Is the Penninsular Club worth your loyalty?

From P&Os perspective the point of the loyalty club is to gain repeat business from its customer base - but have they diluted it so much it just 'doesn't cut the mustard' anymore? A big benefit is the percentage discount on on-board spend, however this is only applied to the balance of any spend over and above the on-board credit - so anything you buy with OBC doesn't get the discount. Lots of cruises are coming with large OBC incentive packages so this can mean that the reality of your discount is really rather small. They insist on dishing out tacky plastic pins which you see very few people wearing (for obvious reasons), give you a pair of disposable slippers and a free glass of champagne. The higher tiers get a few nice touches such as priority boarding and an extra glass or two of champagne - but is it really worth staying with P&O to strive to get to those tiers? I've been thinking more about this recently, after the cruises we have booked we have 50ish nights to get to Caribbean, but even though P&O suits us, things like the complex pricing strategy and lack of real loyalty incentive is tipping the balance and I am now more likely than ever to start switching to other brands. Just wondering what the general view is?

It turns out I can't spell Peninsular [emoji52]

Totally agree about the OBS bit. Our last 2 and our upcoming cruise will all be coming with OBS of 4 figures. In 2 weeks that is very hard to spend, and we did try..

Should add this includes shareholder and ex military.

Yes exactly so you probably didn't benefit at all from the loyalty discount.

Anyone who cruises to get the loyalty points is daft. They are a perk a little added extra. No more lo less. A lunch with free wine and free champagne on departure they are nice little extras. I will take all the OBC and b pleased not to get any 10% as that means I have not spent any money.

The loyalty scheme makes no difference to me but it is nice to have the onboard spend discount.

Apparently on average the more people cruise the less profit the cruise line makes from them. Those who happily report that they spent nothing must be a nightmare to the corporate bean counters, plus the profit they don't provide has to be made up by the rest of us :mad: If they could fill the ships with new cruisers they would drop the benefit scheme and discourage passengers with large numbers of cruises.

Thinks - they know your average onboard spend so they could personalise the 'fare' no discounts just amounts of onboard credit. Those with lots of cruises under their belts but a bad spending record would get lots of obc but those with a good spending record would get a fare reduction.

Evil eh! :D:D

Lol good idea! I like it, on a two week cruise we spend about 1k all told [emoji31] and you think you're getting a discount at least but then you realise you got virtually none because of OBC - give me a square deal price and reward my loyalty with the discount!

Anyone who cruises to get the loyalty points is daft. They are a perk a little added extra. No more lo less. A lunch with free wine and free champagne on departure they are nice little extras. I will take all the OBC and b pleased not to get any 10% as that means I have not spent any money.

Quite right of course, but there are a lot of people who stick with P&O because they like to get 'priority' treatment for an hour when they board. From a corporate perspective if the loyalty scheme no longer influences this sort of behaviour is it financially worth it to increase the benefits, especially as competition in the industry increases? Don't forget we all happily tell them our future intentions on feedback questionnaires which helps to drive such corporate strategy

Anyone who cruises to get the loyalty points is daft. They are a perk a little added extra. No more lo less. A lunch with free wine and free champagne on departure they are nice little extras. I will take all the OBC and b pleased not to get any 10% as that means I have not spent any money.

Questionable whether OBC is free. Well, very little is free and from the cruise lines point of view a few hundred pounds of it that will be spent on board with no deductions and with good profits for them is much superior to pricing the cruise lower.

David

I think 'new generation' cruisers won't be loyal, the cruising customer demographic is changing and let's not forget we are all mortal. So how are P&O going to strive to become the cruise provider of choice, what's the plan to set them aside from the competition? At the moment they seem to be focusing on cost cutting by streamlining on-board services across the fleets and using overly complicated pricing to get pax on-board at the highest price they can achieve. I think that developing customer service, thinking about the future of rewarding loyalty etc. might be other things to help them achieve their corporate objectives - i.e. increased customer satisfaction leading to sustainable organisational performance? Also an interesting point from Dave about the "bean counters" when you next look at the Horizon and the daily activities have a look how many are just money spinners getting you to buy foot soak or puffy eye cream - I actually find this and being constantly pestered by photographers quite disengaging but clearly people turn up and hand over their cash or they wouldn't do it...

Before OBS came in our bill used to be approx. £1000+, now they give me obs so my bill is £0.

Which brings me to the question from a long time ago.

which works out cheaper

select fare with oodles of obs

or

saver fare, where you spend the money onboard.

do we think the 2 are about evens.

we have a drink before dinner, a bottle of wine -nearly -per night, always finish it the next night and start on a new bottle, which does not get finished etc etc.

As we have been on Arcadia we have been purchasing items from Whitewall.

Can somebody explain to me why it is always nicer looking at pictures in Whitewall with bubbles in hand, on Arcadia, than it is looking round Whitewall in our local House of Fraser?, with no bubbles in hand.

Before OBS came in our bill used to be approx. £1000+, now they give me obs so my bill is £0.

 

Which brings me to the question from a long time ago.

 

which works out cheaper

 

select fare with oodles of obs

 

or

 

saver fare, where you spend the money onboard.

 

do we think the 2 are about evens.

 

we have a drink before dinner, a bottle of wine -nearly -per night, always finish it the next night and start on a new bottle, which does not get finished etc etc.

 

As we have been on Arcadia we have been purchasing items from Whitewall.

 

Can somebody explain to me why it is always nicer looking at pictures in Whitewall with bubbles in hand, on Arcadia, than it is looking round Whitewall in our local House of Fraser?, with no bubbles in hand.

Love this observation! It's difficult to calculate how the pricing comes out in the wash because it's linked to the cost of the cabin too [emoji51]

Early Saver, Select, Late Saver, Parking, No Parking, Coach, No coach, OBS, No OBS, Double OBS - I mean it's a losing battle trying to figure out if you have paid a fair price for what you got. I wish they would clean it up. It would be good to have a pick and mix approach so you start with a standard price and choose your own bolt-on benefit, pay in full in advance to qualify. They may as well get rid of the loyalty scheme as it stands, it's just an expensive propaganda and the money could be invested elsewhere. When you think about it I suppose that's what they have done really by downgrading the benefit and just keep it ticking along at minimal cost to meet the corporate promise they have made to existing members.

I think they should bring back priority baggage to cabins for the higher tiers and also still have the separate baggage are in Southampton. Fed up of P&O dumbing things down, especially the dress code.

I think they should bring back priority baggage to cabins for the higher tiers and also still have the separate baggage are in Southampton. Fed up of P&O dumbing things down, especially the dress code.

Fed up enough to go to a different line? The gamble P&O take is that you won't. Consider what you reply to the questions about future loyalty on their questionnaire and use them to have your say. We often don't put as much effort into completing them as we should, I do believe it drives the decision making process. I think the dress code is a sign of the shifting customer demographic, people don't mind a few formals but don't want the expense and effort of much more.

The best thing about your loyalty points on P&O is that they contribute to your loyalty grade on Princess so we found ourselves on Elite after only 2-3 cruises on Princess. This means free laundry, free wifi, free drinks buffet every evening, priority embarkation and tenders, free wine-tasting.... etc so well worth having.

I spoke to P&O about the lack of incentive in their loyalty system and they sent me a questionnaire about how I thought things could be improved - but nothing's changed.

Outside of the 10% off the ob spend nothing else offered as benefit seems worth having.

Went on Princess recently and their benefits for Elite are really good - free laundry as often as you want, 250 mins each free internet, priority tenders (no tickets or queue, just turn up at the tender), 1 free mini bar set up, free wine tasting plus others items. No 10% off but better overall I think.

Best of all we had only done 1x7 night cruise on Princess but were Elite through our P&O history.

The best thing about your loyalty points on P&O is that they contribute to your loyalty grade on Princess so we found ourselves on Elite after only 2-3 cruises on Princess. This means free laundry, free wifi, free drinks buffet every evening, priority embarkation and tenders, free wine-tasting.... etc so well worth having.

 

I spoke to P&O about the lack of incentive in their loyalty system and they sent me a questionnaire about how I thought things could be improved - but nothing's changed.

You beat me too it Tartan !!

We are Ligurian tier with P & O and enjoy the priority boarding, special lunch, champagne etc but this alone does not keep us Loyal to P & O. We enjoy the product and as much as we look at other lines nothing we have seen or heard has enticed away.

Yes Princess loyalty scheme is better than P & O and I wish P & O would match it but on its own it would not be enough for us to jump brands.

If P & O got rid of the Peninsular we would still cruise P & O but if they got rid of the British feel of the ships and went Americanised like the rest of the Carnival fleet then we would probably look around for an alternative type of holiday.

The pricing is very complex but we just book from the first brochure our must do cruises. Usually 4 in the year then we fill in the gaps with saver fares as they become available. If the fares don't drop we stick to our 4 booked.

I suppose that's the annoying thing I like the P&O brand but have now registered with Princess and will be booking a short cruise to see what they are like. We have cruised with Fred Olson but that was too old. We also tried Ocean Village when that was around and were mortified by it lol - having said that it was possibly the best cruise we ever did because we were offered one of 20 places in a 'secret lounge' for £70, having seen what the ship was like we signed up and what a great decision it was: free internet, papers, breakfast, lunch, canapés and drinks of any type in a two/three hour period before dinner absolutely blooming marvellous and really enjoyed getting to know the other pax in there [emoji38]

Fed up enough to go to a different line? The gamble P&O take is that you won't. Consider what you reply to the questions about future loyalty on their questionnaire and use them to have your say. We often don't put as much effort into completing them as we should, I do believe it drives the decision making process. I think the dress code is a sign of the shifting customer demographic, people don't mind a few formals but don't want the expense and effort of much more.

I am afraid it has made me fed up and go to a different cruise line we know cruise with Princess as our first choice and going on QM2 soon. Its not just loyalty club but the whole package that P&O has provided these last 2 or 3 yrs has put us off which is their downfall as for many years we cruised 2-3 times a year with them. Our last cruise was Britannia maiden was excellent and we have booked on her for next October but cannot see us cruising with P&O again until then.

Outside of the 10% off the ob spend nothing else offered as benefit seems worth having.

Went on Princess recently and their benefits for Elite are really good - free laundry as often as you want, 250 mins each free internet, priority tenders (no tickets or queue, just turn up at the tender), 1 free mini bar set up, free wine tasting plus others items. No 10% off but better overall I think.

Best of all we had only done 1x7 night cruise on Princess but were Elite through our P&O history.

As Elite you do get 10% discount on shop purchases on Princess but it does not apply to drinks, excursions etc.

I am afraid it has made me fed up and go to a different cruise line we know cruise with Princess as our first choice and going on QM2 soon. Its not just loyalty club but the whole package that P&O has provided these last 2 or 3 yrs has put us off which is their downfall as for many years we cruised 2-3 times a year with them. Our last cruise was Britannia maiden was excellent and we have booked on her for next October but cannot see us cruising with P&O again until then.

Looks like we will be joining you my husband is looking at Princess now! As you say it's their downfall - I'm 47, no kids, disposable income and hopefully at least another 25 cruising years left in me [emoji256] maybe by then someone will have opened retirement ships [emoji106]🏼

We are also looking at more Princess cruises.....we did our third one with them last summer and were amazed that we were Elite because of our P and O history....and to be quite honest we were treated like royalty...straight through check in and security and once on board shown to our cabin which was ready for us before 1 pm....free laundry and dry cleaning, canapes in cabin on formal nights....fresh fruit in cabin on request...lots of internet....priority tenders...allocated lounge to await disembarkation with coffee etc. ...we paid less than £50 a night for our cruise and still had the free shuttles etc. and could choose our dining time as well!! .we really felt valued passengers which I'm afraid we don't feel with P and O .....:(

We just wish Princess did more cruises from Southampton....we are contemplating the North Cape one next summer.

Looks like we will be joining you my husband is looking at Princess now! As you say it's their downfall - I'm 47, no kids, disposable income and hopefully at least another 25 cruising years left in me [emoji256] maybe by then someone will have opened retirement ships [emoji106]🏼

Already have, called Saga.

David.