Princess Casino Offer hard sell of Princess Plus

[Stamp1]

We have a casino offer for a free balcony room. On calling to book, the agent tried to tell us we had to take the Princess Plus or pay all these optional fees which are not really optional for us. An extra $18 a day room cleaning fee, on top of the regular gratuity, $5 per person to eat in the dining room etc. they basically lied and said everything changed in August and the extra charges would be much more than the 60$ a dayPrincess Plus cost. Anyone else have this hard sell on trying to book with the Plus for a casino offer? 

[BlerkOne]

Doesn't sound like you were talking with Princess 

[Rick&Jeannie]

I suggest that you call again to see if you get the same story. It may very well have been an overeager sales agent. 

[memoak]

You were probably talking to the off shore Princess casino department. They are pretty much clueless. Best to get the free cabin pay the $200 deposit and then get a  CVP to get things straightened out

[Stamp1]

Sorry not sure what CVP is ? 

[azbirdmom]

Sounds like the person was way off script.  What changed in August was the $5 room service fee and the $18 would be the crew appreciation charge for a full suite (it's $16 for a balcony).  It would not surprise me that they are pushing Plus but that's the wrong way to do it.Did you book?  If you didn't you may want to book it yourself online OR call back and get someone else to see what they say.   And if you hear the same thing I'd recommend that you reach out to management to let them know about the deceptive sales practices that are being used by some of their phone reps.

[Host CJSKIDS]

Just now, azbirdmom said:

Sounds like the person was way off script.  What changed in August was the $5 room service fee and the $18 would be the crew appreciation charge for a full suite (it's $16 for a balcony).  It would not surprise me that they are pushing Plus but that's the wrong way to do it.Did you book?  If you didn't you may want to book it yourself online OR call back and get someone else to see what they say.   And if you hear the same thing I'd recommend that you reach out to management to let them know about the deceptive sales practices that are being used by some of their phone reps.

 

Sounds like sound advice!

[karatemom2]

We have found the outsourced casino sales reps to be very aggressive in trying to push add ons like transfers, insurance and plus packages - all of which we decline. I imagine they work on commission so are highly incentivized to get you to buy the additions, especially since many casino bookings are free or very low cost. It reminds me of the person at the car dealership desperately pushing the extended warranty. You just have to give a firm no and if they are pushing out misinformation, ask to speak to a supervisor. 

[wallyj]

54 minutes ago, Stamp1 said:

Sorry not sure what CVP is ? 

Cruise Vacation Planner also previously known as PVP Princess Vacation Planner, they work for Princess  and can book your cruise and should be knowledgeable about the product. YMMV.

[Itried4498]

21 minutes ago, karatemom2 said:

We have found the outsourced casino sales reps to be very aggressive in trying to push add ons like transfers, insurance and plus packages - all of which we decline. I imagine they work on commission so are highly incentivized to get you to buy the additions, especially since many casino bookings are free or very low cost. It reminds me of the person at the car dealership desperately pushing the extended warranty. You just have to give a firm no and if they are pushing out misinformation, ask to speak to a supervisor. 

 

It's not just the offshore reps.  I've had plenty of very friendly domestic-based reps be pushy about those addons.  That's often the point of offering a commission :).  I'm not a phone person but given how lousy their website has been, I've had to call more than once.

 

Just yesterday I couldn't complete a booking online so I called.  The agent was extremely friendly, but was insistent on adding Plus, protection, etc. saying we could always remove these later but we'd have to pay a higher price if it went up and we decided we wanted them.  I was pretty firm that we there's no decision to be made, we don't want them, and she wouldn't budge.  

 

 

[Stamp1]

Thank you. I needed to hear all this as they almost had me convinced. Some of the things they said were dead wrong. They said I would have to pay an extra $18 a day room cleaning fee and $5 per person to eat in the dining room.

I am obviously not a confident Princess cruiser. Usually go with HAL. I would complain to a supervisor but don’t want my free balcony and big casino free play offer taken away. 

[camper49]

On 10/13/2023 at 10:10 PM, Stamp1 said:

Thank you. I needed to hear all this as they almost had me convinced. Some of the things they said were dead wrong. They said I would have to pay an extra $18 a day room cleaning fee and $5 per person to eat in the dining room.

I am obviously not a confident Princess cruiser. Usually go with HAL. I would complain to a supervisor but don’t want my free balcony and big casino free play offer taken away. 

Have u sailed a lot with Princess? 

[Shippy]

On 10/13/2023 at 7:10 PM, Stamp1 said:

Thank you. I needed to hear all this as they almost had me convinced. Some of the things they said were dead wrong. They said I would have to pay an extra $18 a day room cleaning fee and $5 per person to eat in the dining room.

I am obviously not a confident Princess cruiser. Usually go with HAL. I would complain to a supervisor but don’t want my free balcony and big casino free play offer taken away. 

Not really sure what you are talking about. Do you mean the daily gratuities ??

Even with your 'free' room offer you would be expected to pay those just like port & tax. Those things are NEVER covered.

 Our casino comp cruise is next month. We ASKED for the plus package to be added. We were never harassed to get it or the insurance....which we never get.

 

[karatemom2]

21 minutes ago, Shippy said:

Not really sure what you are talking about. Do you mean the daily gratuities ??

Even with your 'free' room offer you would be expected to pay those just like port & tax. Those things are NEVER covered.

 Our casino comp cruise is next month. We ASKED for the plus package to be added. We were never harassed to get it or the insurance....which we never get.

 

 

I'm sure the reference the agent called "cleaning fee" was probably daily gratuities and perhaps the $5 referenced was for the room service delivery fee. But the bottom line is that the agent was confusing the OP and being pushy about the add-ons. You may not have experienced it, but we definitely have when calling to book our casino comp trips. Now it's not every agent, so count yourself lucky you have not run across one, but we have absolutely discontinued the call on a couple of occasions and started over with another agent due to the high pressure approach where they almost insist you add it on. We had one agent who said if we wanted to book, we HAD to add these items and then we could go back into our booking and remove them. We know better - but newer Princess cruisers might know. It's clear these agents are incentivized to push the additional options but the tactics can be pretty heavy handed. We have found an agent we just love to work with and now have her direct extension for all of our bookings so we call her directly and don't have to deal with some of the frustration of having to try to combat agents pushing misinformation. My advice to anyone is when you find and agent you like, get the extension and stick with that person!

[Stamp1]

1 hour ago, Shippy said:

Not really sure what you are talking about. Do you mean the daily gratuities ??

Even with your 'free' room offer you would be expected to pay those just like port & tax. Those things are NEVER covered.

 Our casino comp cruise is next month. We ASKED for the plus package to be added. We were never harassed to get it or the insurance....which we never get.

 

 

55 minutes ago, karatemom2 said:

 

I'm sure the reference the agent called "cleaning fee" was probably daily gratuities and perhaps the $5 referenced was for the room service delivery fee. But the bottom line is that the agent was confusing the OP and being pushy about the add-ons. You may not have experienced it, but we definitely have when calling to book our casino comp trips. Now it's not every agent, so count yourself lucky you have not run across one, but we have absolutely discontinued the call on a couple of occasions and started over with another agent due to the high pressure approach where they almost insist you add it on. We had one agent who said if we wanted to book, we HAD to add these items and then we could go back into our booking and remove them. We know better - but newer Princess cruisers might know. It's clear these agents are incentivized to push the additional options but the tactics can be pretty heavy handed. We have found an agent we just love to work with and now have her direct extension for all of our bookings so we call her directly and don't have to deal with some of the frustration of having to try to combat agents pushing misinformation. My advice to anyone is when you find and agent you like, get the extension and stick with that person!

 

[Stamp1]

I called again and my next agent was amazing. No pressure, very thorough and easy to work with to get the booking we wanted. There is a lesson here. Keep trying until you get a good one who will book the cruise that you want. We were just surprised that the first two agents were such high pressure. Of course we knew we had to pay the gratuity but the other items they named were totally wrong.