Ability to Self Disembark?

[halfapair]

We will be on the December 27th sailing of the Crown, a 10-Day Caribbean itinerary. We get back into port on Monday, January 6th at 7:00am, and we have an 11:00 am flight out of Fort Lauderdale Airport.

Will we be able to self disembark and carry our own luggage off the ship?  We did that a few years ago on a Royal Caribbean cruise. Does Princess allow that?

[Guest arowe6]

Yes you can. Self disembark is typically the first group off. 
 

Enjoy your cruise!

 

Andrew 🙂

Edited December 23, 2019 by arowe6

[Cruise Raider]

Ask early in the cruise just to make sure you get in one of the first walk off groups.  At times, we've been told they are completely full.  Now, we always go to guest services early in the cruise just to be sure we can disembark at our desired time.  If I don't have an early flight ... it makes no difference to me, though.  

[halfapair]

Thank you. We will take your advice and ask early in the cruise if we can disembark in the first group.

[paul929207]

As long as you can carry all your luggage it is not  a problem

[voljeep]

and have a free hand if you use the escalator at PE/FLL

[kywildcatfanone]

Yes, no issues at all.  11am flight is easy, you don't have to rush off or anything.

[skynight]

As other have mentioned, yes. But, go to Passenger services early on in the cruise and request early walk off. Remember you have to retain all your luggage in your cabin on the last evening, do not place it in the hall for pick up. 

[halfapair]

Yes, we travel light. We each have 1 piece of wheeled luggage, and one backpack/carry on.

[Steelers36]

35 minutes ago, halfapair said:

Thank you. We will take your advice and ask early in the cruise if we can disembark in the first group.

You can self-disembark anytime you like after they are cleared and ready to go.  I wouldn't worry about dashing off at 7:01am.  You have TONS of time to make an 11:00am flight @ FLL.  We have never had an issue walking off early, mid, late - whatever suits us.  We usually hang around the Piazza and relax and head off whenever there is a break in the line.

 

Princess distributes a disembarkation form EARLY in the cruise.  You fill that out and leave with Stewart or you can drop it off at the PSD (Passenger Services Desk) yourself.  Until they start getting those forms, no one is assigned a time.  Just indicate your flight and what you want on that form.

[kywildcatfanone]

20 minutes ago, halfapair said:

Yes, we travel light. We each have 1 piece of wheeled luggage, and one backpack/carry on.

You can wait till 9am or later in that scenario.

 

Our upcoming flight is at 11:30, and we will have checked bags, but I'm not planning to leave the ship till 8:30 or 9. 

[skynight]

4 minutes ago, steelers36 said:

You can self-disembark anytime you like after they are cleared and ready to go.  I wouldn't worry about dashing off at 7:01am.  You have TONS of time to make an 11:00am flight @ FLL.  We have never had an issue walking off early, mid, late - whatever suits us.  We usually hang around the Piazza and relax and head off whenever there is a break in the line.

 

Princess distributes a disembarkation form EARLY in the cruise.  You fill that out and leave with Stewart or you can drop it off at the PSD (Passenger Services Desk) yourself.  Until they start getting those forms, no one is assigned a time.  Just indicate your flight and what you want on that form.

I want to mention that on our August 2019 Caribbean Princess cruise there were no disembarkation request forms. We went to Passenger Services to find out what was going on and had to request our disembarkation time there. I don't know if this was a test, a change or what it was, but we did not like it and made that clear to Passenger Services and on the post cruise survey.

So for the OP watch out for this.

[leck57]

18 minutes ago, steelers36 said:

You can self-disembark anytime you like after they are cleared and ready to go.  I wouldn't worry about dashing off at 7:01am. 

 

Not entirely correct in my experience. We always self disembark but have to select a time and we can't just go when we feel like it. We were on the Ruby two weeks ago and we had a choice of 3 time windows which we could nominate to disembark and you were left  a ticket in the cabin. I doubt if they would have stopped you had you got to the gangway earlier than your time but in order to avoid disembarkation chaos I am happy to follow the instructions given to you prior to disembarkation day.

[riffatsea]

Self Disembark is not first unless you have status on Princess or are in a suite.

Folks in those categories are let off the ship first to self disembark.

We made the mistake of waiting when we could have been off in that group and the line for immigration/customs was horrible!! We will never hang out and get off after that first group!

[fredflint]

We have done self disembark on Royal and NCL they may have forms and passes etc but if I recall they never really check anything.  Does Princess actually check something?

[Steelers36]

3 hours ago, fredflint said:

We have done self disembark on Royal and NCL they may have forms and passes etc but if I recall they never really check anything.  Does Princess actually check something?

Not that I have ever seen or encountered (at the gangway). 

 

What they may do is check if passengers entering the various disembarkation lounges around the ship have a matching color/number code, but we never go to those.

Edited December 24, 2019 by steelers36

[Steelers36]

5 hours ago, leck57 said:

 

Not entirely correct in my experience. We always self disembark but have to select a time and we can't just go when we feel like it. We were on the Ruby two weeks ago and we had a choice of 3 time windows which we could nominate to disembark and you were left  a ticket in the cabin. I doubt if they would have stopped you had you got to the gangway earlier than your time but in order to avoid disembarkation chaos I am happy to follow the instructions given to you prior to disembarkation day.

They may or may not have different times.  I have been on ships where there were walk-off times at the beginning and middle of disembarkation schedule.  I have been on where it is only early.  We rarely are looking to get off among the earliest times, so we just take our time in the morning (making sure Stewart has cabin access) and get off when we are ready to.  There is no problem with that if taking care of self.  If bags are being left out for the ship to handle and setup in the terminal, then obviously the timing of that has to be coordinated with when you want to disembark.  But if walking off with luggage, it really doesn't matter.  We have Global Entry, so so too concerned with a line downstairs.  We and our friends have never had a problem getting a suitable time slot.  Last time when I filled out the form for the time we wanted and I also indicated self-handle bags, they still left us tags for the time-slot, but we didn't need them.

 

[kywildcatfanone]

10 hours ago, fredflint said:

We have done self disembark on Royal and NCL they may have forms and passes etc but if I recall they never really check anything.  Does Princess actually check something?

No.  You get your self walk off, but leave when you are ready.

[PaperSniper4]

13 hours ago, steelers36 said:

............Princess distributes a disembarkation form EARLY in the cruise.  You fill that out and leave with Stewart or you can drop it off at the PSD (Passenger Services Desk) yourself.  Until they start getting those forms, no one is assigned a time.  Just indicate your flight and what you want on that form.

 

"Early" is no exaggeration! On our cruise last month those disembarkation materials were in our cabin the second night of our ten day cruise. This was basically a form asking what time our flight departed FLL/MIA.   However, nothing about EZ-Check, which we always use if available.  Two days later, or seven days before we returned to Port Everglades, I decided to stop at the Purser's office and ask about where where I could get an EZ-Check form. The person on duty told me the deadline for turning the forms in had passed! We were told the form ought to have been put in our cabin along with the other disembarkation info earlier. There had been some sort of a mix up; partially my fault I suppose as I ought to have asked earlier. Anyway, Princess came through for us, and we were able to use EZ-Check. I made sure that person received a BZ in our post cruise survey.

 

Lesson learned? If something is important to you, like when can I self-disembark? when will I receive an EZ-Check form? - ASK EARLY!😎

[skynight]

12 hours ago, riffatsea said:

Self Disembark is not first unless you have status on Princess or are in a suite.

Folks in those categories are let off the ship first to self disembark.

We made the mistake of waiting when we could have been off in that group and the line for immigration/customs was horrible!! We will never hang out and get off after that first group!

Not our experience. Princess assigns all early walk offs in groups to avoid a backup at immigration. The groups walk off about 15 minutes apart when immigration is normally staffed. Groups are mixed in terms of loyalty status. Any passenger can go to passenger services and select to be in the first group. Generally you will be accommodated.

[kywildcatfanone]

7 minutes ago, skynight said:

Not our experience. Princess assigns all early walk offs in groups to avoid a backup at immigration. The groups walk off about 15 minutes apart when immigration is normally staffed. Groups are mixed in terms of loyalty status. Any passenger can go to passenger services and select to be in the first group. Generally you will be accommodated.

Yep.  Never seen status get disembarkation earlier.  There is a priority lounge to sit in, but that is all I've seen.

[geoherb]

I disembarked from the Caribbean Princess last week. It surprised me that they don't use the disembarkation forms. They just assigned people to the groups. The people waiting in the priority lounge get a head start over the people waiting in the designated areas for their colors/numbers.

 

On a previous cruise, I noticed someone who snuck off the ship before they called her color and number. Her luggage was not there yet. She was having a fit.

[kywildcatfanone]

Just got form for this week.  Walkoff is anytime from 6:30-9am.  Whenever you are ready.

[lstone19]

46 minutes ago, kywildcatfanone said:

Yep.  Never seen status get disembarkation earlier.  There is a priority lounge to sit in, but that is all I've seen.

 

We were on the 10/31 NYC-FLL positioning cruise on Regal Princess. I was surprised when we headed to the Platinum/Elite disembarkation lounge a few minutes before 8:00 to be told that all groups (at least if you were P/E) could disembark immediately (our time was still 15 minutes away). Immediately did so to find an empty Immigration hall! I think we were through everything (had bags to collect off the ship) and in a Lyft headed to the airport by 8:30.

 

For those doing walk-off, the disembarkation instructions just said "proceed directly to the gangway between 6:30am and 9:00am". No meeting place was listed.

 

[riffatsea]

Our first Princess cruise was last year from LA through the Panama Canal to FLL.

We were amazed to see the absolute CRUSH of people lined up in immigration when we didn't get off in the first group!!  One of the suite perks on Princess is priority DISembarkation.

I guess different ships do things differently ?

Edited December 24, 2019 by riffatsea