crew appreciation gratuities and princess plus

[trinitygirl]

Hi everyone, just hoping for clarification.  I have seen on quite a few CC posts now, the statement that the crew appreciation/gratuities charge is included in Princess Plus.  On the website it does not mention this (just drinks.wifi, OBC) and on my upcoming cruises, I have a button on the personaliser encouraging me to pre-pay the fee.  I have just spoken to someone on the Princess phone line and he has said that the crew appreciation fare is not included in Princess Plus.   This is not related to the fact that the fee is incorporated into the cruise fare for Australian and NZ cruises  - the cruises I have booked are all in Europe with on board charges accrued in USD.

 

So, can anyone shed any clarity on this for me?

 

many thanks

[PacnGoNow]

16 minutes ago, trinitygirl said:

Hi everyone, just hoping for clarification.  I have seen on quite a few CC posts now, the statement that the crew appreciation/gratuities charge is included in Princess Plus.  On the website it does not mention this (just drinks.wifi, OBC) and on my upcoming cruises, I have a button on the personaliser encouraging me to pre-pay the fee.  I have just spoken to someone on the Princess phone line and he has said that the crew appreciation fare is not included in Princess Plus.   This is not related to the fact that the fee is incorporated into the cruise fare for Australian and NZ cruises  - the cruises I have booked are all in Europe with on board charges accrued in USD.

 

So, can anyone shed any clarity on this for me?

 

many thanks

It says right on the website, that it IS included.  It’s always been included when we have used it from the US.

 

https://www.princess.com/cruise-deals-promotions/plus-premier-cruise-packages/

 

Move down to Princess Plus.  The Princess agent should have looked on their own website.

 

Crew appreciation same as gratuities/tips.

Edited October 12, 2022 by PacnGoNow

[skynight]

Don't all Australian/New Zealand fares already include the crew gratuities?

[PacnGoNow]

1 minute ago, skynight said:

Don't all Australian/New Zealand fares already include the crew gratuities?

OP said this is not from Australia/NZ.

[travelin.sisters]

this is very interesting. ..

is it a difference because you are sailing in/from Europe?

this is on our current booking:

 

but when I searched the terms & conditions it only says the beverage package & wifi...are they getting ready to change the package?

Princess Plus & Princess Premier - Princess Cruises

 

[sloopsailor]

36 minutes ago, trinitygirl said:

Hi everyone, just hoping for clarification.  I have seen on quite a few CC posts now, the statement that the crew appreciation/gratuities charge is included in Princess Plus.  On the website it does not mention this (just drinks.wifi, OBC) and on my upcoming cruises, I have a button on the personaliser encouraging me to pre-pay the fee.  I have just spoken to someone on the Princess phone line and he has said that the crew appreciation fare is not included in Princess Plus.   This is not related to the fact that the fee is incorporated into the cruise fare for Australian and NZ cruises  - the cruises I have booked are all in Europe with on board charges accrued in USD.

 

So, can anyone shed any clarity on this for me?

 

many thanks

 

Crew appreciation is absolutely included!!

 

It's a darn shame the customer service people working for Princess don't even know the details of one of it's most popular pricing packages. What the heck is wrong with the Princess' training program? Is there any at all?

Edited October 12, 2022 by sloopsailor

[Brickwood]

It is definitely included in my future bookings, but I'm in the US and so perhaps that is the difference?.  I also have a button on the cruise personalizer to prepay gratuities, but if I select it, I get a message saying crew appreciation is paid for as part of the promotion.  Have you tried actually hitting the button?  They also have a button saying I can upgrade to Princess Plus which I already have, so obviously they can't distinguish the details on everyone's bookings. 

[Brickwood]

My booking confirmations also indicate that crew appreciation is prepaid by Princess for guests 1 and 2

[PacnGoNow]

I checked one of my cruises starting in Europe and Under the cruise personalizer, add a cruise package…

you can select Princess Plus and it DOES include crew appreciation.

 

If you book a cruise right now from Europe, you have the option of selecting 

Princess plus and YES it does include

crew appreciation.

I would screenshot the website info.

 

Agent was clearly mistaken.

[wallyj]

You can easily see if crew appreciation is in your booking by going to the travel summary and scroll down and you will see all ‘perks’ added to your booking with the ‘retail price’ shown. 
 

I believe many passengers are not aware of this feature. Look for link saying boarding pass and travel summary when you log in on to website Personalizer. Click on this link the click ‘print travel summary’ .

 

let us know if crew appreciation is listed in you summary.

[trinitygirl]

Hi all, thanks for the responses.  There are no perks showing on Travel Summary, but when I click on Onboard Services, down the bottom I see this - as you can see, there is no mention of gratuities.  When I click on payments, and click on crew appreciation, it will let me go all the way through to pre paying for them.  The terms and conditions for Princess Plus and Premier do not mention gratuities.  Again, while I am booking from the Australian website, these are three European cruises (ex Rome and Southhampton) with the onboard currency in USD (crew appreciation is included in the fare (not princess plus) for all cruises where the onboard currency is AUD).  So it sounds like those of you booking in the US and Europe get gratuities included in Princess Plus, but those of us in Australia do not.  That seems just weird to me???

[Taykee1]

I have booked from Australia for and Alaskan Cruise and I also have to pay the crew appreciation as its not included in the Plus Package. Must not be included in the package for us Aussies. My understanding is once we pay this then we don't have to carry any money around with us for tipping on the ship. I hope this is correct. 

[Arizona Wildcat]

3 hours ago, Brickwood said:

It is definitely included in my future bookings, but I'm in the US and so perhaps that is the difference?.  I also have a button on the cruise personalizer to prepay gratuities, but if I select it, I get a message saying crew appreciation is paid for as part of the promotion.  Have you tried actually hitting the button?  They also have a button saying I can upgrade to Princess Plus which I already have, so obviously they can't distinguish the details on everyone's bookings. 

How would you suggest Princess hire and train enough people.  At home grocery shelves are half empty because of no stockers.  Since it takes a year to really get completely knowledgeable how does Princess or any other employer do that today?

[wowzz]

4 hours ago, Taykee1 said:

I have booked from Australia for and Alaskan Cruise and I also have to pay the crew appreciation as its not included in the Plus Package. Must not be included in the package for us Aussies. My understanding is once we pay this then we don't have to carry any money around with us for tipping on the ship. I hope this is correct. 

Without starting a tipping thread,  yes, no need to carry cash around.  And even if you did not have PP, an 18% service charge is added to the drink prices, so even then you would not need cash. 

[Steelers36]

6 hours ago, trinitygirl said:

Hi all, thanks for the responses.  There are no perks showing on Travel Summary, but when I click on Onboard Services, down the bottom I see this - as you can see, there is no mention of gratuities.  When I click on payments, and click on crew appreciation, it will let me go all the way through to pre paying for them.  The terms and conditions for Princess Plus and Premier do not mention gratuities.  Again, while I am booking from the Australian website, these are three European cruises (ex Rome and Southhampton) with the onboard currency in USD (crew appreciation is included in the fare (not princess plus) for all cruises where the onboard currency is AUD).  So it sounds like those of you booking in the US and Europe get gratuities included in Princess Plus, but those of us in Australia do not.  That seems just weird to me???

 

4 hours ago, Taykee1 said:

I have booked from Australia for and Alaskan Cruise and I also have to pay the crew appreciation as its not included in the Plus Package. Must not be included in the package for us Aussies. My understanding is once we pay this then we don't have to carry any money around with us for tipping on the ship. I hope this is correct. 

Perhaps the cost of Plus for Aussies booking with Princess is a little lower than $50 USD in order to compensate for not including crew appreciation?  Sounds to me like another failing of Princess IT.  If buying a cruise in home country, CA/Grats are baked into the cruise fare.  If they don't bake it in to overseas cruises, then I don't see why they cannot charge you the equivalent to $50 USD in AUD and include it.  

[Lizabu]

10 hours ago, trinitygirl said:

Hi all, thanks for the responses.  There are no perks showing on Travel Summary, but when I click on Onboard Services, down the bottom I see this - as you can see, there is no mention of gratuities.  When I click on payments, and click on crew appreciation, it will let me go all the way through to pre paying for them.  The terms and conditions for Princess Plus and Premier do not mention gratuities.  Again, while I am booking from the Australian website, these are three European cruises (ex Rome and Southhampton) with the onboard currency in USD (crew appreciation is included in the fare (not princess plus) for all cruises where the onboard currency is AUD).  So it sounds like those of you booking in the US and Europe get gratuities included in Princess Plus, but those of us in Australia do not.  That seems just weird to me???

It looks like your gratuities are not included. I booked princess plus too and this is what that screen looks like under my account:

 

[JF - retired RRT]

11 hours ago, Taykee1 said:

I have booked from Australia for and Alaskan Cruise and I also have to pay the crew appreciation as its not included in the Plus Package. Must not be included in the package for us Aussies. My understanding is once we pay this then we don't have to carry any money around with us for tipping on the ship. I hope this is correct. 

You don't have to carry money around the ship either way. Tipping beyond "crew appreciation" is discretionary.

[coo359a2]

Not sure how many cruise days the $439.43AU covers for Trinitygirl,   but we are being charged $29AU pp per day for our 2 Australian cruises booked    next year that are not on Princess Plus.    Doesn't quite convert over to our usual rate of $14.50US.  All OBC is still listed as US$ = AU$ with no adjustment between currencies.  

[NSWP]

On 10/13/2022 at 9:51 AM, skynight said:

Don't all Australian/New Zealand fares already include the crew gratuities?

Only for cruises within Aust/NZ for Aussie/NZ residents.

[PurpleTraveller]

As an Australian with an Alaskan cruise booked I have been discussing this issue with my PVP and Princess. Australians do not get gratuities included in the Princess Plus or Premier packages. For $50.00 per person per day for Princess Plus we only get one internet device and drinks up to $12.00. No-one at Princess can tell me why gratuities are not included for Australians. Gratuities will still be added to my on board account for my Alaskan cruise and any other cruises outside of Australia and New Zealand. For myself as a none drinker the Princess Plus package is not worth while and I will simply buy an occasional drink, use my 50% off internet device and pay gratuities. 

[Brickwood]

On 10/12/2022 at 8:26 PM, Arizona Wildcat said:

How would you suggest Princess hire and train enough people.  At home grocery shelves are half empty because of no stockers.  Since it takes a year to really get completely knowledgeable how does Princess or any other employer do that today?

Hmm, sorry if my comment was misunderstood - certainly didn't mean to offend - just stating facts as I see them.  Totally agree that Princess isn't the only company in this situation.  We just need to be aware so we can navigate the realities of these times.

[Over from NZ]

On 10/13/2022 at 9:09 PM, Steelers36 said:

 

Perhaps the cost of Plus for Aussies booking with Princess is a little lower than $50 USD in order to compensate for not including crew appreciation?  Sounds to me like another failing of Princess IT.  If buying a cruise in home country, CA/Grats are baked into the cruise fare.  If they don't bake it in to overseas cruises, then I don't see why they cannot charge you the equivalent to $50 USD in AUD and include it.  

Exactly. Grats are not included in the plus package for Aussies and Kiwi's booking cruises over there.. and they need to be paid extra. However, when you convert the dollar.. the fee of the plus package is considerably cheaper for Aussies & Kiwi's than it is for say American's. At the moment, it's about NZ$55 a night for us to book the drinks package. That's about US$32-33 - so about right if you consider the Grats need paying in addition to that. 

[rickays]

We have just returned from doing a US cruise that we booked in Australia.  After checking with customer service onboard, we were informed that the plus fare includes crew appreciation.  The reason this doesnt show up when booking in Australia is  because there is no computer code as Australians have it included automatically.  Was told to for future overseas cruises with plus fare just go to service desk and they can enter code.

Edited October 20, 2022 by rickays

[PurpleTraveller]

4 hours ago, rickays said:

We have just returned from doing a US cruise that we booked in Australia.  After checking with customer service onboard, we were informed that the plus fare includes crew appreciation.  The reason this doesnt show up when booking in Australia is  because there is no computer code as Australians have it included automatically.  Was told to for future overseas cruises with plus fare just go to service desk and they can enter code.

 

This is very interesting as I've been told by numerous customer service representatives at Princess and my PVP that gratuities are not included and that I would have to pay them on board or prepay them. If I do decide to take the Princess Plus package I will definitely go to the service desk to get them to enter the code. I wonder what happens for anyone who doesn't know to go to the service desk? Thank you for reporting about your actual experience on board.

 

[harfield]

On 10/13/2022 at 8:51 AM, wallyj said:

You can easily see if crew appreciation is in your booking by going to the travel summary and scroll down and you will see all ‘perks’ added to your booking with the ‘retail price’ shown. 
 

I believe many passengers are not aware of this feature. Look for link saying boarding pass and travel summary when you log in on to website Personalizer. Click on this link the click ‘print travel summary’ .

 

let us know if crew appreciation is listed in you summary.

No Cant Find it anywhere.

 

Edited December 4, 2022 by harfield