Reserve Excursions online before Cruise

[lrockwitt]

I don't remember ever having to pay for excursions reserved on Princess website before our cruise?

When trying to book for our South America cruise, it said if not paid within 24 hours, excursion will cancel?

Usually we have paid for it onboard.

Did I miss something?

 

 

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[Jeter02]

Apparently this has all changed. It depends when your cruise is. I think its if your cruise is after July or August 2017, then Yes, you now have to pay up front for the excursions. My July ship excursions I was able to still just reserve and pay once I get onboard. This made my life easier, as I had OBC to apply towards it.

[lrockwitt]

We too have a lot of OBC to use and were planning to use towards it. We will now have to book when we get on board. That really sucks.

 

 

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[Colo Cruiser]

I don't remember ever having to pay for excursions reserved on Princess website before our cruise?

When trying to book for our South America cruise, it said if not paid within 24 hours, excursion will cancel?

Usually we have paid for it onboard.

Did I miss something?

 

You missed a lot. These are just a few of many.

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2480314&highlight=pay+excursions+in+advance

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2434604&highlight=pay+excursions+in+advance

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2376124&highlight=pay+excursions+in+advance

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2394598&highlight=pay+excursions+in+advance

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2503380&highlight=pay+excursions+in+advance

[Jeter02]

I am so sorry to hear. That's why I when reading other threads, I was slightly nervous, thinking I;d too would have to pay upfront. The Alaskan excursion, are extremely expensive, and that OBC helps break it down and make it somewhat affordable. It would be nice if they could at least apply the OBC automatically to the excursions via online as an option, if we are no longer able to just reserve. Otherwise I too would feel like the things I want to do would book up, and I'd lose out. That was my fear at least. Once again I'm sorry. I hope you are able to get the excursions you would like. Have you tried calling Princess by any chance, to see if there is anything they could do, such as apply the OBC. It can;t hurt to ask,

[likeadisguise]

Certain kinds of OBC can be used if prepayment is required - you'll see it available to use when you go to pay for your tours.

[dianef]

I reserved a tour for Oct and was able to apply obc to book it.

[easyboy]

Apparently this has all changed. It depends when your cruise is. I think its if your cruise is after July or August 2017, then Yes, you now have to pay up front for the excursions. My July ship excursions I was able to still just reserve and pay once I get onboard. This made my life easier, as I had OBC to apply towards it.

 

 

Payment for reservation on shore excursions on the CB this September is still optional. We can still pay onboard.

 

 

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[Astro Flyer]

Based on reading the experiences of other passengers, beginning sometime this Fall (exact implementation date is based on ship & itinerary) all shore excursions will require prepayment either by chargecard or OBC. For my cruise ending in early November it's optional to prepay or to have it added to our onboard account to be offset by available OBC.

[cherylandtk]

We too have a lot of OBC to use and were planning to use towards it. We will now have to book when we get on board. That really sucks.

In case you missed it in the links above, or OBC mention in the last post, you CAN use your OBC to prepay your excursions. Just click through to the payment page and you will see the OBC applied to your reservations.

[lrockwitt]

As someone quoted in an earlier post, I have more OBC than my husband. I don't want to prepay his portion and it is not transferable. I will wait till I am onboard.

 

 

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[likeadisguise]

As someone quoted in an earlier post, I have more OBC than my husband. I don't want to prepay his portion and it is not transferable. I will wait till I am onboard.

 

 

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You can't do it yourself online, but if you call Princess they can use your OBC to pay for your husband's shore excursions.

[indygirl99]

As someone quoted in an earlier post, I have more OBC than my husband. I don't want to prepay his portion and it is not transferable. I will wait till I am onboard.

 

 

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You can call Princess and they will use his OBC to pay for his excursions.

 

Worked for me.

[Mud_Shark]

Didn't work for me, but I think I was one of the first to call and ask that question about applying my additional OBC towards my wife's excursion reservation. They didn't understand, but that was a month and a half ago. It was a foreign concept to the Princess rep so I gave up and paid the money to make the reservation.

 

Glad to hear they are beginning to work the bugs out. Hopefully before too long you can do it yourself online.

 

Don

[RetiredNTraveling]

Okay, for what it's worth!

In the past cruisers, could and would book multiple excursions for the same port while trying to make up their minds. This ended up with an awful lot of excursions being FULL early on! Then once on board, they would make their decisions and cancel the ones that they didn't want. PCL was then left with empty places they had to try and fill.

I feel that we should be responsible for making decisions in a timely manner. After let's be fair, the other cruisers need to have the opportunity to enjoy the cruise also! :eek: Really!

 

Just Mike

[dfields1814]

I have a Oct cruise from Japan to Vietnam. We did not have to prepay to reserve. At least when I reserved our excursions. I did have to prepay for excursions last year on an Alaska cruise.

 

I have a 49 day cruise around South America in 2019. I did a rough estimate on the cost of excursions using todays prices. It was about $3000. That is a lot to prepay. So it looks like I will be looking at independent tours that I can pay for at the time of the excursion. That means Princess is out my $3000. And that is just for two passengers. If just 200 couples out of over 3000 passengers on the Royal do the same Princess would be out over $600,000 (200 * $3000). If I was a Princess executive I would be rethinking this issue. Maybe figure out a way so that people can't book multiple excursion in the same port. And/or maybe a cancellation fee if cancelled within say 2 weeks of sailing.

[klenklen]

Question, if we do pre pay for an excursion and want to cancel on board will we be credited the amount paid. With the new look website the FAQ did not open.

[Astro Flyer]

Question, if we do pre pay for an excursion and want to cancel on board will we be credited the amount paid. With the new look website the FAQ did not open.

I also couldn't access the FAQs (another weekend snafu) but as I recall this was their cancellation policy.

 

Cancelling earlier than 5 days before sailing results in a credit on your chargecard; cancelling later up to about 36 hours before the tour results in an OBC.

[Tina G]

I just registered for excursions for our Japan cruise. I noticed that the symbols for difficulty levels were missing. I use a cane to walk, so this was important information for me. Is this a recent change? Also, there used to be a way of signing up for a waiting list for sold out excursions, but this is gone, too. Is this new?

[Astro Flyer]

I just registered for excursions for our Japan cruise. I noticed that the symbols for difficulty levels were missing. I use a cane to walk, so this was important information for me. Is this a recent change? Also, there used to be a way of signing up for a waiting list for sold out excursions, but this is gone, too. Is this new?

 

The tour videos have also been eliminated for my cruise & like your experience we don't yet know if those are permanent changes or are temporary as website changes are being made.

[caribill]

Okay, for what it's worth!

In the past cruisers, could and would book multiple excursions for the same port while trying to make up their minds. This ended up with an awful lot of excursions being FULL early on! Then once on board, they would make their decisions and cancel the ones that they didn't want. PCL was then left with empty places they had to try and fill.

 

That has been hard to do for a couple of years.

 

 

When you book excursions, it is by passenger's name. It used to just be by number of places you wanted on an excursion.

 

Also, it will not let you book the same passenger name on two excursions that are at the same time.

[jennybenny]

I don't remember ever having to pay for excursions reserved on Princess website before our cruise?

When trying to book for our South America cruise, it said if not paid within 24 hours, excursion will cancel?

Usually we have paid for it onboard.

Did I miss something?

 

 

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Crappy new policy

 

It probably makes it easier for the cruise line, but I don't like it.

We will wait until final payment to pay for excursions, if there is money for them. lol

Just hope the ones we want are still available

[Grego]

Okay, for what it's worth!

In the past cruisers, could and would book multiple excursions for the same port while trying to make up their minds. This ended up with an awful lot of excursions being FULL early on! Then once on board, they would make their decisions and cancel the ones that they didn't want. PCL was then left with empty places they had to try and fill.

I feel that we should be responsible for making decisions in a timely manner. After let's be fair, the other cruisers need to have the opportunity to enjoy the cruise also! :eek: Really!

 

Just Mike

 

 

I believe that you'll find that this is the underlying reason for the policy.

[lrockwitt]

Too bad that others have made it difficult for us that do not do that.

I like to choose my excursions carefully and do my research. I do not like paying for excursions so far out.

 

 

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[caribill]

I believe that you'll find that this is the underlying reason for the policy.

 

In my mind the two main reasons are:

 

a) Most (if not all) of the other cruise lines make you pay when reserving shore excursions. No reason why Princess has to be special anymore.

 

b) Some other cruise lines have found that psychologically if you pay (not use OBC) for shore excursions on board you know you may have a big on-board bill and try not to increase what you owe by much additional on-board spending. But if you have pre-paid for the excursions, additional on-board spending does not result in a huge amount owed at the end of the cruise, so you do spend more this way.