Princess v P&O

[wowzz]

14 minutes ago, daiB said:

Princes high to low. P&O low to high. Is what happens and what MT was sayong. As he has said before.

Thank you  - I have to admit I found it difficult to understand MT's post.

Dies that mean that it will always be cheaper to wait until the last minute to book a cruuse with Princess,  irrespective of offers such as free drinks packages,  gratuities included etc?

[terrierjohn]

25 minutes ago, daiB said:

Princes high to low. P&O low to high. Is what happens and what MT was sayong. As he has said before.

It may have been what he meant Dai, but its not what he typed.

[wowzz]

27 minutes ago, terrierjohn said:

It may have been what he meant Dai, but its not what he typed.

Thank you - I wondered why I could not understand the post. 

[billyvegas]

I have done loads of Cruises on Cunard , P&O and Princess. Princess wins every time for me, but not from Southampton, done that once never again.

 

[ann141]

9 hours ago, wowzz said:

Thank you  - I have to admit I found it difficult to understand MT's post.

Dies that mean that it will always be cheaper to wait until the last minute to book a cruuse with Princess,  irrespective of offers such as free drinks packages,  gratuities included etc?

Not always.I booked a Princess Cruise on Black Friday  a couple of years ago for the following year and the price increased and never dropped again and if you like a drink or two it may be more advantageous to wait to see if drinks are included.Its all about supply and demand.There is a Princess cruise for next year that I am considering and the price has dropped by several thousand over the last couple of months.Once more people have been tempted by the low price, the cost will rise.However for the British Isles cruise 8 weeks before the cruise was the cheapest, but that was mainly for inside cabins.

[wowzz]

4 minutes ago, ann141 said:

Not always.I booked a Princess Cruise on Black Friday  a couple of years ago for the following year and the price increased and never dropped again and if you like a drink or two it may be more advantageous to wait to see if drinks are included.Its all about supply and demand.There is a Princess cruise for next year that I am considering and the price has dropped by several thousand over the last couple of months.Once more people have been tempted by the low price, the cost will rise.However for the British Isles cruise 8 weeks before the cruise was the cheapest, but that was mainly for inside cabins.

Thank you. I have only booked one Princess cruise recently, which I had to schedule into a self booked US  multi centre holiday,  so I did not have the option (or the bravery!) to wait to see if prices would drop. 

[ann141]

39 minutes ago, wowzz said:

Thank you. I have only booked one Princess cruise recently, which I had to schedule into a self booked US  multi centre holiday,  so I did not have the option (or the bravery!) to wait to see if prices would drop. 

As I mentioned earlier, Princess have a policy(not widely advertised )that if you book a cruise and the price subsequently falls, you are able (only once) to ask for a price match to the reduced price at a cost of £100.(Some people have said the £100 is per cabin, others per person so I'm not sure which)

[majortom10]

12 hours ago, terrierjohn said:

In my experience over the last 10 years that definitely applies to Princess; but is totally the opposite with P&O certainly with select fares, and so far we have never seen our balcony launch price bettered even by the cheapest saver fares, I cannot speak for inside cabins which are generally the last to sell out.

Yes I agree when I was referring to paying the higher price on brochure release I was referring to Princess and my advice would be to wait until closer to sail date because prices generally drop. P&O have been the opposite where they have released some very good fares on brochure release date.

[majortom10]

1 hour ago, ann141 said:

As I mentioned earlier, Princess have a policy(not widely advertised )that if you book a cruise and the price subsequently falls, you are able (only once) to ask for a price match to the reduced price at a cost of £100.(Some people have said the £100 is per cabin, others per person so I'm not sure which)

In the past if the price dropped from when you booked and you contacted Princess they would automatically refare you like they do in US. I have done this a few times and once they not only reduced my fare to new lower fare they also increased the OBC to the newer offer but unfortunately they seem to have stop doing this and gone down the road of charging £100 like you say this last year or two.

[majortom10]

13 hours ago, majortom10 said:

Dont know where you mean have to pay to receive price drops the only explaination I can think is that if you book early and py high price and then decide to change cruise you have to pay a supplement which is what P&O have done for a number of years if you want to change a cruise. I have been cruising with P&O for 19yrs and Princess for 12yrs. If you book early on brochure release then you will pay higher price and if you hang on until closer to the cruise prices always drop. We have just returned from BI cruise with Princess which was initially on brochure release nearly £2000 for an inside cabin when we booked inly few months prior to sale we got a price of just over £1000pp. Today I have received e-mail from Princess offering free upgrade to balcony cabin for price of an inside from £1399 for BI cruise on Regal next summer when it was first released last year was a lot dearer just for inside cabin. Also last summer we cruised on Sapphire to the Med and paid a lot less when we booked than price on initial release. 

With the above highlighted statement made by me in a previous post I was referring to Princess cruises and NOT P&O which was a misleading statement made by myself which seems to have confused some. P&O on the other hand have this last 2-3yrs to my knowledge have released some excellent prices on brochure release and have never been beaten.

[P&O SUE]

12 hours ago, ann141 said:

Princess usually have some good offers on Black Friday

 

Yes I booked my Princess cruise last year on Black Friday. Inside cabin but only £549 each for 7 nights! Prices for drinks onboard much more expensive than P&O though. I’d been watching the prices for a while and they definitely go down from launch. I like the fact you can choose your cabin too.

Overall I prefer P&O but I can’t book on launch so will probably book another Princess one in the future.

[majortom10]

12 hours ago, wowzz said:

Thank you  - I have to admit I found it difficult to understand MT's post.

Dies that mean that it will always be cheaper to wait until the last minute to book a cruuse with Princess,  irrespective of offers such as free drinks packages,  gratuities included etc?

Princess generally do not offer free drinks packages with them when booking in the UK it is an offer usually for US cruisers and called Sip n Sail. The only time this changed is for a short period earlier this year they offered "free drinks package" for Caribbean cruises only but were very high so really were not a great deal and not really "free" as you were paying for the drinks package in the price.One thing to consider is that drinks are a lot dearer than on P&O even when taking into account larger spirit measures they serve and also they have recently increased the service tax on top of price from 15% to 18%.

Edited September 26, 2019 by majortom10