molecrochip

Any non-motorised/non electric aid is allowed in a standard cabin as long as you can move it into the cabin and it doesn’t hamper escape. If you need such aid, report it for completeness. Additionally, if you have a medical condition/issue which would need assistance in an emergency, or cause you difficultly or significant extra time reaching your muster station, then I would mention.

I don’t know, but would expect it to follow the onboard concept.

No news. Not so much about changing the Ts and Cs but actually changing the systems behind the cruise personaliser to allow it to take place.

Like I say, no guarantee until announced but smart money appears to be here. Some consider them to have the most cost effective premium cabin in the sky. Aviation has been shook up and some leisure routes are flying completely full in economy and premium but struggling to sell lots of business seats. It’s been suggested that Virgin are interested in taking a stake in Norse as they need more leisure seats and this could be an easy way of getting cheap/quick access to high load leisure configurations without having to change the config of their existing planes.

Not saying done deal but will leave this link here: https://travelweekly.co.uk/news/air/norse-atlantic-attracts-charter-interest-after-antarctica-flight There has also been interest, suspected to be Virgin, to aquire a significant interest.

Just wanted to update, I've heard from various separate sources now that Maleth will be operating their last long haul flight for P&O on 22 March, and won't be back in the Autumn.

The Manchester Maleth flight has been delayed by 4hrs. That delay has been incurred since arriving at Manchester this morning.

Firstly, I do have sympathy with the poster. It is not a good way to start your holiday. Can you prove P&O knew? If Maleth told them that yesterday when it was updated on Gatwick's website then there was little they could do - especially if, as I suspect, its correct about Swissport not being able to move check-in time. Communication of problems from Maleth to P&O seems to be a specific issue. To be fair, you could have been on Tui today and if that flight was delayed 6 hours, the airport experience would not have been much different. Been there, experienced that. I don't believe the March date is correct. Travel Weekly reported that Maleth was announced within days of the contract being signed. Maleth is relatively new, especially in the passenger market. It seems one of their bigger issues is recruiting cabin crew. The courts have already determined that package holidays or plane operators, have to provide a service from A-B as broadly specified to meet their contract. Food & drink, TVs, enhanced classes are all nice to have but do not form part of the contractual service. Flights from London can also mean any Gatwick or Heathrow. The booking usually states a flight on a specific day rather than a specific time as airlines often change the times of their flights. That will likely be the P&O staff member from the Southampton office on duty. And lets say that that is correct. The two options were take a newish charter operator with limited contingency plans, or cancel lots of holidays. Hang on... this is just American corporation bashing without basis. P&O is not eyed as a bottom of the company cruise line. It has significant attention and support from the corporation, and those in Carnival UK actually lead and influence in lots of areas of corporation policy. Cunard is led as part of Carnival UK by the same bloke as P&O. America is the biggest cruise market in the world so it makes sense that the Corporation has a big focus here however P&O along with Aida , Costa, P&O Australia and Carnival are region specific cruise lines focusing primarily on local custom. P&O is 98% British customers and doesn't routinely advertise outside of the UK. Cunard has key markets in the UK, US, Japan, Germany and Australia and advertises in all of them. Every brand has to evolve to meet the changing needs of its audience. If you like the P&O of old then maybe Princess or Saga is a better fit. P&O has evolved to continue to be the first choice cruise line in the UK for UK passengers. Finally, you say on "the cheap", if Maleth were the only option, its unlikely they were cheap, as that position commands a premium.

There are so few single balcony cabins you may stand a chance if the ship is not at capacity and people booked into that category don’t want twin balcony upgrades.

Are you looking in the website? As the actual ‘direct’ upgrade price will be based on prices on the day you booked.

With P&O, you a given a time that boarding begins for you. Irrespective of anybody else, this is the time that you can check-in and board. If you arrive an hour early, boarding is not open for you. Please go back into Southampton or join this arbitrary queue until your boarding window opens. This is exactly the same as when BA prints boarding group 6 on your boarding pass or app. Just because groups 1-3 are boarding along with priority passengers, doesn’t mean that you can board because your preference is not to wait.

It’s not a case of better, it’s a case of different. P&O/Cunard offer early check in as a perk otherwise it’s a case of allocated time. In Europe, terminal design generally follows airports. Checkin first then security. I know it’s different in the US. The two which have security first are the newest one, and one that was retrofitted that way. They sometimes queue out the door to get into security. That’s also common in the US.

Firstly, yes, airports do this. I’ve arrived at Heathrow before to be told that due to being really full of passengers, you could only enter the terminal at 3hrs before your flight. We had to wait in the car park. Anyhow, you had an airport arrival time of 4hrs-90min before departure and are happy to play the game. On a cruise, you’re given an arrival time of say 3pm for a 5pm ship departure, or to put it in the same terms as above, 2hrs - 30 mins before departure and this is a problem? This is not actually about being made to wait outside, this is about not liking being told what time you can check-in, and wanting to arrive early. Lets be clear, if everyone sticks to their allocated arrival time, nobody waits in a queue. I know that some people arrive the day before or set out early. If you don’t want to wait around Westquay or more generally, if you don’t want to be part of that boarding allocation ‘lottery’ then pay for a cabin with priority boarding at 12:30 onwards. It’s a perk, not a right. The queueing system is ensuring that perk is retained.

No terminal is designed for everyone turning up at once. Heathrow terminal 5 would grind to a halt if an entire days passengers all turned up at 8am. Thats why cruise ship boarding times are issued, and airlines have a check-in opening time for each service.

It’s the port being strict. The reason for being strict is that with the bigger ships, the terminal was becoming overcrowded. That's a health and safety issue hence early arrives being made to wait.

If not saying it won’t every happen if a ship has loads of cabins left, but it won’t happen as often. What’s more important, 100% capacity at lower prices or 95% capacity at higher prices. The answer is whatever draws the most money (including on board purchases) and it’s usually the later. This is a pivot on the strategy of trying to expand the pool of passengers who travel with P&O at any cost!

Paul Ludlow has publicly said this was going to happen. Prices would go back to a buy at launch mentality/don’t expect late mega-deals and this board rubbished the suggestion as trying to drum up business. Additionally Carnival said that across the Corporation, 75% of all inventory for 2024 was already sold by mid-December 2023, and at average higher prices than for 2023. Also we’ve had two and a half years of pushing the big ships to a new audience. The three together removes the need for slashing prices just to fill ships.

P&Os stats say that they carry 95% British guests. You may know that the Carnival family have their brand focused on German passengers, Aida. Aida carries 98% German passengers. Don’t’ let the stats put you off as all are made very welcome whatever nationality.

This is a fair summary of what will happen. An earlier decision may be taken if the situation worsens. I do not believe 2 or 4 will happen as ship needs to return to the UK. If it’s not safe enough to sail with passengers, then it won’t be safe enough to transit the ship with just crew.

Maybe I’m Olly Smith…. ….. I’m not!

Yes, turn off data roaming, in fact put your phone on flight mode. It’s not an app, just a website you access from the ship’s WiFi. Finally, you don’t need to buy a wifi internet package. It’s a free site to use. Have a great holiday.

Maleth was a one year contract…. They have not excelled themselves with delivering the basic elements of the contract, therefore I don’t expect them to be back. It’s believed Norse, BA and Virgin are in the frame for next winter. BA and Virgin have new plane capacity being delivered during the year. Norse have spare capacity.

They Tui planes were filled first as they were arranged first…. that means those who booked first got Tui. No science here. A change.org petition never gets a Parliamentary debate. You need to use the official petitions website to get that. Along the way, those petitions are vetted for matters government can actually intervene on. As this is a commercial matter, the government can’t intervene and would close the petition anyhow….. probably why it’s on change.org in the first place!

It’s about 50:50 depending upon maintenance, drills and other ships in port.

There’s been a mistake on this group somewhere along the way. The letter I saw clearly showed Vigo being swapped from first til last, not Cadiz.