, even though I check the box for “all guests”. Hmm. I delete and retry. Nope. I try to add it manually for each guest but, since they are kids, the app is too “smart” to allow that. I take a few deep breaths and back all the way out to the screen that has the list of sailings, etc. It is from here that I am able to access my account and check off the “authorized users” for my credit card. Why, Princess? Why are you messing with me? Anyways, once I had done this, the card was automatically saved to all 4 accounts and we got the green check mark for that section. I have never felt so much satisfaction at getting a green check mark! Next up is ordering the medallions. Here’s another fail on the part of Princess. If you live in Canada, you can’t get the medallions shipped to you but must collect them at the port. Here’s the thing – the port for this sailing is in Canada, so obviously the shipping company must ship to Canada or else how would the medallions make it to the port? These are the kind of things that keep me awake at night. Other than the fact that I had no option other than to choose pick up at port, the rest of the medallion ordering was pretty painless – I opted for the regular (free) medallion and the (free) lanyard. Both kids have the wristband already that they use and I have airtag holders that fit the medallion perfectly, so no need for expensive Princess accessories. Another green check mark for us! The health section was a little more tricky as I needed to figure out if we were merely fully vaccinated, or up-to-date. The teens and I have had 3 shots (all that we have been allowed in BC) and the 11 year old has had 2 shots (all that he has been allowed in BC) but the terminology seemed to be skewed toward the US CDC definitions…I agonized a little over what our status was, but figured it really didn’t matter since we had to take a test anyways. I plugged in fully vaccinated for all of us and moved on. Surprisingly, I was able to easily upload the proof of vaccination but was then met with the dreaded “Pending” that never seemed to change! Will it ever be accepted, or will it forever be pending? I was disappointed that I couldn’t get the green check mark for this section, but I guess I have to wait until I can upload our test results. What did happen, though, was that all four of were suddenly GREEN LANE! Yay. Arrival groups, of course, were met with the white screen of death so at that point I counted my blessings and quietly put down my phone… Now that I felt I was an app expert, I decided to dabble a little with dining. In the past, I have enjoyed traditional dining with the same waitstaff, time, and table but it’s not a deal breaker. For now, I have booked the same time in the same dining room each night, except for one night where I have booked Crown Grill. This all seemed to work without a hitch. Kind of. After booking and paying for Crown Grill, I realised that I never received any kind of confirmation and it did not show on the travel summary or personalizer. Princess chat assured me this was not a problem. I’m not as convinced. Then, to make matters worse I decided to upgrade to the Premiere package (more on that later) which includes specialty dining so I cancelled my original booking and rebooked with the dining credit. While rebooking and applying the credit worked like a charm, I have yet to see my original credit card charge be refunded. Time will tell. I’m feeling really proud of my technical abilities by this point, so I go into Journey View timeline and check out what events are on offer. Nothing blew me away – Encore and Sweet Soul Music are the production shows (seen both several times), comedian, magician, various trivia, Alaska presentations (all of which we have done but will likely do again as they really are great) and the usual suspects of art auctions and Effy giveaways, I went through and bookmarked any that appealed to us, but I’m not 100% sure that this does anything – it doesn’t seem to “flag” anywhere or act as a reminder. But hey, it looks pretty with the water and the ship…

Yes, it can be done but needs to called in to Princess (either by you or your TA) as it needs an override and a TWID (Travel With ID) to link the bookings. Inexperienced reps will tell you it can't be done but it definitely can. One word of caution - if you are planning on getting EZ Air, you can't do that with the kids in a different room as the air requirement requires an adult to be booked on same cabin booking and the air will cancel if that requirement isn't met. If there is a workaround, I haven't found it yet.

Cabin: We have sailed in everything from an inside to a suite and are not picky on type or location since we spend so little time in the room. That being said, for this sailing, I was a little more selective with cabin type since BFF was coming along. It’s one thing being in a tiny box with my kids, but quite another with someone else’s kid! I figured that we would all like a little extra space/privacy and looked at deluxe balconies and mini suites – who doesn’t love a sofa, right? The minis were only slightly more expensive than the deluxe balconies, so I decided to go with that. I also decided to try something I have never tried before in terms of location. While I really don’t care where I’m located, I tend to book more aft cabins than anything else (I think it is just ingrained in me from when the kids were little and it was easier to be aft near the kids club). This sailing I’m all the way forward on Lido Deck (never been on that deck previously). I figured that it would be convenient if the kids wanted to run out and get pizza or ice cream. Hopefully, this will turn out to be a decent choice. I should mention that cabins on this sailing have been erratic. At one point, another friend was thinking of sailing with us and we were looking at availability, There was lots available in all categories and she was going to book an inside cabin. The next day, all inside cabins were showing as sold out. There is no way they could have all sold overnight as we counted at least 10-12 available on various decks when we were looking. A few days after that, the entire sailing became “unavailable.” Since then, I have been checking almost daily – while insides never opened back up, the sailing itself would be available one day and unavailable the next. I have no idea what Princess is doing, but I’m confident that it’s not sold out. Maybe limiting capacity? Creating supply/demand? Glitchy website? Who knows...

I would assume that if all are booked in one room, the two adults would be 1st and 2nd...which is what I based my response on. FWIW I always travel with just myself and 2 kids so have always had number 2 guest be a youth. I have been able to have the package removed from the second guest based on the fact that it was a child. It's something that needs to be done by a supervisor but it can be done!

Only the two adults need to purchse.

I was already in a mini, so unless they had suites available there wouldn't have been anything to upsell us to! My friends on the sailing went from an inside to a balcony, though!

We have a form printed from the Government website that needs to be signed and notarised by her parents to give permission. Hopefully that will suffice - the good thing is that we all live here in Vancouver, where the cruise begins and ends, so if anything comes up her parents can be at the port in minutes!

Itinerary: As I mentioned earlier, this cruise was a bit of a last minute booking to use up our remaining FCC from cancellations. It needed to meet specific criteria: ü Not involve any flights – I’m less concerned about Covid on my travels than I am about delays, cancellation, and lost luggage so this was a biggie right now. This sailing is roundtrip Vancouver so not only do we not need to fly, we don’t even need to drive – we live an 8 minute walk from Canada Place! ü No longer than 7 days – while I’m of the mind “the longer the better” my grade 10 DD was horrified at the thought of taking any time off school (not sure how she became so responsible). She reluctantly agreed to a week maximum. This sailing is 7 days, but one of those days happens to be a pro-d day for schools so she will only be missing 4 days. ü Timing – DD’s BFF, who is sailing with us, is going on a roadtrip at the end of September (I guess she isn’t as worried about missing school) so that had to be factored into the timing of the cruise. DD insisted that the beginning of the school year would mean that she wouldn’t miss as much work and it would be easier to catch up. Since school started back on September 6th and we leave on September17th, this sailing seemed to work with timing. This is a 7 day roundtrip Vancouver-Alaska sailing, stopping at all the usual ports – Ketchikan, Juneau, and Skagway. There is also a call to Victoria for a few hours on the last evening. This sailing will not take in Glacier Bay, but will call at Endicott Arm. We have been to Alaska so many times that I didn’t even look at the ports – we have literally done them all countless times. Since this is a Royal Class ship, it will not sail the Inside Passage but travel on the outside of Vancouver Island – once again, not a concern as we have sailed both routes a number of times.

Have you checked in your princess.com account that your email isn't suppressed? I'm a TA and haven't been getting anything from Princess - I went in to check and it was all set to "no marketing". I know for sure I never opted out of anything, but maybe it's an automatic thing if you do stuff as a TA. I changed it back and it seemed to stay that way for a few days but then switched back to "no marketing" again when I checked yesterday. Maybe that is why it's saying you aren't eligible? I get that same message (as a TA) when I plug in clients who are on non-eligible ships...

COVID Stuff: I guess we have to discuss the elephant in the room. I have taken three cruises so far this year and felt perfectly safe on all of them. All of them required vaccination (check) and testing (check) but none of them required masks. We chose to wear N95s indoors, and many other passengers did, too. We did everything we normally do on a cruise and, other than the fact that the ships seemed empty (not a bad thing) the cruise itself seemed to be exactly the same. No big difference in service, entertainment, etc. I have been a little nervous reading the reports of so many folks testing positive on Alaskan cruises but willing to risk it. It definitely helps that we live here in Vancouver so don’t need to worry about expensive hotel quarantine or getting stuck and not being able to fly home (this was my MAJOR concern on the previous cruises this year). My reading tells me that nothing has changed in terms of protocols for cruises from Canada so we will be doing a telehealth rapid test on Friday for our sailing on Saturday. For folks who may be interested, we get the free tests from drug stores and pay for the video observation from Azova COVID-19 Testing for WestJet and Swoop Travellers (azova.com) We used this with two of the previous sailings and it was easy, convenient, and accepted! The first sailing we used Switch Health – also no issues but more expensive and they had to send us the test (that was back in February so may have changed now). - Example of free test kit available in BC drugstores, along with video observation via Azova.com

Where our journey will begin..

I will attempt to do a “live from” on our upcoming cruise on Royal Princess. I have read reports of wifi being awful, or CC not cooperating, so can’t promise anything but will post as/when I can. We are still one week from sailing, but since I have already started thinking/obsessing/planning/writing I figured I would get this rolling in the hopes that anyone else sailing might chime in. Our roll call has been pretty quiet, but I know there are a few of us on this sailing! Background: Boring stuff first. On this sailing is myself, DS (11), DD (15) and DD’s BFF (15). Kids and I are seasoned cruisers, with Princess being our go-to line for many years. We are starting to branch out and try other lines these days – partly because the kids want more excitement, and partly because I haven’t been thrilled with the direction Princess has been taking (can we talk app???) This is BFF’s first cruise and I’m a little nervous – she’s a great kid, but she’s a teen…my kids have been cruising since they were babies so know the rules and the expectations. Let’s hope BFF is quick to learn! After booking this cruise, I learned that there are a number of ex coworkers/friends of ours also sailing! Ironically, we all worked together for Princess Cruises back in the day when Princess actually hired their own staff to work shoreside at the ports. Those were the good old days. It’s going to be fun to sail with them – we all booked separately, not realizing that each other was going so this is definitely meant to be! This cruise was a bit of a last-minute thing to use up FCCs before they expired. I had originally booked on Crown for a roundtrip Hawaii sailing in October, but then DD informed me there was NO WAY she would miss 2 weeks of school. After a lot of juggling, searching, and tears, we found this sailing that met all of our requirements so I immediately booked it. We have cruised Alaska more times than I care to remember – one great advantage to where we live in Vancouver is that we can walk to the port (yes, walk) BUT you are also restricted on where those sailings will take you… - Royal Princess docked at Canada Place

Interesting that you should mention this. I have been complaining for a LONG time that I never get anything from Princess - no emails regarding Elite onsale, no promos/offers, nothing in the mail, etc. I have asked reps countless times to check my email address/preferences, etc and been assured all was good their end and that my email must be filtering out Princess stuff. I never even thought to go in and check from my end as I trusted what they were telling me and I KNOW 100% that I had never opted out of anything. Well, when the bidding came about and it was mentioned to make sure you were signed up for marketing emails, I went into my account. Guess what? I was marked as no email, no mail, no calls. I switched it all back and it saved. I went in next day and it was still good. After reading your post, I just went in and checked - all set to no again. What the heck?

Can I ask what you submitted as proof from Princess? I need to submit mine, but not sure what to upload - booking confirmation? Also, where does it show up once added?