Chrish2

10 hours ago, Windsurfboy said:

It's about time  someone stood up for P&O.

 

P&O is not a charity. 

 

Cabin Prices have come down in real terms. The Business model, has changed, more profits coming from on-board spend. 

 

P&O drinks prices are reasonable.  They can’t be expected to stock every brand,  but as long as they have an entry brand , a medium brand and a top range whats to complain. 

 

In the old days when they were happy for people to drink their own in cabin, they made a handsome profit on cabin, on board spending was a bonus.

 

I'm sure of you wrote to the right person in P&O and said I'm  happy to pay another £30pp per night if you let me bring own drink for in cabin consumption they'd be very happy. 

 

But those of us who drink in bars and restaurants would not be so happy

How P&O handle situations has become arrogant. If they wanted this change then it should have been well before paid in full dates for the cruise, and ideally a “from 2025” type thing.
 

Instead of treating customers with some respect they pull short notice changes. I’m especially thinking of the customer who emailed P&O only days ago to clarify and was given the existing policy in force at the time. Maleth flights are another example, instead of having a fair policy for those who had reached paid in full they took the “ha ha we have your money now” route (remember some people had already PAID for premium economy due to their height).

This behaviour really runs people the wrong way, new clientele and old clientele alike.

I'm rather miffed about this change. It feels tacky and does not fit into the positioning of line.

Previous years have had a book by and sail by date. This seems just to have a sail by date. I can see how this streamlines the process but makes me wonder what the timings for any renewal will be for next year.

Definitely think the alignment to the calendar year is to do with a contract for the administration via the app. 

Marketing leaflet for the 3rd leg (only) is on first mates site which sort of contradicts what we have heard so far.

Any hints yet of launch price for the three voyages announced? Have a MNVV credit and considering the 5 night one.

Noticed the bar was offering Cruise Monkeys (vloggers) a range of drinks beyond Champagne  https://www.youtube.com/@CruiseMonkeys in their trip a few months ago. They didn't spell it out but I did wonder if the deal had changed at the time. Maybe this is a formalisation of an informal policy.

Receipts are in the app whist onboard. I've always screen shotted these to help keep track. I would assume VV operate an electronic journal and the folio details should be sufficient to recall a given receipt on it. You might have better luck emailing the ship rather than sailor services as they may have easier access to the electronic journal (and accessing it more frequently than a random customer service agent on land).

My understanding is the door must be shut for the AC to operate. To ensure the door is shut the copy says "locked" so there is no mistake, not half closed, not nearly closed "closed and locked" is very clear. I think if you look you can see the magnetic sensor in the door. The whole thing if fine, there should NEVER be a need to operate the AC whilst the door is open given it won't be able to cool/warm the air of the cabin to the target temperature.

Phone up and make sure your cabins are linked under the “celebrate together” promotion. This is better than doing it yourself by adding a contact. After a few days you will see this in the app under “me” > “add-ins”. On your second day onboard you will both get a bottle of bubbles delivered to your rooms. If you already can see this in the app then it’s already done. Check under “messenger” > “contacts”.

Wasn’t circles intended to be a marketing scheme separate from the TA side intended to bring in group bookings? Are TAs creating group bookings to give customers an OBS boost and claiming the free cabin for themselves? 

5 hours ago, CanadianCruiser21 said:

I think there is a huge logistical and cost reason why VV, and every other cruise line, does not bring staff on board just to clean the cabins between sailings. Cleaning between sailings isn’t even an issue they currently have. There are over 1000 crew already on board, and it’s common for cruise ships to repurpose crew members to where they are needed most.

But they do bring staff on during turn around day, or they did last year.

When I was on a back to back in Miami in 2022 they had a sizeable team of day staff that boarded to help clean. They are all dressed in the usual Virgin staff uniform but had masks and lanyards on. They mostly supported with prepping rooms. By the time boarding of new passengers happened later in the day they had mostly disappeared. I assume this is how they can have such a late final disembarkation time.

On 10/1/2023 at 11:26 AM, daiB said:

“On the European front, occupancy came in better than anticipated for Costa and AIDA, with both brands hitting 119 percent occupancy in August. Not to be outdone, P&O Cruises achieved its highest occupancy in over a decade,” said Josh Weinstein, president and CEO, on the company’s third quarter earnings call.

The quote seems a little unclear. Does P&O Cruises have the highest occupancy it has had over the last 10 years for its entire fleet or just for European sailings? Also what time frame is it? Just August? Well that would be easy due to the shift to support more families, it's pure focus on the UK market and school holidays all come into it.

To me it sounds a big positive sound bite but when you dig into it there does not seem to be much substance to understand if this is long term (what about the other 11 months, what if you look at all geo locations.

Lots of people focusing on these comments and assume prices will go up, quality will go down. That’s not quite how I read the comments the new CEO has made. There are a whole world of options they have
 

For example just thinking about Miami departures

* on turn around day they have staff come on board to help with cleaning cabins. If you change your mix of itineraries to have slightly more longer sailings you increase profit per person per night by not having that cost as frequently. Does it diminish the product or lower quality? No

* they current have transfers sorted for rockstars but how many people outside terminal v are making the same identical trip to the airport? Adding paid for ground transport for regular non-rockstars like transfer to the airport would improve the experience for travellers and increase profit 

* likewise they can look at growing how much you book through them. I know they varied their terms earlier in the year permitting them to sell flights and hotels. Whilst TAs can do this VV don’t seem interested yet in that side of things.

* There are some interesting things they could do within the Virgin group to bring UK customers, which the virgin brand (and ship offering) really hits home for, to their sailings. 

I kept an eye on some prices for MNVV in the past for sea terrace. I look at the final price on the summary page just under “Voyage total” and in big red text. This to be is the “true selling price”, it includes all “auto” promotional available to everyone, is inclusive of taxes, and frankly is what mr public currently pays. 

What I spotted was this voyage total slowly increase (might jump a bit more if the sea terrace sells out and you have to take central or xl). Then once high enough they bring in the lock it in rate. This returns the price back to earlier times but with slightly different conditions. Of course on earlier dates can get the pay in full discount. Once the lock it in rates appear there usually is a $300 premium negating the $300 discount MNVV gives.
 

Interestingly when working out prices after the “voyage total” (e.g. 10% sailing club, 10%pay in full, $300 MNVV) I’ve always been charged less than I worked out. I always phone to book as usually doing back to back needing cabin selection or have multiple cabins and wanting them be next to each other. 

They have also been maintaining fare price per night relatively steady. What has changed is how they dish out free promo money. Most of this was originally sailor  loot. At some point they started to make it quasi all inclusive with the free bar tab on every booking. This seems to have stopped the “but no drinks package” feedback and worked well for booking. At the same time they have dialled back sailor loot ($100 Jlo, $50/$50 sail with friends, $200 during red hot booking month etc). The only big sailor loot for new bookings is the MNVV and that’s been boosted to $600 sailor loot. I can’t see that returning back to $300, it doesn’t explain well, and customers are not dumb, they know $300 spent onboard only costs VV cost price of goods.

They cracked something interesting in 2022 with a true no solo supplement but I think it interacted with other offers too well. Subsequent solo offers haven’t been that good but I can see this might be an area they may continue to experiment with. This might well be where they target offers.

Update: maybe what I said was out of date https://www.immihelp.com/carrying-currency-to-from-india-when-traveling-to-india/ suggests 25,000 IRN (around 300 USD) can be exported ... but I really would want to do more research if I was you.

The Indian rupee is a closed currency. You wont be able to buy it outside the country and if you do acquire some when visiting it is strictly illegal to then export any as a non-resident. Definitely worth doing some research, maybe check one of the other boards for cruise lines that visits frequently for info and even consult with a guide book.

Follow the advice of others here and tick the sailors name when you add payment info in the app. Your folio will be merged. If you are still unsure, on first night spend on yours and spend 1 drink on theirs, as soon as the system loads the tab and loot data (usually overnight) you will see if it is working how you want.

One odd thing with this setup, sailor 2 will not see spending in their app, even what they themselves have charged. This is odd and they sometimes do make mistakes. I would prefer it to behave like second card holders on credit cards (can see what they have charged but no grand totals or transactions from primary holder). Also would be useful to opt to allow second card holder to see everything, other lines show onboard account on the tv screen so it isn’t too far fetched to give full visibility.

6 hours ago, DAP2 said:

 

Interesting.  Mine says $235..And it makes no sense. It's not 10% or 5% of my voyage. It doesn't match the taxes or deposit. I can't figure it out and the call center has no idea. 

 

Back in the covid cancellations each person got their own credit and it didn't always split equally between each sailor.

Also if you are computer savi you can get more info about your credits. A request is made to /sw-ext-api/v1/sailors/voyageCredit when you are on the dashboard page ( https://www.virginvoyages.com/accounts/v1/account/dashboard ) and the response for each entry covers the original "amount" and the "amountLeft". If that made no sense to you then it probably is of no use, but if you understood it you will be able to use developer tools to view this info.

Reading between the lines of the file @jon81uk posted in another thread gives an idea of their internal thinking. Namely that VV plan/position themselves in 6 month seasons at a time and Brilliant Lady is billed as "coming soon" for Winter 2024/2025.

With them not billing the 6 month season "Summer 2025" season as "coming soon" you would assume BL's Winter 2024/2025 will launch first before the "Summer 2025" for all ships. Will they do all 4 at the same time? Who knows! It will be the first time they will have so many ships deployed needing bookings.

Hey, is there some sort of spreadsheet showing each ship, date, departure port, disembarkation port etc? Using the search on the virgin website is tiresome.

• Roller blades, roller skates, skateboards, scooters, surfboards, bicycles, and similar items may not be utilized on­board (except  for mobility aids related to special needs)

No wonder with the size of that pool 😂

19 hours ago, cantgetin said:

It is TOTALLY permitted for TAs to buy MNVVs when they cruise and "resell" them to their clients.  In fact, VV encourages this as a marketing tool.  They  are limited in how many they can purchase.  It isn't a gray area or somehow inappropriate, and the same MNVV rules apply as if you had purchased it on board.

Don't get me wrong, I can 100% see each part of VV turning a blind eye/letting it happen: onboard sales will welcome the ability to hit sales targets, TA relations want to help their agents make sales by provide another "pre-made" tool for their disposal, finance are happy with deposits in the bag etc. It however seems, based on the terms,  TAs reselling them is just an afterthought.

Might be fairer to say its a grey area when approached from a UK standpoint; sanctioned commercial use would be address explicit in the terms (or some sort of addendum), partly due to higher consumer protection obligations.

> “The best part is these series of ‘Portsmouth Shorts’ itineraries are just a fraction of the news we have to share. 

> “All I can say is stay tuned for epic news – we’ve got more sailing your way next week, and the new itineraries will be available to book starting Sept. 7.”

On the "epic news" I'm not going to hold my breath given their track record.

1 hour ago, jon81uk said:

What was the agreement when you “bought” the deposit voucher from the TA? Did the TA charge you the deposit value and explain they will put that down as your deposit?

Oh, just noticed the opening line "I bought 2 MNVV certs from a TA". Maybe this is some-one flogging some pre-purchased MNVV certs. For some reason I was thinking this was "I bought 2 MNVV certs onboard". Explains the possible confusion and the TA may be operating in a grey area, still would expect the deposit applied unless special terms was attached to the sale/use of the cert.

Hi @cakewalk73

Work on the assumption this is just an oversight or misunderstand will help you either understand your fare or get it corrected.

For each MNVV voucher you have paid a $300 deposit. When you book you should get that deposit applied as a payment. They should also discount the fare by $300. Ask the TA to explain 1) where the deposit has been applied AND b) where the discount $300 discount has been applied.

Keep in mind the starting price might have been higher than you expect as lock it in rates do not apply.

When I booked using MNVV onboard there was some funky maths involved with the % off offer, solo occupancy and taxes. Unfortunately the booking email from Virgin Voyages don't seem to break down the fare cost sufficiently, unsure if TAs have a more detailed breakdown.