AlibearNS

We were on the Majestic for 14 nights in May and have to agree about the theatre entertainment. I know Princess doesn't do this as well as other lines, but this was dire and I said so on the survey.

I put it down to Covid and staff shortages; maybe it's harder to find good acts right now, but I feel your pain. For us, the Cruise Director & staff at Live were excellent so we went there whenever we could get a seat. Odd layout, took a while to get the hang of it!

Also a vegetarian and I agree about the vegi meatballs. I was so excited to try them and ew!!! Enough said.

Having never sailed Royal Class, I really thought I'd miss the full promenade, and I did a bit, but it wasn't a deal breaker. We also sail Celebrity, and there are things we like/dislike about both lines, but overall we had a fabulous time, loved the ease of the medallion, and we've booked on the Royal in September.

4 hours ago, Adventures ahead said:

Hi Ali!  Hope you got your passports! : ) Drop me a line.

Hey! Yes, they are finally here! Now trying to choose a cruise to celebrate their arrival!

Would help if Princess didn't keep kicking me out of their system!

Seems to be hit and miss these days. Perhaps overloaded by people like me constantly checking itineraries and pricing, ha ha!

I can't get pricing up now. It was working for me an hour ago. It now stalls then kicks me out.

It was doing this a week or so ago as well, on all my browsers, but it's been working okay this week until now.

Really frustrating.

I've also been looking and will check again later. This might be the push I need to book. 

In May, on our 14 day cruise, I wore sandals on the ship during day and evening, and switched to my boots or sneakers when going ashore or for glacier viewing. I mostly wore short sleeved pretty tops at dinner but wished I'd brought my black cardigan along. I didn't bring skirts or a dress this time and mostly wore dark trousers, or pants as called in North America, ones which were good for day or evening use and a posher pair of pants and a sparkly top for formal night. Lightweight sweaters worked as layers under coat and for evening dinners. It was very casual in the MDR, but I like dressing up a bit if I had the time. I never felt out of place. Some days I got to wear my sandals and short sleeved tops around port so definitely bring  some. As usual, I took far too much as we used the laundry more than once.

We sailed 14  days on the Majestic last month, first cruise since 2019. The only thing sub par for us was that the theatre entertainment was absolute pants. Other niggles, as pescatarians they wouldn't allow us to sign up for Chef's Table (they apologized profusely) and that my favorite pina colada soup is now served in a bowl not a glass. I let my thoughts be known, ha ha. We chose to wear masks (many didn't) and it felt good to be cruising again. The crew kept telling us how good it was to have us back. It was a GREAT vacation and we made Elite at the end!
Reading about the issues on the Crown, I feel sad that so many won't have the ports/experience we had. It isn't fair to advertise one thing, knowing you are supplying another, even if it is in the small print that things can be changed.
We wanted to book a Vancouver loop again this fall, to somewhere warmer, but the Crown is doing the loop to California in September (before the dry dock) and the price is way too high to take the risk.
ps The wine pours did seem smaller, unless we were in Vines.

My understanding is any reason means "any" reason.  I've not had to use this option yet, so interested in those that have. Do you actually have to give a reason?

I'd like to know too if anyone has done this and if it was simple. We have an issue that could arise before our cruise in a few weeks time and we took the Platinum cover for the "any reason" cancellation just in case. From reading all the terms I think we're ok, but would love to hear from someone who's actually done this.

Haven't been able to post for ages, trying another browser

Does anyone know the answer? We're on the sailing before, and initially looked into to do a b2b but the Eclipse is disappearing for 6 days before heading to Hawaii. I'm curious???

We're also vegetarians. I asked on the Eclipse recently at breakfast in the MDR and they don't do them. I'm hoping this will change and put it on the survey.

I'm glad this thread was dragged up again because I haven't been on the boards just lately and I just want to say we were on the Eclipse 17th April sailing and LOVED the food in the MDR. We've been telling everybody how good it was. I guess you would call us pescatarians, we mostly eat vegetables dishes and occasionally fish. Now, either we have low standards (and I don't think we do - DH is very fussy) or the problem was with the red meat and chicken, which we don't eat anymore.

We were in anytime dining, and everyone around us seemed  happy with their meals. I never saw anyone complaining.

Please people, don't be put off sailing the Eclipse because of this thread. We had a fabulous cruise, best cruise director ever (Alejandro), best captain ever (Captain Leo), best crew ever, and in our opinion, after 26 cruises, best service & food we've ever had on a cruise!

20 minutes ago, ldubs said:

I hate it when I get a bad attitude on a customer service call.  When I see that happening I usually just hang up and redial.  Just not worth it to me to deal with someone's bad mood.   

I love this! It shall be my strategy in future. At the time I'd been on hold for an agent twenty minutes and I was terrified she was going to hang up on me! Apart from the credit issue, I needed that voyage number.

17 minutes ago, Dani24 said:

Certainly, address the poor customer service experience. Management should know when something wasn't right, so they can investigate and offer retraining or whatever is necessary to prevent it going forward. But with employee turnover, and shifting demands, accept that occasionally you're going to catch someone on the wrong side occasionally, and try not to let it influence you to make big decisions (such as swearing off a cruise line you've loved entirely) for a likely one-off.

I totally agree with everything you say. It was just the one experience after the other that upset me. Companies do need to keep on top of this as yours do, else bad attitude spreads. I've seen that in the workplace. Maybe it was because it was "just an overnighter" and an individual agent having a bad day. Thank you for your comments.

It was 3 days ago I called; to be honest I didn't know about new itinerary's coming out today. Yes, I called between business hours. I guess I could have emailed the issue, but I did that once on another cruise line and never got a reply so I guess that influenced my thinking. Maybe a lobotomy may be more accurate, but not a word I'd like to use. To me, there's a recent sudden change to what I perceived as a trusted brand giving great service to the complete opposite. That's subjective I guess, based on my own experience.

And yes, it was only an overnighter - heard that a lot. But for us it was a last minute booking to celebrate our anniversary. I wanted it to be special.

I read on other social media of people getting rude agents on the phone, wondered if this is now becoming the norm. I hope not, hence my email to guest relations. The agent's attitude on the phone was so bad, it bordered on unbelievable. Whilst on hold, I was also filling in an online form for lost property that required my voyage number which I couldn't find on my card, or paperwork. I explained and asked her (whilst she was getting up my details), if she could tell me what it was. Answer: Captain Circle is NOT for questions like that! Ouch! Later in the call she barked a 3 digit number at me confusing me completely and then said, that was the voyage number I wanted so I guess she decided to give it to me after all. I did say thank you!

Yes, it does seem a little hasty to drop Princess altogether, I'm just wary of booking right now. I do understand how things can go wrong, especially on such a short cruise. Yes, the staff are working hard, but there's just no need to give attitude. It was so unpleasant. I was getting over it, but the phone call just made matters worse. I wondered if anyone else is getting agents with bad attitude?

I love Princess, I really do. 10 wonderful cruises until our last, one-night on the Ruby, Vancouver to Seattle. I accept that things can go wrong, and as pointed out to me more than once by staff onboard, “it’s just an overnighter,” but I truly expected to have the same experience whether on one night, or the much longer cruises we generally do. The Ruby is (was) my favorite ship so perhaps that made things seem worse.

Anyway, this post is not about that, but about the agents’ attitude on the phone afterwards. I rang Captain Circle to ask about a missing cruise credit and how and when it would be applied, and the attitude from the start of the call to the end could only be described as passive aggressive to the point of rudeness. I couldn’t find a dedicated line, the number seemed to be the general one, and she didn’t put me through to anyone, so maybe agents wear all hats? I also noticed on my last few calls that there’s no background noise. Do agents work from home? I have no problem with that, but I do have a problem with lack of people skills and poor training. There was no survey at the end – believe me, I waited for it!

I wasn’t going to complain about the one night cruise, but the agent’s unnecessary rudeness pushed me over the edge so I ended up writing a lengthy email to customer relations about the cruise and rudeness of their staff. This made me feel really uncomfortable, like telling tales on a much-loved sibling for their own benefit. But the truth of it is we have two future cruise credits each, and right now feel disinclined to use them.

Yes, the upgrade fairy is alive and well! We just got a call AND an email titled free upgrade offer and a number to ring asap 😄 Inside 1B to a M1 Club Class for one night cruise leaving in less than a week. Princess contacted us directly then let our travel agent know! YAY!

I entered this contest, but haven't heard anything. Sun&Sea is right, main winner was supposed to be notified March 20th but Princess are often late with announcing winners. There's still a chance, fingers crossed. I was particularly concerned about the sizing required. Many of my photos didn't fit, so I only entered three.

The rules are actually still up and searchable via google. Says "Up to nine hundred ninety-nine (999) verified Entrants’ Photos will be displayed in the corridors of Sponsor’s Sky Princess Cruise Ship."

Once, when going up the stairs to a scheduled Meet and Greet, we passed a large group coming down all complaining grumpily about having to give up their seats to a bunch of Cruise Criticizers...made me smile.

We always buy the Gold Wine Package on cruises 10 nights or more. We were on the Emerald Princess 10 night Vancouver Coastal on the 24th September this year and looked forward to the package again, especially with the demise of BOGO$! On the first night the waiters were confused by our request, knew nothing about it, so went to ask the head waiter. Came back and said it was not offered! I'd heard this can be the case if there aren't enough supplies, but we headed to LA so I hoped perhaps it might be available later into the cruise. We went to reception the next day who told us the wine package was "discontinued." I made sure to ask whether they meant "unavailable on this particular cruise" or discontinued on all the ships. He went into the back office, returned, and said it was being discontinued across the fleet. There were new wines coming, therefore the whole thing was being looked at, to create a new special deal and pricing not yet in place. I asked again if this was like the BOGO$ and he said yes, discontinued like the BOGO$ until something new is in place.

Needless to say this was a HUGE disappointment to us! Later in the week, when we dined at the Crown Grill we had a very knowledgeable waiter who had been with Princess many years. I asked him about it, he confirmed the package had been discontinued because of the new wine list coming in!

I meant to make a thread about it when I got back, but what with the changes on CC, I stopped logging in for a while then forgot. I'd like to know the current situation on other ships? Is it gone?

Just 4! I'm packing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We did this itinerary over Christmas and really loved the Coral. I have to admit the internet was just terrible, worst ever, even when using it in the Internet cafe. I wouldn't let it put you off Princess though as other ships can be much better. I think it was either the Star or the Ruby, where the Internet was really fast for us and I was chatting to family almost every day. It definitely varies per ship.

We have family in Southampton so go there regularly from Heathrow, cruising or otherwise. We always use "English Rose" and have used them four times now. My daughter's company always used them and she recommended. Great price, easy to email, easy to book online. Never had a problem. They'll be there waiting for you. http://englishrosecollection.co.uk/

As others have said, no magnifying mirrors in Princess balcony cabins (wouldn't know about suites). I always have to take mine with me. In fact it's one of the first things I pack so I don't forget. They do have them on HAL and also Aqua class on Celebrity though.

I sent an email to Princess regarding the BOGO issue. They responded and informed that Happy Hours have been discontinued fleet wide and that we can look forward to new and exciting promotions.

It's been gone a while now and we're still looking forward to those new and exciting promotions. Why didn't they wait till they had something in place before cancelling it? Crazy.