Steelers36

Recent reports and experience indicate they are now opening up as early as 59 days prior to sail date. Could be less though, but you can certainly start checking as far out as 59.

Which ship & date? I know it can vary, but I only see >= 11:00am for Regal in Rome. (I will be there well before 11am, however).

Here is my experience this morning. First stop was AA.COM. AA was offering me to select seats, but the link threw me over to BA website and seat selection page. (I have seen this before). If I then go to select any Business seat, there is a price from low $100's up thru $147. I presume USD since AA-codeshare. Next, I logged in to BA website and accessed my flight. Again (being ticketed now), I was allowed to select seats. However, it was the same page AA.COM sent me to and when I accessed seat plan, same fees. It is only free - apparently - to higher end Avios members and at check-in. Now, I can't sit here and complain much because I had certainly read about folks facing seat selection fees, even in Business Class. That said, I thought booking BA as an AA-codeshare might be a workaround. I will try calling and see what I am told, but I do not hold out much hope. This has to be a rarity - getting charged hefty seat selection fees when booking Business. So, do not need to be told to avoid BA. I knew that and was avoiding them, but the airfare we have is incredible low and even if I fork out another $280 or so for seats, it is still a bargain. IDK how many folks will be selecting seats ahead of time as it would be nice to get window seats. One good thing is this flight has the brand new BA Club Suite seating which recently changed from the old Club World seats. It still rubs me the wrong way, however, as BA seems an outlier. So, yes, I knew the risk and went ahead with the flight since the price was just not to be beat by a mile. Just sharing the experience and will report again if I have any success with phone reps at either AA or BA.

You can wait until on board or pre-book using DMW.

Just read where someone else on same voyage did the Arrival Group on Aug 2 (59 days out).

Yes, but I figure if I could explain how the game works, or what it takes to win, it would seem like I was a smart player. LOL.

Gotcha, except I order the starter water pkg for $7 and that gives us 12 bottles to work with and refill. I end up leaving one behind now and then and don't like to refill each one a ton of times.

Hard to say, but it is a sense I get from some anecdotal reports. I would say it is quite possible ours could have been 59 days out also as I had not checked today until this evening and did not check yesterday at all. Aug 2 would be 59 days out, so likely then (I didn't check that day either - I think Aug 1 was the last time I checked). Glad to have Group A 11:00am just in the unlikely case where it does matter. Now we can show up as early as we want.

I noticed this evening that Arrival Groups had opened up for Regal Oct 01. I have not been checking daily, so I cannot say the exact day it opened, but it had to be just inside the 60 day mark. Maybe it's going to be getting earlier now than in the past. Anyway, it worked and I grabbed Early A. Now my MC App "home page" has the big green box with the QR Code. Looking good. I was thinking it might happen around this timing, but had not checked the past couple of days.

There have been some threads in recent past concerning that fact that Princess has been delaying paying the airlines and not ticketing at the 45 day mark - sometimes waiting until less than a month to go. I had suggested I was going to request early ticketing after FP Date. For our outbound flights on AF, either I missed they were already just ticketed just prior to 60 day mark, or they were done within a day of my request. Earlier this week, I requested ticketing (at just under 90 days) for the return flights BA+AA codeshare on BA and our file was ticketed in 24 - 36 hrs I would say. So, that is pretty fast considering Princess seemed to be dragging out the ticketing. At least they still react promptly to specific requests. I did both requests on the EZ-Air page within Cruise Personalizer. We are flying in Business both ways on all segments. However, as many know, you don't get to select seats all the time on BA. Our flight from FCO to LHR is BA-operated and ticketed and for that Eurozone flight, I had been able to select seats at booking time (and each time I re-fared). However, the BA-operated/AA-codeshare flight from LHR to YYZ has never allowed seat selection. From reading other accounts, it appeared needed to be ticketed first. Also, some folks have run into having to pay BA for a seat, so I went with the AA codeshare on the Transatlantic leg (it was cheaper as well). Now that we are ticketed, nothing has changed on EZ-Air page - still cannot select a seat. I hope I have better luck with AA or BA. Will be trying that next and can report back my experience. Hoping I do not have to wait until check-in time. I have seats selected on AF from the get-go thru EZ-Air. The pricing for both directions was never going to improve, so I decided to get ticketed and not be waiting on Princess.

I don't play what used to be the one-armed-bandits. Like you, they look complex to me and I don't have a clue how to play them - something like a kids video game. Oooooo.... showing my age here for sure. That said, a machine that plays BJ or Poker I do understand.

Are you on my cruise? You can give one of your coffee packages to my wife. Actually, I will trade you half of our mini-bar for one coffee pkg. 😉

I certainly agree there are devotees for both SR's and the OP is just going to get that feedback. My suggestion to @PumpkinPatches is to take the free night in the CG and then book another night in Sabi's that they will pay for. This way, they try both for a great overall price and they can decide what to do in future. Why did I suggest it this way? Well, and this does speak to your "Edit" line, the CG cover charge is $29/pp and Sabi's cover charge is $25/pp.

Interesting. The Plus is $250 above Standard/Base - which is as expected. But the Premier is $185 over Plus which is more than one would expect (+$125 is what I would expect).

What they said (prev post). It would have been better for me to say "and not liquor".

Have you tried the steps in Post #90? Also, ignore and do not attempt to Link a Booking!!!

Again, do not attempt to Link a Booking. IDK why this "feature" is there, but it is a rabbit hole at the least.

https://oceanready-personalinfo-ui.prod.ocean.com/ Choose ENGLISH. Scroll down past userid/pswd to "Use Booking Number" in blue. Click on that. Type in First Name, Last Name, Booking Number (6-alphanumerics), Birthdate. Click on "Login with Booking Number". You should be in now.

Yes, I have found that a small amount of wine brought back to the ship doesn't get any reaction from security. Often there isn't someone nearby at an alcohol table either. I really do think they are more looking for alcohol than wine and they would also know the corkage fee is chargeable when taken to a DR. I just go along and if I get charged corkage I know it is expected and if I don't, it's an unexpected delight.

I have found that at times my waiter doesn't charge me for every new bottle I bring.

True but the port security is checking the carry-on. Princess scans every bag going onto the ship and will find bottles. If I were to leave a bottle in a checked bag for some reason, I would tape a note on it explaining I realize this is unusual and am prepared to pay a corkage fee and that it is wine and not alcohol.

Call in to the CVP line and ask for someone else. This guy is a loser for sure. ETA: In the meantime, if you intend to book direct with Princess, do yourself a favor and book those cabins on Princess.com and put on a Courtesy Hold for 3 days.

Seems odd to exceed $25/pp/day.

Okay, that is what I suspected. When you link to the web version of the MC App, DO NOT attempt to link a booking. Just login with Booking Number/Name/Birthdate and you should be okay.

Sounds more useless than a Trivia Session prize.