Princess Plus package price increase warning

[PMGS247]

18 months feels pretty inevitable that there will be a price increase.  Seems like a few people believe there are some good sources of advanced notice.

 

Regardless, being 18 months out would recommend adding it to the booking now.  Final payment won't be until ~Oct '24 so you're not locked into anything, but you do guarantee the current rate should you wish to keep it.  You can make a much more informed & lower risk decision at that point to remove it or keep it, whatever makes the most sense.

Edited June 5, 2023 by PMGS247

[reedprincess]

49 minutes ago, MissP22 said:

Princess use to do something similar a long time ago. 

We had the horse racing on Regal in Dec 2022.  Held in Vista lounge.  Good fun, as always. 

[MissP22]

1 minute ago, reedprincess said:

We had the horse racing on Regal in Dec 2022.  Held in Vista lounge.  Good fun, as always. 

I haven been a a smaller ship in a long time but I'll look for it.

[Honolulu Blue]

1 hour ago, MissP22 said:

Princess use to do something similar a long time ago. 

I'm not surprised.

33 minutes ago, reedprincess said:

We had the horse racing on Regal in Dec 2022.  Held in Vista lounge.  Good fun, as always. 

What excuse did they give for dragging those things out of storage?  I haven't seen them on any of the Princess cruises I've sailed on (all since 2021).

[SargassoPirate]

1 minute ago, Honolulu Blue said:

I'm not surprised.

What excuse did they give for dragging those things out of storage?  I haven't seen them on any of the Princess cruises I've sailed on (all since 2021).

I think they are stored with the barrel chairs. 😁

[Buckeye10640]

On 6/4/2023 at 9:19 AM, capriccio said:

That was my initial response to the new WiFi payment structure but after our last cruise, I've definitely changed my mind.

 

WiFi (which worked great on our Coral Princess cruise) is now so much more than just email.  Our DD had emergency surgery with complications half way through our 28 day cruise.  Being able to FaceTime and text with her and her family was invaluable.  We did not have to worry about tracking minutes or dropped connections.  We had no trouble with connections at any time of day or night (there was a 14 hour time difference).  My DH also used it for streaming. 

I dont mind paying for wifi, particularly with 50% off for platinum.  But....I  have not gotten availability and quality  anything like you are describing. Thats my problem....

[Honolulu Blue]

1 minute ago, SargassoPirate said:

I think they are stored with the barrel chairs. 😁

And the skeet shooting targets and rifles. 😃

[Buckeye10640]

40 minutes ago, reedprincess said:

We had the horse racing on Regal in Dec 2022.  Held in Vista lounge.  Good fun, as always. 

I have not seen that in forever!

[AtlantaCruiser72]

5 hours ago, Honolulu Blue said:

Here's a super random picture I took on a cruise I did in early 2020, before the pandemic, that wasn't on Princess:

 

1988 called ... they want their show lounge back .......

[charlie murphy]

7 hours ago, Expat Cruise said:

I wish we, too, didn't need the internet access. But the way our businesses are set up, without internet access, we could not be halfway around the World cruising, away from them. 

Well I'd be calling that a business expense! nice deduction! I get that, man what a nice office! 

[CynCyn]

9 hours ago, Buckeye10640 said:

I have not seen that in forever!

They had MOOSE Races in the piazza on Discovery last week.

[dsarah]

12 hours ago, PMGS247 said:

18 months feels pretty inevitable that there will be a price increase.  Seems like a few people believe there are some good sources of advanced notice.

 

Regardless, being 18 months out would recommend adding it to the booking now.  Final payment won't be until ~Oct '24 so you're not locked into anything, but you do guarantee the current rate should you wish to keep it.  You can make a much more informed & lower risk decision at that point to remove it or keep it, whatever makes the most sense.

If I add it to my current booking now, can I remove it before final payment without changing my current fare and OBC?

[PMGS247]

8 hours ago, dsarah said:

If I add it to my current booking now, can I remove it before final payment without changing my current fare and OBC?

Should be able to. This is definitely something to verify at the time of adding it, but given your base fare and promotions aren’t tied to the package and it would be a stand-alone add-on, I would think that would be fine. Now, if at the time of adding it they decide they can restructure your entire fare to something where the base fare and the package inclusions are melded together, then you could have a problem down the road. Their intentions may be 100% good in doing this, the total price and OBC may be better thus way, but you’d want to avoid locking yourself in.

 

It absolutely should be do-able, but you raise a good point that additional care should be given to ensure they don’t do it such a way that you’re locked in. 

Edited June 6, 2023 by PMGS247

[fizzy1]

Just booked our first Princess cruise,Sky, July next year,Norway , out of Southampton. Got a fab deal on plus,great cabin D420. Chuffed. 

[Cruise Raider]

4 hours ago, fizzy1 said:

Just booked our first Princess cruise,Sky, July next year,Norway , out of Southampton. Got a fab deal on plus,great cabin D420. Chuffed. 

Is that only on certain cruises?  I’d love to take advantage of that deal.  

[gah_cruise]

5 hours ago, fizzy1 said:

Just booked our first Princess cruise,Sky, July next year,Norway , out of Southampton. Got a fab deal on plus,great cabin D420. Chuffed. 

We sail on Sky this summer to Norway (14 nights) and have Premier (only cos it was included as promo at Plus price).  Just priced up the identical cruise for 2024 and it's 2K more for the two of us (with the current promo you showed)..... that's knocking on a nearly 40% increase over what I paid in Sept 2022 .

Thinks me going to wait a while.

[jwattle]

On 6/6/2023 at 11:24 AM, Cruise Raider said:

Is that only on certain cruises?  I’d love to take advantage of that deal.  

It's a UK deal

[Cruise Raider]

29 minutes ago, jwattle said:

It's a UK deal

 

Thanks!  It is a great deal .. would love to see that in the US. 

[Thrak]

On 6/5/2023 at 3:52 AM, Honolulu Blue said:

While I have a few minutes, I'll play off a couple of your comments.  

 

First, I was surprised by how many photos I've taken over the past couple of years of cruising.  I like going to concerts, and those take up a lot of pictures. I'm averaging close to 1000 per cruise these days.

 

And second, no, I'm sure my collection of photos and videos will not be treasured by my heirs (if they can find them).  But I value them in the here and now to remind me of where I've been and what I've experienced.  Here's a super random picture I took on a cruise I did in early 2020, before the pandemic, that wasn't on Princess:

 

 

I can't imagine wanting to wade through that many photos - especially as they all have non-intuitive names. If I had the patience to wade through them I'd likely rename a (very) few of them to recognizable names and dump the rest as things I'd never look at again anyway.

 

If taking all those photos is a good thing for you then, by all means, you should continue to do so. For me it would just be a bunch of dross. Fortunately, film and developing is no longer an issue and digital storage has become cheap so those who do enjoy taking multitudinous photos can do so to their heart's content.

 

Note On the price of digital storage: I once had to "make my case" for work to pay for a USB flash drive for me to use at work. It was 256 MB and cost $89. Times have certainly changed.

[katmu]

I just booked an April 2025 Med cruise on Sun Princess as a solo as it was actually cheaper for me to book with the Premier package than with Plus.  Even though there were some things in the Premier package I may not utilize like the “gifts”, at the price I paid I’m happy.

[nasa1974]

The Princess Plus and Premium is still a lot cheaper than Royal Caribbean and offers more. RCI has sales all the time to confuse you on actual cost. The Royal Caribbean offer is drinks only and the cheapest I got a package was $75/day. 

[Honolulu Blue]

41 minutes ago, Thrak said:

I can't imagine wanting to wade through that many photos - especially as they all have non-intuitive names. If I had the patience to wade through them I'd likely rename a (very) few of them to recognizable names and dump the rest as things I'd never look at again anyway.

 

If taking all those photos is a good thing for you then, by all means, you should continue to do so. For me it would just be a bunch of dross. Fortunately, film and developing is no longer an issue and digital storage has become cheap so those who do enjoy taking multitudinous photos can do so to their heart's content.

 

Note On the price of digital storage: I once had to "make my case" for work to pay for a USB flash drive for me to use at work. It was 256 MB and cost $89. Times have certainly changed.

Wading through all those photos isn't that big of a deal for me - the scrolling function in Google Photos works very well.  And I often put related photos in a group (e.g., Lou Gramm concert), which also helps.  And I like the default naming scheme of the photos (date and time) so helpful that I rarely change names unless I'm posting them somewhere else.

 

Sometimes I wish I didn't take so many pictures so I could more completely enjoy the experiences in the moment.  But I see the results, and it really does help me to remember and savor experiences in the long term.  

[antsp]

On 6/6/2023 at 11:24 AM, Cruise Raider said:

Is that only on certain cruises?  I’d love to take advantage of that deal.  

All of 2024