rocklinmom

I am surprised your TA didn't book your sons in their own cabin, they are more than old enough (minimum age to be in own cabin is 16). I've done it many times. 

5 hours ago, cr8tiv1 said:

For what is it worth:

 

1.  If the injury is covered by "cancel for any reason", you will get back the cruise fare minus the insurance cost.

 

2.  If the injury is not covered, you will get the cruise fare back as Future Cruise Credit.

 

3.  One person on the booking needs to remain/other name can be replaced.  There may be a last minute passenger fee.

 

I speak from experience.

December 1, fell and broke my wrist in Hawaii

December 7, surgery to fix and plate

December 10, flew back to California

December 23, flew to Seattle

January 4, flew back to California

6 weeks post fracture, began physical therapy

 

You are able to travel.  She will need assistance.  Nothing can be done while healing.  I was given the option of a removable cast for 6 weeks, or have the surgery and be castless (sort of).  I am guessing, that some orthopedic doctors might want a full hard cast.

 

Hope she is comfortable and will consider going on the cruise.  The wait staff will even cut up her meals.

 

 

Wow this sounds similar to her! Yes I am hoping she will still come with us and we can pamper her. The wait staff will cut her meals for her? That would be awesome and of course we can also do it. We are fine with taking the FCC for them if they decide not to go, or if possible replacing them with my sisters (but it sounds like one of them has to remain on the booking and I doubt he would choose between them LOL). We all live close to the SF port so easy to rebook them on another cruise with the FCC - and perhaps invite ourselves along...Thank you all for your responses 🙂 

We are 3 weeks out from our cruise and my mom fell and broke her wrist requiring surgery and possibly a followup surgery. We have Platinum insurance (because you never know what can happen, like this) so if they can't go, can we swap them out for two other family members? Or does one of them (him) have to remain in the cabin? I don't think he would want to go without her. We are getting down to the wire so I am trying to come up with a backup plan if needed. 

18 hours ago, Ken the cruiser said:

Yes. But I believe you get that 10% in OBC posted to your shipboard account once you board your cruise. At least that's how it worked on our recent Antarctica/SA cruise. In fact, it was in the form of refundable OBC, as we paid with a credit card for most of the excursions we prebooked.

 

Yes the Elite 10 percent discount posts as refundable OBC to your shipboard folio after you have done the shore excursion. 

The excursions for our May Alaska cruise are also currently marked with the 20 percent off "sale" but they are still higher than when we booked ours in February. Glad I booked them early. 

We will be sailing out of SF in May and would prefer to keep our suitcases with us when boarding so will try to do that. I hate waiting for our suitcases to show up at our cabin and sometimes it's not until late evening after dinner. Or everyone's shows up right away but one and it's usually mine. 

Yes you can book excursions in your Personalizer using OBC, it will automatically show your OBC as a payment option (uncheck it if you want to pay with credit card instead). Be aware if you do pay with OBC and later cancel the excursion it is a bit more complicated to get it refunded vs. an automatic credit card refund. 

Yes sadly this is the new Princess customer service number. Pretty sure this will be our last cruise with them. I shouldn't have to hound them on Instagram to get things done. 

2 hours ago, birdiebill said:

Please report on the amount of piazza sound on staterooms in the sphere on deck 10.  We are scheduled for 10428 later this summer and are not late night people.  

There is at least one person currently on deck 10 who posted on FB that she hears music from the piazza below her until midnight. She also said that the Dome shows were moved to the piazza since the Dome is not ready yet, so maybe it won't be as bad later? But you can always have music in the piazza. If you are a light sleeper and go to bed before 10 (like me) I would try to move up to deck 14 or 15. 

7 minutes ago, HondaGirl05 said:

Awesome! Glad it helped. Question - did it show you how many spots were left for the excursions in your account? We are trying to decide if we should take the risk (of loosing our spot) or not

Yes they are very clever and hide how many spots are left during these excursion sales. We just had one last week for Alaska cruises. I guess this week is Northern Europe. You should be able to cancel and then immediately rebook it, it should say "Apply Credit" or something like that instead of a pay button, then you should show as rebooked in the excursion at the lower price, and the refund of the price difference posts to your credit card within 2 to 3 days. I don't use OBC to pay for excursions because I don't know how smooth the refund process is, so if you used that instead of paying on a cc then I don't know how it works. 

Yes I know exactly what you mean. I have been sailing with Princess for years and I can't believe how bad their 800 number customer service is now. It's like night and day. I used to call the 800 number (let's say 5 years ago) and talk to an agent based somewhere in the USA and they were efficient and got things handled. Never had a problem. Now I've spent hair-pulling frustrating hours trying to communicate on the "new" 800 number and going nowhere, waiting forever to get a response on the new live chat, and after always booking my own cruises directly with Princess I gave up and used a PVP. I am not thrilled with him either but it was better than dealing with the phone agents. When I had a problem with my dad's military OBC I only had luck by messaging Princess on Instagram. If you have IG you might try that. I miss the old Princess 800 number agents, I don't know where they went, maybe they weren't rehired after Covid. It's sad that it's just not the same anymore. 

34 minutes ago, Rescue Dog Mom said:

Was there an additional charge for this lunch? Also (first-time cruiser), by MDR do you mean one of the Renaissance painter dining rooms?

Yes one of the the MDR's (main dining rooms) on each ship will be open for lunch on sea days, it's part of the included dining. One will also be open at embarkation from noon to 1:30. The entrees for purchase are a new thing with Princess, and you will see them on the dinner menus sometimes as well. 

Yay the fries have the sauces on the side! Thank you for posting this, she will be happy LOL

Thank you for posting the new MDR lunch menu, so we will have it on the Crown in May. I agree it will be nice to have lots of new choices. I hope they still have the traditional embarkation day lunch with chicken cacciatore and orange soufflé. Also my picky daughter will miss her traditional "large plate of French fries" (no way she would eat their new "colossal" version LOL) but I'm sure she can still order plain ones. 

1 hour ago, ninka26 said:

Would you be able to purchase at the lower rate and then cancel the original?

That's what I was trying to do this week. It worked when I did it last month (cancelled our excursions at the higher price, then rebooked at the lower price, and it refunded my credit card the difference in price). This time their payment system was all messed up and it wouldn't work. 

They ran this "Sale" last month for our Alaska cruise (after jacking up the prices first, then lowering them for the sale) and I booked ours. Now they are doing this second Alaska Shore Excursion Sale again and the prices are even less for the ones I booked. I tried to cancel and rebook for the lower prices to save some money but their shore excursion payment system conveniently wasn't working. It appears to be fixed now but I don't know if I want to mess with them again honestly, it was stressful. I have been sailing with Princess for years and this is a new thing. While I appreciate a "sale" it really isn't if they raise the prices first, then lower them during the sale, and then raise them again. Yes I know, the beauty of marketing LOL. 

Yes Princess has raised shore excursion prices significantly since the beginning of the year. For our May Alaska cruise they raised the prices, then lowered them for a 5 day "Alaska Shore Excursion Sale", then raised them again, and now are doing another 5 day "Sale" with even lower prices. I had booked ours during the first "Sale" and just tried to cancel and rebook them for these lower prices to save some money...of course their shore excursion payment system wasn't working and I couldn't do it.  I am leery of trying it again even though this second "Sale" goes until Monday the 19th. You might watch yours to see if they do the same thing, raise the prices and then do a "Sale" for you. 

1 hour ago, reedprincess said:

https://boards.cruisecritic.com.au/topic/2982198-new-princess-lunch-menus/

 

https://boards.cruisecritic.com.au/topic/2989705-the-new-lunch-menu/#comment-66870235

 

Just a few on the topic..

 

Oh I hadn't seen these...does the .au at the end mean the Australia CC forum?

Here are new MDR lunch menus that I saw in the Princess Food and Dining group on Facebook. The first photo is an explanation and it says that the last two entrees listed rotate every day. There are also extra items at the end for purchase. It doesn't say if the menus are fleet wide yet or not. 

Yes we are on an Alaska cruise and they have been playing with our shore excursion prices since the beginning of the year. The prices shot up, then went down for a "Alaska Shore Excursions Sale", then shot up again, and yesterday went down again for yet another "Alaska Shore Excursions Sale" LOL.

I was trying to cancel and rebook at the lower prices (they went down from when I booked with the first "Sale" prices). It had worked for me before but yesterday was a mess and nothing was working right. I would love to get the lower prices but I'm not touching it after that. Princess is definitely raising shore excursion prices across the board though. 

Looks like the shore excursions payment screen is fixed as well. I don't think I'm going to mess with it. 

1 minute ago, Thrak said:

 

Google, Yahoo, and DuckDuckGo are not browsers. They are search engines. Safari is a browser. Firefox is a browser. Chrome is a browser. If you are using Safari every time you are only using one browser. Clear the cache and cookies on your browser. Try a different browser.

I tried two other browsers, no difference 😞

I can't wait til we are onboard though, the ones we want are filling up. We also have to make our final payment next week, wonder how if their credit card system not working?

What the?! I am also trying to make a credit card payment today on shore excursions and the payment screen doesn't even come up in my Personalizer. It puts the shorex's in my cart, then I click Pay Now and nothing happens. Is Princess trying to make me never cruise with them again? I don't have time for this. How is their credit card payment system having issues? 

14 hours ago, cr8tiv1 said:

If you are a buffet person or will use the elevators most of the time, then I would book Riviera Deck 14   R730+   or more aft.  The infrequently used Cafe Caribe will be a deck above.  The benefit of these cabins are that you are 6 steps up to the Terrace (adult only) pool and Outrigger Bar.  It also has really nice tables and loungers.

 

Go to your app and pull up the photo for Terrace Pool.  Lovely spot and not well used.  

We are booked in cabins R707 to 701 this May on the Crown, across from the aft elevators for my elderly parents. They are under the buffet and you mention being farther aft than these, so do you or anyone know if there will be a lot of noise above us from the main buffet area? We still have time to switch cabins if necessary.