New to P&O-Question

[ledodeck01]

I live in Canada and am interested in booking P&O. Reading their website, I see that there are 2 prices: One a early saver price and second a much higher price. With the higher price (select), you can choose your own cabin and get first choice for dinning. The difference is often over 200 pounds ($300 Canadian)- a fairly substantial amount. Never encountered this before.

My wife & I are diabetic and being bumped to a late dining time would not be healthy for us

 

I would like to know your experience. Do most people book select?.

[wowzz]

Not only do you get choice of cabin and dining preference, there are often other perks, such as increased obc, and free parking at the port. (Not much help to you, as I do not imagine you are considering driving from Canada !)

Personally, I consider it worthwhile to pay the extra, to ensure I get the cabin I want, and to make sure I get 'anytime' dining - 18:30 is too early and 20:30 is too late.

 

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[Morgans]

Also free shuttles with select. OBC can be fairly substantial at times too.

[the english lady]

I live in Canada and am interested in booking P&O. Reading their website, I see that there are 2 prices: One a early saver price and second a much higher price. With the higher price (select), you can choose your own cabin and get first choice for dinning. The difference is often over 200 pounds ($300 Canadian)- a fairly substantial amount. Never encountered this before.

My wife & I are diabetic and being bumped to a late dining time would not be healthy for us

 

I would like to know your experience. Do most people book select?.

 

There are actually 3 prices...select ,which has all the bells and whistles, early saver, which personally to me does not seem worth it, you can chose the category of cabin, but not the actual. You have 2nd dibs for dining, after select have theirs. Finally you have saver fares which may or may not come in closer to sail date..Much cheaper but you can only specify a type..inside, outside etc. No choice of dining.

What do people book...depends if you cannot get away except at short notice then you may always book saver fares, and if dining does not suit try and amend it onboard.

I have a feeling a lot of (late)saver fares are given freedom dining. As to what you end up with on an early saver fare...early sitting seems to be popular at the moment, so select would probably get most of them. Late sitting has some devotees ,us included.

If you must have a particular dining time I would go for select fare to guarantee it.

You can TRY and change what you have been allocated once onboard if you went for a saver type fare and did not like what you were given. However it cannot be guaranteed that they could change you..

It is up to you. Book a select fare and a lot of people may pay a lot less than you for their cruise. Equally they may have a dining option they are not happy with and it is not possible to change, and/or a cabin in a very undesirable location.

Pay what you feel happy with ,but it is clear what you don't get with the cheaper fares.

[Castaway24]

Don't forget that the buffet is open at all times so if you do go for early saver/saver and don't like your dining time there is always somewhere to go for a 'snack' especially with your diabetes. We've only ever booked saver and had no problems with our cabins and even go upgraded twice. It all depends on how much control you like to have and how much you're willing to 'give it a go'. We also changed our dining time too once on board from early to late sitting, they will try to accommodate where they can. Staff on P&O are good, especially the senior ones. Enjoy P&O. Which ship are you thinking of booking?

 

 

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[danielundecided]

If you book a select fare you're first in the queue for upgrades. For us the select fare always works out cheaper because of the coach transfers - depending on the length of your cruise the OBC may make up a fair bit of the difference between the select and saver fare.

 

Dan

 

 

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[mandylennon]

We book select fare because we like to select a cabin that suits us.

 

What is usually offered is the choice of extra on board credit/car parking or coach transfer. This may be suitable for you if you are flying to the UK you may be able to get free coach from the airport to the port.

 

Port shuttle transfers are included in select fares and can cost around £3 per person, so if there are a lot of ports on your particular cruise, you will not pay extra for the transfers.

 

As has been said you get to choose your preferred eating time, either freedom which is basically anytime, early evening or late evening.

 

But basically you won't know what the complete advantages are available to you yourselves until you call to enquire/book.

[danielundecided]

We book select fare because we like to select a cabin that suits us.

 

 

 

What is usually offered is the choice of extra on board credit/car parking or coach transfer. This may be suitable for you if you are flying to the UK you may be able to get free coach from the airport to the port.

 

 

 

Port shuttle transfers are included in select fares and can cost around £3 per person, so if there are a lot of ports on your particular cruise, you will not pay extra for the transfers.

 

 

 

As has been said you get to choose your preferred eating time, either freedom which is basically anytime, early evening or late evening.

 

 

 

But basically you won't know what the complete advantages are available to you yourselves until you call to enquire/book.

 

 

Expanding on what Mandy said you could fly to London, spend a few days there, and you would get a free coach transfer to and from Southampton from London.

 

In addition some cabins can be very undesirable ie. under/over a theatre, nightclub etc. or some obstructed views are better than others so I do think it is worth it knowing what cabin you're in and having the choice when you book.

 

Dan

 

 

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Edited October 28, 2016 by danielundecided

[ledodeck01]

Don't forget that the buffet is open at all times so if you do go for early saver/saver and don't like your dining time there is always somewhere to go for a 'snack' especially with your diabetes. We've only ever booked saver and had no problems with our cabins and even go upgraded twice. It all depends on how much control you like to have and how much you're willing to 'give it a go'. We also changed our dining time too once on board from early to late sitting, they will try to accommodate where they can. Staff on P&O are good, especially the senior ones. Enjoy P&O. Which ship are you thinking of booking?

 

 

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I really would like to see Iceland- here is a cruise available on the Azura next June that includes some of Norway as well.. I will be asking for feedback on the ship and cruise on another thread later. I certainly appreciate all your feedback.

[Castaway24]

A friend of mine only ever cruises with P&O and she loves Azura.

 

 

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[Gillypat]

Azura is wonderful and if you choose a balcony go for C deck they are huge!!

[mickey89]

Contrary to some opinion, Early Saver fare (when offered) is an excellent deal especially if the cruise is in the Caribbean. The difference to the Select choice is only dining time and cabin number as shuttles are unnecessary in the caribbean.

 

We saved £800 by choosing the Early Saver and were able to select the cabin grade which allowed us too avoid many of the cabin location problems. We used the saving to book the specialty dining restaurants for every night of the cruise and still was cheaper than the Select Fare.

 

Do the maths and choose the best fare that suits your situation.

[Presto2]

I live in Canada and am interested in booking P&O. Reading their website, I see that there are 2 prices: One a early saver price and second a much higher price. With the higher price (select), you can choose your own cabin and get first choice for dinning. The difference is often over 200 pounds ($300 Canadian)- a fairly substantial amount. Never encountered this before.

My wife & I are diabetic and being bumped to a late dining time would not be healthy for us

 

I would like to know your experience. Do most people book select?.

 

We always book Select as we have to cruise in school holidays and the ships seem to be pretty full by then - no chance of an upgrade. We want to make sure that we have the cabin we want so no disappointments and the freedom dining we want. It all depends what time you want to sail --- I guess that if you are way out of school holidays that there is a massive difference. :)

[Josy1953]

We always book the select fare because as others have said there is usually free car parking or coach to the port and extra on board credit. We have also found that booking the select fare early often works out less than than waiting and booking a saver fare ( our cruise next month is now £500 pp more for the saver fare than we paid for the select fare when we booked in February and we have free coach to the port, on board credit, our preferred cabin and dining time ). Only you can decide what is important to you but the old saying " you get what you pay for " is often true.