tacticalbanjo

Banks have to refund fraudulent transactions whether it has been done on a credit or debit card unless you've done something really daft like give your PIN to someone. But with a credit card you wouldn't have to pay your bill immediately giving you time to fix the problem. With a debit card you might get direct debits bounce depending on when in the month your account gets cleared out and how long it takes the bank to refund you.

I think the point about airports and cruise terminals is interesting. Can you imagine being told you must turn up at the airport after 3.30pm but no later than 4pm? I can't imagine anyone would comply with that. No matter where you are travelling from, even just crossing Southampton, traffic could easily cause you to be late given such a small window. But P&O seem to think you can time arrivals that precisely. And it's all very well saying that you can go for a stroll but for people with limited mobility or families with children, it really is easier said than done.

P&O's Peninsular Club rewards both lifetime and current loyalty in their upper tiers. For the top tier Ligurian you need 250 nights with at least 20 being in the last three years. P&O also manage to give on board spend discounts to all their tiers which is a nice touch. The problem for Cunard is that unless you made Platinum and Diamond conditional on sailings in the last few years then you'd only have all but the most frequent travellers on Silver and Gold. And if you introduce new tiers on the top and want to restrict priority embarkation to those new tiers then you risk upsetting passengers by taking away a perk from them. Unless they did some sort of complex grandfathering thing.

I'm on Britannia towards the end of the month on what looks like a very similar itinerary. I'm hoping MDR service will be improved. I'm travelling with my mum and we're both regular cruisers so we will both notice if the service is lacking. Even the toddler might! This is her fourth cruise with two Cunard and a Princess trip under her belt. Also hoping that Haugesund will be more open in the middle of the week as I will be cruising with my one year old which puts lots of excursions out of the picture because I can't guarantee she'd have a car seat. So walking about it is! We've got plenty of years of travel left ahead of us and I've been to the fjords before so this is really a test of whether we like the kids facilkites now that such things are important to us instead of bars and atmosphere.

If Cunard want to make sure people comply then they need to allow for people being late and push final boarding back several hours after their last allotted check in time. It's not acceptable to most people to be given a 3pm check in time when final boarding is 3.30pm and if you miss it because of traffic tough luck. Last time I cruised it took me about 20 mins just to get from the dock gate to the terminal because the traffic was so bad. Even if we were to stay in Southampton instead of doing the hour or so drive in the morning I could end up being late and missing the ship. I'm platinum with Cunard so it doesn't matter for me but I understand why others turn up early.

The kids club was a major reason to book with P&O. I know we have to stay with her and she might have to stay in the nursery but that isn't a problem. I just want her to have a safe space to run around in. I used the night nursery on Cunard which is a similar set up. In fact, the youth team are shared between the two lines so I expect the whole set up will be fairly familiar to me even though I've not been on P&O before. On previous cruises when I've asked my steward what they want don't with the nappies they've asked for them to be bagged in nappy bags then placed in a red biohazard bag presumably so they don't go off for rubbish sorting. I'll ask out of courtesy when we get on board and do what I'm instructed. If they don't mind then I'll just put in the bathroom bin.

I’ve just been on Sky Princess where the rooms have a similar layout so I know I can put the baby in the wardrobe and we will still be able to use the bathroom as long as we are quiet. This means we can use the balcony which is great. This will be little one’s fourth cruise so we know the general cruising with toddler bits but not P&O with toddler bits.

I'll be heading off to the Fjords next month on the Britannia with my mum and my 17 month old. It's my first time with P&O but not my first cruise. Anyone have any tips for P&O in general and also for P&O with a toddler? I understand we can use the Lido Pool even though kiddo is still in nappies - very surprised we can use anything except the water play area outside The Reef. Are there any places near by for a quick change of little one before and after a swim? I don't want her getting cold and I'll want to get her in an absorbent nappy asap after we get out of the water. Does anyone know about the baby change situation? Will I have to be taking her back to the cabin each time? I know to let the steward know we will need the red bags.

Just come off Sky Princess where I surprised myself by liking the Medallion. During the day I wore it on my wrist in a watch strap type thing and at night I popped it out of the strap and put it in my clutch. No outfit ruining necessary! And I didn't have to worry when I wore clothes without pockets. I liked that I could find the rest of my family at any time - my husband might not have liked the ease at which I could track him to a bar. Also liked that my room unlocked as I approached. Not having to fish around in my pockets for a key card while holding the toddler/drinks/snacks from the buffet was really helpful for me. Trying to juggle clutch, nappy bag and baby last year on QV and QM2 was a bit of a challenge. It's waterproof too so no worrying about leaving my card lying about while I take a solo swim. I believe the technology uses radio rather than NFC so it does need power which rules out putting it in cards. But no reason why they couldn't have both options available - my toddler was given a key card because under 2s aren't allowed medallions. Sky also had Starlink. Very reliable 3Mpbs all over the ship at any time. And we even had signal in our cabin. The WiFi is super patchy on Cunard and the internet itself very slow. Last time we were on QM2 we couldn't get any signal at all in our room - not idea when you want to browse the internet at 3am while you feed the baby! Whatever they do change on the QM2 I hope the changes are as successful as Carinthia Lounge which went from a disliked part of the ship to one of my favourite parts of the ship.

The internet is now provided by Starlink and we were seeing around 2.5-3Mbps down. Very reliable, no up and down speeds. I’ve seen speculation on another thread that the speed is throttled so that everyone gets more or less the same service all the time rather than one person being able to hog all the bandwidth. I managed to stream tv on my iPad with only a few buffering pauses. Very happy with the internet on board.

I had a glass of Malbec in the Crown Grill tonight and my husband has had it in the MDR. Can be more specific than ‘Malbec’ though. This is my first Princess cruise having done 11 with Cunard. Some things like the room, the buffet and medallion (so good for travelling in a group) I really like. Others like slow service, fairly uninspired menus and general crowdedness I haven’t. I have my toddler with me and the staff have been excellent with her.

Could it the reduction in formal nights be a money saving exercise? I know a lot of cruisers expect to see a higher level of food in the MDR on a formal night. So if you reduce the number of formal nights you also reduce the food bill. It's not much but when your ledger is billions in the red every little helps. I also suspect that Cunard aren't as bothered about the opinions of existing passengers as they are about the opinions of potential passengers. It's no good catering only to your shrinking pool of existing customers to the exclusion of new passengers or you'll eventually go bust. So if potential passengers are saying that formal nights are offputting they'll get rid. I was worried before my first trip with Cunard but find its something that I enjoy now. But I did have to buy a lot of dresses for that first trip because like most people my age, I don't own a lot of formal wear. It's just not called for these days.

I got one too. It's made the wait until my November trip to Norway on QV seem like that much further away.

I love dressing for dinner on the QM2 but if I didn't I'd still love the relaxed vibe, the great insight programme, the amount of space per passenger, sitting at the bar in the Golden Lion with a beer and a book, the uncertainty of how the Atlantic will behave and the sense of coming home I get when I step on board. Honestly, with the way some people want to drive away customers who don't like things exactly like they do sometimes it seems like half this board don't actually want Cunard to be a financial success and remain a viable line long into the future.

It's the promise of the pudding trolley that makes me get the iPad out! I simply have to do my best to get to those delicious desserts 😄

Believe me, I tried all the toys I could think of but my daughter likes to be moving and doing instead of sitting and they just ended up being flung on the floor which was disturbing for other guests. She wasn't a big eater at the time so food didn't distract her for long. The iPad ended up being the best tool for the job at that time (9 months old) but I expect to phase it out as she gets older and able to sit still for longer and take part in conversation more. We don't have technology at the table at home but we don't have three courses at home either.

In the weeks leading up to my baby’s first cruise I was so worried but we enjoyed it so much that we have four cruises booked over the next 2 years. It’s so much less stressful than the airport if you sail from Southampton. You roll up with a car full of baby crap, get on board and it’s waiting for you in your room. You can take as much stuff as you like. You don’t have to worry about needing a car seat at the other end if you stick to walkable ports. There’s always a big variety of food available so you don’t have to worry about finding something to eat. My baby had chicken and veggies cooked specially for her every night. You don’t have to spend half the day searching for somewhere suitable to eat. There are toys on board and an evening baby sitting service for sleeping babies run by staff that are properly qualified. Many of the staff have children of their own and love interacting with kids. Many of the passengers have children and grandchildren and love interacting with kids. My baby soon figured out that she could wave as she was carried about the ship and gets lots of attention. Sure, you might come across some people who disapprove of children being on board but they will be in the minority. As long as you aren’t annoying other passengers - swift exits if little one gets upset at dinner etc - then you are only enjoying something that Cunard themselves are advertising. The whingers can find an adults only line.

Children in nappies aren’t allowed to use the pools on any cruise ship. There are splash zones on some Disney, MSC and (I think) Royal ships but no access to actual swimming pools. It’s a hygiene/disease spreading thing because swim nappies don’t absorb urine and draining a pool down at sea is so much harder than on land. I realise I should have said that the night nursery is until 11 not all night. Still long enough to have a few hours to yourself though.

I can’t help you with a toddler but I did take my then 11 month old on the QM2 in December and the QV in October when she was 9 months old. She was crawling and cruising on both trips so we were quite aware of making sure she wasn’t a nuisance to other passengers. We found that there always seemed to be one bar open that was quiet enough for little one to explore a bit without annoying any passengers or staff while we tag teamed drinking a coffee and baby wrangling. The children’s facilities are quite good. There’s a room with all sorts of baby and toddler toys for your little on to let off some steam in but they do need to be supervised by an adult. I can’t remember the exact times this is open but it’s for a few hours in the morning and afternoon. You can drop them off after 6pm to sleep in the night nursery which is the same room with travel cots put up. You get a pager and if your little one wakes up, you have to go collect them. The staff check on them every 10 minutes. You’ll know if you are likely to make use of it but if you can then I’d recommend it as a way to avoid being trapped in your room all evening in the dark being quiet. The staff are all UK qualified childcare workers and seemed really good at their jobs. We took our daughter to the main dining room each night and was able to get through 3 courses most nights with some cartoons on an iPad with the sound turned off and a bit of bread roll while we had starters. My daughter takes ages to eat so we could often get dessert down us while she was finishing her food. They were happy to cook her a meal from the menu each night without salt but we found it easier to just ask for a grilled chicken breast and some steamed veggies to be ready for her each night. We made sure she had a bit of variety via a buffet breakfast and lunch. Buffet also meant we could get food to her quickly. If your toddler isn’t ok with a shower yet then you can ask for a baby bath. Our 11 month old had plenty of room to splash around in and play but she is on the smaller side. One of the biggest problems we had was that our buggy didn’t fit through the cabin door so we had to take our daughter out in the hall and fold it down to get it in the room. On our next cruise we’re taking an umbrella stroller.

You'd need to compare widths but my Baby Jogger City Elite was ever so slightly too wide to fit through our cabin door on Cunard which was a complete pain because we had to get baby out in the hall and collapse the stroller to get it in the room.

Going back to this point. I have personally experienced this on a September 2021 sailing around the British Isles. My husband had the full drinks package while I only had the soft drinks package. However, I was visibly pregnant so it was clear that I would not be drinking at any stage of the trip. I asked bar staff as soon as we got on board but it had to be run by the one of the bar supervisors so we couldn't actually buy the package until the next day which wasn't a problem since we would have struggled to drink the $69/$29 package costs on embarkation day. In fact, a lot of the bar staff were advising people not to buy on the first day because of this.