No Green lane in Australia

[Normanville]

We have been “downgraded “ to Blue after months of being Green for our October cruise. So has at least one other. We are assuming that this has happened because of the update to the app because of the new charges, and not being able to have the medallion shipped to us in Australia. If that is the case there will be no Green lane in Australian ports. If we can’t get to green I don’t think we can get a boarding time. Havoc will reign if we all turn up at the same time.

 

Is this happening to everyone in Australia who has future cruises booked?

[Jean C]

We've been downgraded to blue lane too, for our cruise in November. I had hoped it was a glitch in their system and I'd bounce back to green lane in a day or so, but you now have me wondering 🤔

 

Even when mailing medallions to addresses in Australia becomes a thing, spare a thought for your poor rellies in good ole NZ, it won't be an option for us lowly folk 😪

[Normanville]

Have just updated app, still Blue. Boarding times have been cancelled. Someone on another forum suggested to check 11 days from sailing.

[Jean C]

This third party article might help a bit  - sheesh, the lengths us poor passengers have to go to, to figure out changes that have happened - I've not received any info from Princess themselves, I don't know where I'd be without Cruise Critic!

 

https://www.cruisehive.com/princess-cruises-details-new-embarkation-procedure/106468

[OzKiwiJJ]

Before our last cruise in March we dropped from Green to Blue a few weeks before embarkation. Once we had done the health declaration it went back to Green. 

[Jean C]

17 minutes ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

Before our last cruise in March we dropped from Green to Blue a few weeks before embarkation. Once we had done the health declaration it went back to Green. 

Had you already selected a boarding time? That option's disappeared!

[Normanville]

36 minutes ago, Jean C said:

This third party article might help a bit  - sheesh, the lengths us poor passengers have to go to, to figure out changes that have happened - I've not received any info from Princess themselves, I don't know where I'd be without Cruise Critic!

 

https://www.cruisehive.com/princess-cruises-details-new-embarkation-procedure/106468

Thanks for that info Jean. Looks like you are in the Green lane only if you have your medallion in your hand. So we will only have two lanes Blue and Accessible. I guess  there will have to be a priority lane as that is part of the Premium package. Also good to know about the 11 day update with cabin number as we have a guaranteed mini for our Christmas cruise. Probably bought this in because of all the Guaranteed cabins available now.

Juls

[Normanville]

8 minutes ago, Jean C said:

Had you already selected a boarding time? That option's disappeared!

No that could only be done 59 days out and has now been discontinued. Had it marked on my calendar!

[Jean C]

30 minutes ago, Normanville said:

No that could only be done 59 days out and has now been discontinued. Had it marked on my calendar!

I have a friend who is boarding a Princess ship in Europe in two weeks. He was green lane and had chosen a boarding time, he's now blue and boarding time has disappeared. Just a shame that Princess doesn't communicate changes with passengers, all we ever get is upgrade, upgrade, upgrade emails 🥴

[LittleFish1976]

3 hours ago, Normanville said:

We have been “downgraded “ to Blue after months of being Green for our October cruise. So has at least one other. We are assuming that this has happened because of the update to the app because of the new charges, and not being able to have the medallion shipped to us in Australia. If that is the case there will be no Green lane in Australian ports. If we can’t get to green I don’t think we can get a boarding time. Havoc will reign if we all turn up at the same time.

 

Is this happening to everyone in Australia who has future cruises booked?

 

Social media reports say that Princess is doing away with boarding times altogether from some date in August (can't remember what date that was).

 

 

[Ondine]

2 hours ago, Jean C said:

This third party article might help a bit  - sheesh, the lengths us poor passengers have to go to, to figure out changes that have happened - I've not received any info from Princess themselves, I don't know where I'd be without Cruise Critic!

 

https://www.cruisehive.com/princess-cruises-details-new-embarkation-procedure/106468

 

Yes it would be lovely if Princess would do us the kindness of informing us of the changes.  I got upgrade offers this morning but no mention of all the changes that they are undertaking.  Thank goodness for all of you on Cruise Critic or else I would be completely in the dark.

 

On Youtube Canadians are complaining as they are also in the same boat with medallions.

 

I am not looking forward to boarding now because last November when the Grand first arrived it was pandemonium at boarding time.  Took us 3 hours to go through the terminal with nowhere to sit and people fainting in the heat.  Total chaos.  And we were green lane same as almost everyone else.

 

Am I crazy to have booked the first cruise for the Melb season??????  Beginning to think so.

[LittleFish1976]

3 minutes ago, Ondine said:

Am I crazy to have booked the first cruise for the Melb season??????  Beginning to think so.

Just checked which that would be. Seems I'm on that one too - my first time with Princess.

[Ondine]

I can't seem to find where on the online app you upload your health (vacc) papers.  I am sure you could do this last season.  I haven't tried the phone app.  Has this disappeared - will we not need to do it?

My photo is still there but am wondering if rules are going to change.  Still says you need rat test etc.

[OzKiwiJJ]

4 hours ago, Jean C said:

Had you already selected a boarding time? That option's disappeared!

For that cruise, yes, not that it made any difference as the ship was late arriving so embarkation was a shemozzle.

 

The arrival time selection seems to have vanished in the last week or so, posdibly since the new Plus/Premier deals were announced.

[OzKiwiJJ]

I'm not worrying about Green/Blue Lanes any more, at least not for Australian embarkations. It didn't seem to mean a thing on any of the six cruises we did in the past year. 

 

When we embarked the Round Australia cruise on Coral last year, three days after we had disembarked from a previous cruise, we hadn't even been able to get into the app to do anything. It only took a few minutes for them to do it all in the terminal. 

[OzKiwiJJ]

2 hours ago, Ondine said:

Am I crazy to have booked the first cruise for the Melb season??????  Beginning to think so.

After my experience in March I don't think it matters whether it's the first or last cruise out of Melbourne. It's a mess! At least it wasn't hot for our embarkation, just wet! 

[arxcards]

They were hoping to mail them out in Australia, at least that was one of their aspirations last year. It would make the boarding process even slicker if they did, and there would be a blue lane alternate for pick-up for anyone who doesn't have one.

 

Green lane for last season in Oz was pretty much only used to confirm your pre-cruise info was completed, including vaxx status and covid test. It was almost used as a carrot to get everyone to tick all their boxes, whether or not they were needed before check-in. As mentioned, green & blue were treated the same when entering OPT.

 

Now that anyone with premier will have priority boarding along with suites, elites & platinums, it will be interesting to see how it all works without boarding slots. If it reverts, those with priority will be able to arrive a bit earlier for check-in than the other half of the passengers.

[OzKiwiJJ]

50 minutes ago, arxcards said:

Now that anyone with premier will have priority boarding along with suites, elites & platinums, it will be interesting to see how it all works without boarding slots. If it reverts, those with priority will be able to arrive a bit earlier for check-in than the other half of the passengers.

In other words not much different to what it was pre-medallion, just few extra priority boarders.

[Jean C]

18 hours ago, Ondine said:

I am not looking forward to boarding now because last November when the Grand first arrived it was pandemonium at boarding time.  Took us 3 hours to go through the terminal with nowhere to sit and people fainting in the heat.  Total chaos.  And we were green lane same as almost everyone else.

Sorry to hear how difficult boarding was on the Grand. Now for Australia/NZ, instead of everyone being green lane, everyone will be blue lane (except maybe for a handful of Americans) 🤣

[arxcards]

11 hours ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

In other words not much different to what it was pre-medallion, just few extra priority boarders.

Except for the shorter cruises, with a couple of hundred extra priority boarders. Could be that for some of those, the priority queue will be longer than the regular queue.

 

At least for our shortie next Feb on Coral, we have all 3 priority qualifications covered.

[Kiwi_cruiser]

14 hours ago, arxcards said:

Now that anyone with premier will have priority boarding along with suites, elites & platinums, it will be interesting to see how it all works without boarding slots. If it reverts, those with priority will be able to arrive a bit earlier for check-in than the other half of the passengers.

 

I will be interested to see if elites & platinum will still get priority boarding!

[arxcards]

1 hour ago, Kiwi_cruiser said:

 

I will be interested to see if elites & platinum will still get priority boarding!

I can't remember what it was, but 15 or so years ago they wanted to roll back some of the Captain's Club amenities or qualifications. I can't recall what it was, but a mutiny was brewing and Princess relented. 

 

I can't see them tinkering with priority boarding in their loyalty program, but they have already staged it via boarding calls, depending on numbers. A similar response would likely see elites & suites as 1st call, followed by platinum & premier as 2nd call.

[OzKiwiJJ]

2 hours ago, arxcards said:

I can't remember what it was, but 15 or so years ago they wanted to roll back some of the Captain's Club amenities or qualifications. I can't recall what it was, but a mutiny was brewing and Princess relented. 

 

I can't see them tinkering with priority boarding in their loyalty program, but they have already staged it via boarding calls, depending on numbers. A similar response would likely see elites & suites as 1st call, followed by platinum & premier as 2nd call.

When we cruised from Barcelona on 2017 that exactly what they did - Elites and Suites first, then Platinums. We were only Platinum at the time but were in the first Platinum boarding group and there weren't many in the Elites/Suites group. They even had a nice lounge for priority boarders, with tea/coffee and cakes. Very civilised!

[Kiwi_cruiser]

8 hours ago, arxcards said:

I can't see them tinkering with priority boarding in their loyalty program, but they have already staged it via boarding calls, depending on numbers. A similar response would likely see elites & suites as 1st call, followed by platinum & premier as 2nd call.

 

When we cruise on the Majestic Princess from LA to NZ in October 2022, there was no priority boarding.
 

There was only 3 lanes, Blue, Green and something else.

[arxcards]

44 minutes ago, Kiwi_cruiser said:

 

When we cruise on the Majestic Princess from LA to NZ in October 2022, there was no priority boarding.
 

There was only 3 lanes, Blue, Green and something else.

Yellow lane would be the other.

 

This was all set-up around covid, with the intentions of keeping people apart. Boarding slot times were to be followed, regardless of loyalty/suite priority. There was still a priority check-in line in Sydney & Brisbane, and if parked in a seating area after check-in, they then called via priority groups first. Some days were awesome, others like your day in Honolulu and ours on the first day in Sydney on Majestic were painful. If they are dropping the selection of boarding groups, it will be reverting to priority boarding first, then likely allocated as deck by deck after that as it used to be.