Wireless on Britannia

[SouthYorks]

Having elderly parents we need keep in touch with family. Can anyone tell me about the Wireless service onboard Britannia? Is coverage good across the ship or just certain areas? What is the cost of the service? We hope to use from iphones and ipad. Thanks.

[groovechick]

IIRC the packages cost £35 for 100 mins (if bought in advance they give you 20 free mins so you get 2 hours), or £70 for 200 mins. I bought one because of my work but would not have bothered otherwise.

 

It is mindnumbingly slow. Connecting can take up to 5 minutes. The connection drops out frequently. I managed to connect in our C deck cabin and on decks 16/17 - never tried anywhere else. I found logging on just to download e-mails usually ate 15-20 mins of time!

 

Unless you absolutely need to contact your family every day, I would just wait until you are in ports and use the free wifi services there. There are usually bars and cafes around the dock that have a free service - just look for the place that has a load of P&O or other cruise ship staff inside/outside. My children managed to use their phones/stay in touch everywhere we went apart from on sea days.

 

The packages are also individual, you can't have multiple users.

[SouthYorks]

Thanks Groovechick, useful information. Sounds like using texts on a mobile holiday package will be as cheap.

[Raymondo111]

Thanks Groovechick, useful information. Sounds like using texts on a mobile holiday package will be as cheap.

 

It depends on where you are, most mobile phone Companies offer some sort of pay per day plan in Europe to avoid data roaming charges etc, however, it's much more expensive if you are anywhere else in the World. Also I think if you use the ships mobile network if you are at sea then this may not be included in the Mobile Phone Companies daily rate.

[groovechick]

The ship's wireless network is completely independent of mobile phone service providers' networks, which is why you pay for it. Your usual network will probably have an agreement with the MCP (Maritime Communications Partner) which means you will be able to use your phone even on sea days. Check on your service provider's website, the info. should be there.

IIRC my provider's charges were £5/min for calls, 50 p for texts.

[tankmc]

Depends where you are going. it may be cheaper for you to look at the 3 mobile sim.

 

£10 you Get 3000 texts and 100 minutes plus 500MB

£20 you get 3000 texts and 300 minutes plus UNLIMITED data

 

the beauty is you can use these UK and the following countries at no extra cost

 

http://www.three.co.uk/Discover/Phones/Feel_At_Home

[themanwithahat]

Having elderly parents we need keep in touch with family. Can anyone tell me about the Wireless service onboard Britannia? Is coverage good across the ship or just certain areas? What is the cost of the service? We hope to use from iphones and ipad. Thanks.

 

TBH, your best bet is to contact them at ports. You might if lucky get close enough in dock to be able to connect (if you get a reasonable cost SIM or package) but the best bet is to find local Wifi points (Maccies are usually good !) that are free, or a free Wifi Cafe - this partly depends where you are stopping of course.

[Vampire Parrot]

One of the best ways to find a free WiFi hotspot in a port is to talk to your cabin steward - the crew can always find out the latest info on where the best WiFi hotspots are.... and in my experience, P&O crew do everything they can.

 

VP

Edited January 31, 2016 by Vampire Parrot