Southhampton Covid Test at Embarkation.

[pauon]

Has anyone taken advantage of the $60 Covid test by Princess at embarkation at Southhampton?  It says "there is a limited number of tests at or near the port" for our sailing.   Looking for what your experience and delay time on boarding using this option.

[Lady Arwen]

Are you staying in Southampton prior to your sailing?  We’re staying there a few days and getting our test the day before embarkation at Boots Pharmacy in the West Quay Mall.  Each sailing will be different as to how many passengers will want the test at the pier.  We don’t want to take a chance that there will not be enough to go around.  It’s also quite a bit cheaper at Boots.

[triple7tahoe]

3 hours ago, Lady Arwen said:

Are you staying in Southampton prior to your sailing?  We’re staying there a few days and getting our test the day before embarkation at Boots Pharmacy in the West Quay Mall.  Each sailing will be different as to how many passengers will want the test at the pier.  We don’t want to take a chance that there will not be enough to go around.  It’s also quite a bit cheaper at Boots.

Just checked the Boots site--30 GBP each--Around $40-Must make appointment. I am thinking about taking Princess suggested test with me and take proctored test in hotel. We have done that a couple of times in the last three months but not overseas.

 

[southamptoncruisers]

You can not book any pre testing for covid at Boots West Quay Southampton. The nearest boots doing the test is 11 miles away in Fareham. 

[Martha1974]

We did the test at the Mayflower quay at the end of March - there were approx 15 testing stations and we were the only people there! It was only about 10 days after Princess announced that they would accept proctored tests so I guess most people opted for that thinking that there would be long queues at the Southampton centre. We were still in the queue to get into the terminal building when the text with the results came through (approx 15 mins).
 

Unfortunately my husband tested positive (having been negative before we left home the day before) so if we’d done the proctored test at home we’d have been ok to board and probably ended up quarantined on the ship… 

[Lady Arwen]

5 hours ago, southamptoncruisers said:

You can not book any pre testing for covid at Boots West Quay Southampton. The nearest boots doing the test is 11 miles away in Fareham. 

Thank you, we’ll look elsewhere 

[pauon]

5 hours ago, Martha1974 said:

We did the test at the Mayflower quay at the end of March - there were approx 15 testing stations and we were the only people there! It was only about 10 days after Princess announced that they would accept proctored tests so I guess most people opted for that thinking that there would be long queues at the Southampton centre. We were still in the queue to get into the terminal building when the text with the results came through (approx 15 mins).
 

Unfortunately my husband tested positive (having been negative before we left home the day before) so if we’d done the proctored test at home we’d have been ok to board and probably ended up quarantined on the ship… 

Thank you ! 

 

[KikiKruiser]

On 5/21/2022 at 1:59 AM, Martha1974 said:

We did the test at the Mayflower quay at the end of March - there were approx 15 testing stations and we were the only people there! It was only about 10 days after Princess announced that they would accept proctored tests so I guess most people opted for that thinking that there would be long queues at the Southampton centre. We were still in the queue to get into the terminal building when the text with the results came through (approx 15 mins).
 

Unfortunately my husband tested positive (having been negative before we left home the day before) so if we’d done the proctored test at home we’d have been ok to board and probably ended up quarantined on the ship… 

 

So, is this test at the Mayflower quay the one Princess offers at embarkation?  What was the cost? TIA!

[Martha1974]

10 hours ago, KikiKruiser said:

 

So, is this test at the Mayflower quay the one Princess offers at embarkation?  What was the cost? TIA!

It is the one that Princess offers - we opted for that as we weren't 100% sure what the requirements would be for us to test at home and didn't want to arrive and be told that we didn't have the right documents! 

Because DH tested positive we didn't board, which meant we didn't have a ship-board account for the cost to be added to so we didn't actually pay for it, but the cost they quoted on the website was $60 (£45). I've seen a couple of posters on other boards that have done the same test at the Quayside and were not charged for it once they boarded either, but whether that's across the board or they were just lucky I'm not sure. 

 

[Rick&Jeannie]

We are sitting at the Venice Airport right now to return to the US. We brought the Abbott BinaxNow tests with us and did them in our hotel room yesterday. One slight "gotcha" was that even though I had downloaded the Navica app and made sure I could log in to that I did not know that this app was going to send you to the emed site when you actually start to test. I had to quickly set up 2 accounts for that before I could continue. No big deal...just wasn't quite prepared for that deviation!