What price loyalty ?

Particularly expensive are the Fred air fare add-ons. They are charging £900 return to Barbados for their Caribbean cruise, whereas a return on a much better airline than the charter ones they use can be booked for around half that. Of course their fares include transfer to the ship, but it is a huge amount to pay for that convenience.

I agree about the air fare cost on Fred and the quality of flights we have had was not good either.

Berkshireboy

You mention reduced luggage with Emirates - was that just because you were returning with a lower luggage allowance on another airline, or do you have less luggage on the Emirates flight? If less on Emirates, what was your luggage allowance? We have no details of luggage allowance for next year. We had 25kgs + 5kgs hand luggage on Fred last year to/from Tenerife. You can often buy extra luggage from an airline as well - we flew Monarch with Fred back to UK in 2014 and were able to buy another 20kgs bag for a very small fee from the airline before we left the UK.

We have found Fred's food to be much worse than previously experienced on our last couple of Fred cruises earlier this year and I have seen complaints by others, but had no issues on Voyager last Sept.

We only buy the Fred AI going North when drinks are expensive off the ship - I am particularly disappointed that Fred do not even give half price for coffee on the bars if on AI. Would not pay £20 anywhere - we think the bar prices on both Voyager and Fred are OK though.

Yes, VOD and Swan are different to many cruise lines (including Fred to an extent) who provide what we often consider holiday camp style entertainment. The show's, game shows etc. are not our thing as we travel to see other places and experience those places. So anyone wanting that sort of constant 'entertainment' would be better on the other cruise lines.

We like the good (and on Swan, excellent) speakers who discuss topics relevant to the places visited. The open dining is a great plus from our point of view and if you going into the restaurant on Voyager latish we have been put on a table alone, even if it is a bigger table. We find dining with others on VOD and Swan much better than on other lines as we have a lot in common with the other passengers, who tend to be well travelled interesting people. We are quite happy with the self service as well.

It is the itineraries we go for, even with Fred, but Fred are not that good in finding really unusual ports. We like the more academic type of conversation on Swan (and to a lesser extent VOD), but it is very much a personal thing of course. I spent my working life in science research so am very comfortable in that academic style environment and my husband has an interest in many things that have been good topics of conversation on those lines. We have had some good company on Fred as well, but with much more variability and if we cannot get a table for two on Fred we do not usually appreciate being with the same people every evening. We prefer to get to know more people and find it becomes a much more sociable environment that way, especially as there are only half the number of passengers compared to Fred's ships.

Is it Voyager that is going into dry dock later this year - I do not see any itinerary gaps? I know all or most of Fred's ships are for re vamps and Fred has cancelled cruises for that purpose.

Hi Tring

For some reason I can't get the quote function to work on your postings!

You mention reduced luggage with Emirates - was that just because you were returning with a lower luggage allowance on another airline, or do you have less luggage on the Emirates flight? If less on Emirates, what was your luggage allowance? We have no details of luggage allowance for next year. We had 25kgs + 5kgs hand luggage on Fred last year to/from Tenerife. You can often buy extra luggage from an airline as well - we flew Monarch with Fred back to UK in 2014 and were able to buy another 20kgs bag for a very small fee from the airline before we left the UK.

This is in respect of our flight out to Cape Town with Emirates next March. When I questioned VoD about our luggage allowance they said that the fare booked was a "special rate". If you look at Emirates web page you will see that from 20 June 2016 the baggage allowance on special fares has been reduced from 30Kgs to 20Kgs. An extra 10Kgs is £378 and 15Kgs £567. These are discounted figures! and the excess rate at the airport is £42 per kilo [None of these prices are an option!]. The rates are per flight, not return. Hand baggage is 7Kgs. I'm not sure where VoD got 23Kgs from, perhaps they have paid extra or it was a mistake and the allowance is 20Kgs. I'd be interested to hear what allowance you have got on your flights?

We have found Fred's food to be much worse than previously experienced on our last couple of Fred cruises earlier this year and I have seen complaints by others, but had no issues on Voyager last Sept.

We only buy the Fred AI going North when drinks are expensive off the ship - I am particularly disappointed that Fred do not even give half price for coffee on the bars if on AI. Would not pay £20 anywhere - we think the bar prices on both Voyager and Fred are OK though.

Agree about the coffee but like the fact that you can get a decent bottle of wine at half price on Fred. House wines on both Fred and VoD not very good in our opinion.

Yes, VOD and Swan are different to many cruise lines (including Fred to an extent) who provide what we often consider holiday camp style entertainment. The show's, game shows etc. are not our thing as we travel to see other places and experience those places. So anyone wanting that sort of constant 'entertainment' would be better on the other cruise lines.

Don't often get to the entertainment as we always eat second sitting or late when open seating.

We like the good (and on Swan, excellent) speakers who discuss topics relevant to the places visited. The open dining is a great plus from our point of view and if you going into the restaurant on Voyager latish we have been put on a table alone, even if it is a bigger table. We find dining with others on VOD and Swan much better than on other lines as we have a lot in common with the other passengers, who tend to be well travelled interesting people. We are quite happy with the self service as well.

We also prefer small ships and our favorite cruise line is Azamara [next cruise is a week today, Southampton - Montreal on the Quest.] As well as some of the best food on a cruise ship the passengers are a mix of British, Australians, Canadians, Americans and other Europeans which makes for interesting conversations.

It is the itineraries we go for, even with Fred, but Fred are not that good in finding really unusual ports. We like the more academic type of conversation on Swan (and to a lesser extent VOD), but it is very much a personal thing of course. I spent my working life in science research so am very comfortable in that academic style environment and my husband has an interest in many things that have been good topics of conversation on those lines. We have had some good company on Fred as well, but with much more variability and if we cannot get a table for two on Fred we do not usually appreciate being with the same people every evening. We prefer to get to know more people and find it becomes a much more sociable environment that way, especially as there are only half the number of passengers compared to Fred's ships.

Is it Voyager that is going into dry dock later this year - I do not see any itinerary gaps? I know all or most of Fred's ships are for re vamps and Fred has cancelled cruises for that purpose.

No - its Autumn next year. The Black Watch is having an extra fortnight in drydock in November following the fire which has led to one cruise being cancelled. We are on back to back cruises on her immediately afterwards so fingers crossed that there are no delays! :)

Now Azamara does sound interesting - we may splash out on them one day.

Nothing been said about our luggage allowance and we do not fly out until 1/2/17 so it will be a while before we get tickets. We are thinking of ringing VOD in a week or two when the calls for the newly released cruises are dying down, so I can see if I could find anything out. Those excess luggage prices are steep to say the least!

We are thinking of booking our own flights out to Sri Lanka for 2018 as Emirates do a flight with a 13 hour stop over in Dubai, and we could book into an airside hotel during that stopover and get some sleep. We would be paying a fair bit more, but wondering if VOD will give a small cash refund towards it, or at least knock off the Manchester supplement which is now on our bill (£70 each I think).

Happy holidays,

Barbara

Hi Barbara

Please let me know what VoD say about the baggage allowance next year on Emirates. I hope that it's still 30 Kilo's but suspect that it will be less.

As far as a possible refund on your flights to Sri Lanka is concerned I imagine that it depends on whether VoD have arranged scheduled or charter flights for that cruise. If scheduled it shouldn't be a problem to give you at least a partial refund. If it's a charter I don't think that you stand much chance, as the costings will be based on filling up the flight.

Azamara are very good but the prices have gone through the ceiling recently. After next week we have one further cruise booked with them next year which, unless a real bargain comes along, will sadly be our last.

Alan

Won't be a charter for us to Sri Lanka as we go from Manchester, when they do not seem to use charters, (they could send people on a shuttle to London but has not been our experience with three recent cruises). The cruise sales lady onboard last Sept. said they hoped to take charters from London for some planned cruises and had signed a big contract with one of the flight consortiums for regional flights. We have been block booked on Turkish Airlines and Aegean last Sept and Emirates out to Hong Kong next Feb. The Man supp is about £70 pp one way mind.

Those block bookings are a nuisance as you cannot get into the airline's system to check in and choose seats until arriving at the airport, because everyone has the same booking ref. We once went to HK with Costa and some couples were put in the middle seats of a set of 4 for a 12 hour flight from Heathrow!! Luckily we got to the airport just in time to bag the last aisle seat and the one next to it - mainly because our flight started at Man so we had an earlier check in than the London people.

Swan (and I think VOD) used to publish a small reduction per flight for not using that flight a few years back, but I was told last year that they charge the same now anyway, even if flights are not used. However, when we booked the back to backs for both 2017 and 2018 they did knock off something for the unused flights on the middle change over day, as well as another -5%.

Thing is, we have now booked 2018 with Man Flights, so they could easily say we cannot cancel those off at all without loss. We have found the company quite good though in the past - so maybe. When they rang re our later return flights for next Feb we were asked if it was OK before taking our extra payment, so we are now thinking we may be able to ask them to put us on a different flight, even if it costs more - could always ask anyway. If, as I suspect they still use Emirates, then they would likely offer us the Dubai to Sri Lanka flight we would want, but with a later departure from Man - Dubai (about 20.00 and we would like the 13.10). Emirates are currently charging the same for both those flights. There is an airside hotel in Dubai were they charge about £123 for a room - sounds a bargain to us!

I have found the roll call for your VOD cruise so I will post on there if I get any info - some of these posts may be deleted as they are not all directly about Fred.

Talking Fred, we are still waiting to hear about our flights back to Man from Tenerife on 8th Dec (we sail out from Southampton). Even people flying out to Braemar in Lisbon on 10th Nov and Tenerife on 24th Nov did not have their flight details a week ago and probably still don't. Hence they cannot sort airport transfers etc! I despair with Fred.

One good thing about Azamara is that one month before a flight they break up the group booking into individuals within the group. This allows everyone to go online and access reservation details and reserve seats etc. We were able to do this with our upcoming cruise and have reserved our seats on the homeward Air Canada flight to Heathrow.

Fred has always been late at giving out flight details and could [and should] improve in this area.

As you say it would be better to post any follow up to the VoD roll call.

Good luck with getting your travel arrangements sorted for Sri Lanka.

Alan

The only reason to book early is to secure a specific cabin and a spot on the cruise, it has nothing to do with 'loyalty'.

 

If you don't care that much about which cabin you get and are willing to risk the cruise selling out, then don't book early and wait until you see a good offer for the cruise you want.

 

But if you do book early you can be sure there will be better offers later on, even if 'later on' turns out to be a week or a month after you booked.

 

Can't have it both ways sadly,

You have it right, all our cruises have been with Fred, we have considered waiting until the last minute to pick up bargains but have dismissed this as we like the brand, the ships and like to pick our cabin. Yes we could wait and save some cash but hey you takes your choice and pays the price. Enjoy!