caribill

Benefits have gone from getting something at no cost to only getting something if you spend more money with Princess. o Don't purchase photographs = no new benefit o Don't purchase Spa services = no new benefit o Don't purchase Princess shore excursions = no new benefit Sort of like the infamous Princess coupon book -- spend money with Princess and get a discount. I have never seen a post saying how that coupon book is a great thing to have.

And, no doubt, more expensive.

I look at it differently. The price for 150 free minutes on a 7 day cruise would have been about 50 cents/minute or a value of $75. The current undiscounted price for unlimited minutes is $70 for 7 days. The discounted price is $35. If Princess offered the current Internet for free for 7 days, it would cost Princess less than the old benefit cost them.

Glad you agree.

It is a 28 day cruise. So that is about $37/night/person. Some people may find that reasonable.

It snowed when we were on the Antarctica part of our Antarctica cuise.

Another reduced Elite benefit is the 10% discount for Boutique purchases. The 10% discount now only applies to full priced items. If the item is put on sale for one cent less than full price, the discount no longer applies.

Good IT team = $$$$ Bad IT team = $

No. My spouse would be shocked to find out I was ever in the gym.

Now that crew appreciation is pooled across the entire fleet, not just to the crew on the ship you are on, one's daily crew appreciation amount is about one cent per crew member on your ship per day. They are pleased because they get to keep 100% of what you gave them. For the cabin steward, significantly more than the 7 cents your daily crew appreciation for a week flows through to him/her.

If your husband will be using the same card, then in your record there should be someplace to put him in as an authorized user. That may or may not be the reason one is green and the other blue. There have been many posts about this happening to others with no explanation as to why it happened.

When a chip fails to be read several times, the machines then ask you to swipe the card so the magnetic strip can be read to complete the transaction. Sometimes this is because the machine cannot read chips properly. Sometimes it is because the chip has been damaged somehow.

Can they erase the data on a credit card's magnetic stripe?

No problem. The tracking is of the Medallion, not the person. Hide the Medallion in the gym and then go wherever you want.

Not everybody books through a CVP.

Apparently it is not the price of the cruise that is a major feature of the black Friday sale, it is the $100 deposit.

Not to mention the extremely small hidden tracking devices inside embarkation day meals.

Is the wearing of masks still optional for passengers and crew?

Are the bars even open at 7:30 AM?

As pointed out earlier in this thread, to really increase bookings by families, Princess will need more cabins that can comfortably sleep 3 or 4 passengers.

Standard fare is the fare that does not include internet, beverage package and crew appreciation (tips). Any discount for this promotion will be off the current standard fare. I assume that for $50/day/person you could add the internet, beverage package and crew appreciation which would bring it up to the Plus fare amenities which is the standard fare plus $50/day/person.

What you can do is set up a reservation for the desired time in the desired dining room. Princess has an app that includes this option, but it might ber easier to just call Princess and have a rep set up your dining times. However, a table for 12 might present a problem. Even if a table for 12 was available, it might not be available at the time you want it to be. Even if one was available, I would prefer instead to have two tables for six. A table for 12 would be so big that most people could not communicate with most of the other people. Two tables for six would solve that problem and you could change people between the tables on different evenings. Even if you are able to set this up pre-cruise, once onboard speak with the dining room manager to see if he/she can make sure the two tables will be the same ones each evening and will be near one another.

Available for purchase for 24 hour periods.

Then you probably also do not like Elevator Roulette" on Princess.

When cruises open up for initial booking, TAs can arrange with Princess for them to have X number of cabins available for them to sell. This number of cabins is a "group" and the TA gets a discount on the pricing which may (but does not have to) be passed on in all or part to the customer. The TA also gets "amenity points" that can be used to give customers perks such as OBC, wine, specialty dining, etc. The TA could also choose to use the points to get a higher commission instead of passing them on as a perk to the customer.