CRUISE REFUND RECEIVED

[mercury7289]

3 minutes ago, AndyMichelle said:

Wowzz got kisses on his... 

Andy 

In the current climate,very dodgy that!

[pete14]

27 minutes ago, AndyMichelle said:

Wowzz got kisses on his... 

Andy 

Happy to do without kisses

[swaddy]

It is a relief to finally get an acknowledgment that my refund is in the queue. 60 days is the third week of June, hoping it will come in time for my birthday at the end of June. Wouldn't that be nice. 

[jeanlyon]

Graham, you have to laugh!  Response at 20:32 from Sarah.  "Good evening, I have escalated the above".  I had to reply that I have already escalated this twice already!!

[grapau27]

29 minutes ago, jeanlyon said:

Graham, you have to laugh!  Response at 20:32 from Sarah.  "Good evening, I have escalated the above".  I had to reply that I have already escalated this twice already!!

She is a guest relations team leader with direct access to finance so her escalation might be good news.

I hope your refund turns up quickly.

Mine turned up last night a few hours after she said it was going into my bank.

I have exchanged 16 emails with her when others including Paul Ludlow have not replied and her last email said she will sort our deposit.

[Purdey16]

I have finally had two emails tonight acknowledging my two cancelled trips and that I had requested full refunds and now that they got some new system in place to get the refunds rolling ( so to speak) maybe the refunds will be a lot quicker but they are still doing March refunds , I think I have about a week left before my 60 days are up and I didn't count the weekends or bank holidays are , let's hope Jean and Andy next in line ☺

[No pager thank you]

I was unusually pleased with my computer this evening. 

 

It automatically detected El Presidente's email, considered that it contained repeated/unwanted material, and accordingly filed it for me in "Trash." Very apt.

 

Now, if only it could be taught to do the same with any email containing the word "unprecedented" then I would be even happier...😉

Edited May 19, 2020 by No pager thank you
Typo

[wowzz]

1 hour ago, pete14 said:

Happy to do without kisses

Pete, "Save all your kisses for me!"

[pete14]

5 minutes ago, wowzz said:

Pete, "Save all your kisses for me!"

I thought you would never ask wowzz. Let’s just hope cruises never coincide or there may be some explaining to do. 

[grapau27]

1 minute ago, pete14 said:

I thought you would never ask wowzz. Let’s just hope cruises never coincide or there may be some explaining to do. 

You could always get on the

Love Train.

[jeanlyon]

Graham, another reply from Sarah.  She can see that my forms have been sent to Finance and it should take 7-10 days.  I told her I thought Paul Ludlow's email was the last straw as I am already at nearly 70 days!  Yes I was polite.

[pete14]

10 minutes ago, grapau27 said:

You could always get on the

Love Train.

And equally we could not always get on the love train, love train. Mind you, if wowzz has received a refund, it may be an opportune moment.

[grapau27]

5 minutes ago, jeanlyon said:

Graham, another reply from Sarah.  She can see that my forms have been sent to Finance and it should take 7-10 days.  I told her I thought Paul Ludlow's email was the last straw as I am already at nearly 70 days!  Yes I was polite.

Fingers crossed that she can fast track it for you.

When I mentioned Paul Ludlow and his up to 60 days it seemed to speed things up.

At least she is keeping regular contact with you unlike some that don't reply to emails.

[jeanlyon]

agree.  Don't get me wrong.  I think it will come, it's a question of when.  I am also chasing my friend's refund, same cruise.  same cancellation dates.  All done through helen.

[grapau27]

8 minutes ago, jeanlyon said:

agree.  Don't get me wrong.  I think it will come, it's a question of when.  I am also chasing my friend's refund, same cruise.  same cancellation dates.  All done through helen.

I know,it was just a relief for us when our refund turned up

[terrierjohn]

The pent up excitement of all you still waiting for a refund is palpable, I do hope you receive it soon or the explosion could be bigger than Vesuvius.

[Jennizor]

Like a lot of others, I received an e-mail from P & O today about my refund. They assured  me that they are working hard to process the large number of applications and I would receive my refund asap. Having just read the e-mail again, I noticed that the booking reference they quote is completely different to the actual one. I am only on day 28 currently so not expecting anything soon but I wonder what this discrepancy means!

[grapau27]

1 minute ago, Jennizor said:

Like a lot of others, I received an e-mail from P & O today about my refund. They assured  me that they are working hard to process the large number of applications and I would receive my refund asap. Having just read the e-mail again, I noticed that the booking reference they quote is completely different to the actual one. I am only on day 28 currently so not expecting anything soon but I wonder what this discrepancy means!

There was 2 on ours 

1 was the right one that we got our refund for last night Day 67.

The other was not ours.

The best thing to do is ring early when they open (9.15am) so you have a short wait and clarify your booking number and politely ask if your refund can be escalated.

If you sit back you probably won't hear anything until you are close to day 60.

[No pager thank you]

I was interested in this 2,000 a day business/special that someone speaking for P&O (allegedly) came out with today.

 

With little on TV, I set out trying to work out how "unprecedented" this refund issue really is - using pen, paper and basic maths, no other knowledge!

 

I share it here as supposition, and for illustrative purposes only, on the basis that no actual information has been forthcoming from P&O, frustrating most who are concerned about getting their money back according to any measurable period of time.

 

Looking at all the cruises disrupted so far across all seven ships, around 91 sailings have either been disrupted or cancelled across the fleet up to and including 31st July.

 

Using the actual capacity/cabin numbers for their ships, and the focus on high fill rates, you can get a fair guess of sold fares for these sailings. With the story of around "more than half" of people going for FCCs, not refunds, you can then have a fair stab at establishing what the refund backlog really is.

 

In doing so, you can assume that each payment has at least a deposit and a balance in most instances to reimburse (so each is a transaction needing to be processed), and additional transactions in some cases for excursions, pre boarding purchases etc.  This means that each cabin to be reimbursed has three or more "transactions" needing to be reversed to fulfill the refund.  Some just one or two, others more than three.

 

Without boring everyone with too many numbers, my estimates indicate that, at the worst, P&O have some 163k transactions to reimburse in total from both suspensions over the mid March to end July period, and somewhere in the region of 40k transactions needed to come back from the initial pause only.  At 2,000 a day transaction refund capacity, that's a total of 81.5 days effort at full tilt; we are going calendar not P&O working days here folks just to remind you 😉

 

Now, let's be fair/balanced and give P&O four weeks to set up this operation from when the problems really started in mid March; accept that's it's unprecedented; and give full latitude for them being slow off the mark with major incident response/planning.  That still gives them about 35 days of actual capacity up to now.

 

In turn, 70k of refunds should be out now, also assuming negligible numbers in the set up phase.

 

However, we know from passenger reports that many 1st wave suspensions remain un-refunded and up to 86pc overall. Even with a decent chunk of margin of error, it just doesn't suggest that a focus on refunds started at the outset.  45 days should have been deliverable at maximum, some quicker.

 

However, as nothing really started until, being generous, around 10 days ago, it gives you a sense of what the backlog volume really might be. 

 

It also suggests what will happen if the "pause" gets extended around the end of this month.  On that measure, only a quarter of the first (and second) suspension refunds combined could be out. 

 

This will be against a backdrop of passengers being asked to rebook on to increasingly full 2021 sailings, having less worthwhile 25pc bonuses due to fluid pricing, and greater skepticism built in about when cruising will restart.  Also lower goodwill generally.  All adds up to more passengers wanting refunds.  All leads to longer waits.

 

Conclusions:

 

-- If it's true, 2,000 refunds a day isn't sufficient/spectacular.  They need to speed up if so.

-- If it's only 2,000 refunds a day and the estimates that I have indicated are either accurate or an undershoot, then it will cause a bigger refund queue to form at some stage, arising from the slow start.

-- 60 days doesn't necessarily sound viable long term with this, even if they improve where they are now, as we know it that the official position is not the experienced reality for many.

 

You would need more transparency from Q&A from P&O to firm these numbers up, but in current circumstances, when I hear any special claim on this topic, always worth treating it with caution.  As I say my numbers are estimates only, so please treat with similar.

 

Mind you, I would be quite interested in hearing the response to "well you know only 2,000 a day will make it worse don't you..." from whichever customer services person announced that, if indeed they did😂

 

Hope more bank accounts are credited tomorrow for everyone on here

[pete14]

3 minutes ago, grapau27 said:

There was 2 on ours 

1 was the right one that we got our refund for last night Day 67.

The other was not ours.

The best thing to do is ring early when they open (9.15am) so you have a short wait and clarify your booking number and politely ask if your refund can be escalated.

If you sit back you probably won't hear anything until you are close to day 60.

Why should it be escalated? I have no issue with people who are in real need of the money they are owed being escalated or those who have been waiting the longest, but it should not be seen as a way of jumping the queue. 

[grapau27]

10 minutes ago, pete14 said:

Why should it be escalated? I have no issue with people who are in real need of the money they are owed being escalated or those who have been waiting the longest, but it should not be seen as a way of jumping the queue. 

Most of us sat back and didn't do anything until our original timeline of day 45 which was then escalated to up to 60 days.

I was asked by the agent if I wanted to be escalated when I rang at Day 59

Nothing wrong with anyone asking when they ring up they can only say Yes or no.

By law they should refund in 14 days even though given the circumstances most of us have been patient and understanding.

 

Edited May 19, 2020 by grapau27

[PandNo Refund]

I think the next lot of cruises contain a lot of ‘height of summer’ cruises...

Even if the average refund amount is £2000 and they are doing 2000 refunds per day, that’s £4million per day they are refunding. And £2000 is a very conservative average.

The next tranche could be the ones that sink P&O - surely nobody is booking ‘new’ cruises at the moment. A lot of outgoings with very little incoming cash... bad recipe.

[Josy1953]

I suspect that a number of people who have booked cruises for later in the year will decide to cancel and choose to lose their deposit. 

 

We have a cruise booked for November and have decided that until there is a vaccine we don't want to go on any cruises.  We have no intention of giving any more money to P&O and have to wait for however long to get it back so we will simply lose the deposit if P&O choose not to cancel the cruise before the balance is due.  It is only £124 because we booked early with a 5% deposit which we think in the current situation is negligible compared to what other people are going through.  We have another one booked for June next year and will leave that one until nearer to the balance due date before making a decision on that one.

[wowzz]

7 hours ago, PandNo Refund said:

I think the next lot of cruises contain a lot of ‘height of summer’ cruises...

Even if the average refund amount is £2000 and they are doing 2000 refunds per day, that’s £4million per day they are refunding. And £2000 is a very conservative average.

The next tranche could be the ones that sink P&O - surely nobody is booking ‘new’ cruises at the moment. A lot of outgoings with very little incoming cash... bad recipe.

However Carnival have raised $6bn recently, (albeit at a ridiculous rate of interest), which, according to the analysts will keep them afloat (sic) until the end of the year.  Currently about 50% of people are taking FCCs rather than cash refunds, which is obviously of major benefit to Carnival. 

Obviously,  the longer the current situation prevails, the fewer the number that will opt for FCC, and the confidence factor will really kick in. I reckon that the "crunch" in terms of bookings, refunds etc, will be around the beginning of Q4 this year.

[wowzz]

31 minutes ago, Josy1953 said:

I suspect that a number of people who have booked cruises for later in the year will decide to cancel and choose to lose their deposit. 

 

We have a cruise booked for November and have decided that until there is a vaccine we don't want to go on any cruises.  We have no intention of giving any more money to P&O and have to wait for however long to get it back so we will simply lose the deposit if P&O choose not to cancel the cruise before the balance is due.  It is only £124 because we booked early with a 5% deposit which we think in the current situation is negligible compared to what other people are going through.  We have another one booked for June next year and will leave that one until nearer to the balance due date before making a decision on that one.

In your position I would probably do the same. However  we have a much larger deposit (5% but for a 5 week cruise) which we are loath to lose. Given the new flexible deposit policy, I am going to keep moving the deposit to future cruises, through to 2023 if I can, when, hopefully pricing levels will have reverted to some sort of normality,  compared to the inflated prices I am currently seeing for 2021 and early 2022.