We have had 2 cruises with Princess in 2023 and 2024, and not had any problem at all with the embarkation procedure. However I can imagine that if the previous cruise had a delayed disembarkation, then the following cruise could well be affected, which might have been the reason you had such a poor experience. And of course such a situation would equally impact the P&O procedure, so I still feel that the Princess, RC, Celebrity, MSC etc system is light years better than P&O, and they really need to fine tune their procedures and join the rest of the cruise industry in the 21st century.