Excursion price increases

[Hamilthorn]

21 hours ago, karatemom2 said:

In the instance of the Norway excursion I was watching there is clearly still plenty of availability so the price increase wasn’t related to capacity. I was sort of hoping to hold out and book onboard because we have a ton of OBC. But with the prices going up, it seems like waiting just ends up costing more. 

When we went to Flaam, I booked the train ride directly with the railway, independent of the RCL excursion, for cheaper and at a different departure time that still fit within our port stay. Of course, using your OBC would be cheaper.

[karatemom2]

8 minutes ago, Hamilthorn said:

When we went to Flaam, I booked the train ride directly with the railway, independent of the RCL excursion, for cheaper and at a different departure time that still fit within our port stay. Of course, using your OBC would be cheaper.

Yes, booking direct is the best option. Most of the people on our roll call booked the train in Flaam directly, although it is now showing sold out for most times via direct booking as well. We are doing a Princess excursion there because we wanted to go further to Voss and it was the only viable option. 

[lahlah57]

5 hours ago, MissP22 said:

The more they raise their prices, the more people decide to book tours with outside vendors, usually at up to half the price. You'll often see Princess people at the same locations crammed onto busses and forced to stop at souvenir shops for a lot of wasted time. 

Princess, as well as other cruise lines, have gotten to greedy lately.

There are options and I will take those instead of being taken advantage of by the cruiseline.....just not worth it to me!

[rosevew]

I noticed it at the end of last week for our Med cruise in May. One excursion I was looking at had gone up 30%. The 'from' price wasn't available at all either, even for kids. I contacted the online chat but couldn't get a straight answer there as to what was going on so said that I'd not be going to book any as the increases were out of all proportion. The trips we were looking at were a total of $560 and had increased to over $750. I'll be keeping my money, thank you.

[KillerSnake]

On 2/17/2024 at 12:27 PM, lahlah57 said:

Just looked at excursions in alaska for our cruise in may and it is absurd...$$$!

We decided no excursions and will just walk off the ship and walk around town or take a simple shuttle into town or hop on hop off! We will not be hosed anymore than we already are!

 

Depending on your Ports of Call, I recommend the Guided Map walks under auspices of the American Volksport Association. They cover the nice major points of each port. Three that come mind offer 5K or 10K (some 11K - I think) options. The longer ones can be a bit more challenging for mobility-limited persons.  There is a small fee of less than $10. The guides keep you on track and a Turn by Turn instructions. Plus you get AVA credit towards AVA Event & Distance tracking.  After looking at the Excursions list and prices, this is what my wife and I opted to do. I know several of the Youtube videos of "Walking in Port X in Alaska" are fairly close to the 5K routes.  For my wife and I, this is type of excursion we like. We get to see the key points, have time left to stop and eat or shop (before during or after) our 2-3 hours walking (we read all the signs LOL), earn our AVA credit and can then go back and enjoy more of the ship.

[tulok]

Even the clam shells at Princess Cay went up $10 more. 

[roxievegas]

We have an Alaska cruise booked for May 2025.  After I booked the cruise I went to the excursions and put on wishlist the ones for each port I was interested in.  After reading here that the price had gone up, I went to my wish list and saw that one had gone up $14 each and the other $10 each.  The rest are still the same.

Yesterday I went on line and purchased five excursions.  I have leaving the others to be "get off the ship and walk around"

We are elite, so we are suppose to get 10% back once we are on board.

I also purchase our gratuities - we are 14 months out and I figured we will see a price increase by then.

[threebluestars]

Ugh, I wish I'd booked a few weeks ago but because my cruise isn't until September I resisted. Now the only one we were going to take (because it was in to Paris from Le Havre and didn't want to risk not returning on time) has gone up FIFTY dollars.
 

This is my first Princess cruise in 30+ years. We'll see how it goes.

[Lanwood]

On 2/19/2024 at 2:17 AM, karatemom2 said:

I’ve compared what other lines charge for the exact same tours and Princess always seems the most expensive.

I don't know...My next cruise on Celebrity has been giving me tentative heart failure with the prices they are asking for shore excursions (and everything else). Was thinking Princess looked cheap in comparison. Which is saying something....🤯

[roxievegas]

I forgot to mention that I had researched non Princess excursions with companies that others had recommended.

one - the price was comparable to Princess or close enough

two - some stated that you had to pay now and no refund if cancelled within 48 hours

 

I do know that sometimes the ship arrives late to port or has to change things around and I didn't want to have to deal with an outside company not being able to use them and lose my money.  At least with Princess, I know that I will be refunded if something goes wrong.

[milolii]

1 hour ago, roxievegas said:

I forgot to mention that I had researched non Princess excursions with companies that others had recommended.

one - the price was comparable to Princess or close enough

two - some stated that you had to pay now and no refund if cancelled within 48 hours

 

I do know that sometimes the ship arrives late to port or has to change things around and I didn't want to have to deal with an outside company not being able to use them and lose my money.  At least with Princess, I know that I will be refunded if something goes wrong.

We use the same logic.   I see fewer small private companies offering the full refund if the ship doesn’t make the port.  And as you said the bigger companies have that 24-48 hour cancellation policy.  Many people don’t read this.  
 

Other factors include how far the excursion travels away from the port and if no other option is available. I had a private vendor email me in December that they could not guarantee an on time return; so we went with the similar Princess option. 
 

We book a mixture of Princess sponsored, private groups, and DYI excursions.  
 

 

[Paula_MacFan]

2 hours ago, roxievegas said:

I forgot to mention that I had researched non Princess excursions with companies that others had recommended.

one - the price was comparable to Princess or close enough

two - some stated that you had to pay now and no refund if cancelled within 48 hours

 

I do know that sometimes the ship arrives late to port or has to change things around and I didn't want to have to deal with an outside company not being able to use them and lose my money.  At least with Princess, I know that I will be refunded if something goes wrong.

 

I agree with all your statements. We use a mixture of Princess, independent, and DIY depending on port. In Europe we had several 12 - 14 hour port days with excursions miles from port. We chose Princess for those due to logistics and had wonderful trips. None of them were 'packed' as frequently stated, the buses were new and modern, and most were about half full, with excellent guides.

 

To your first point, for our upcoming Alaska cruisetour most Princess excursions are within $19 of the vendor price, but also include transportation which I figure is worth the small difference. Couple that with being able to easily cancel and automatic refunds if we miss port seems like a no-brainer.

 

We were on the Regal 3 weeks ago and missed Costa Maya due to wind. We received our refund check in the mail within 2 weeks of getting home.

 

 

 

 

Edited February 20 by Paula_MacFan

[dickinson]

I just looked at our one ship excursion we booked for Norway and it went up $60/pp.  Wow!  Glad we booked last month.

[Joanne G.]

On 2/19/2024 at 5:39 PM, Lanwood said:

I don't know...My next cruise on Celebrity has been giving me tentative heart failure with the prices they are asking for shore excursions (and everything else). Was thinking Princess looked cheap in comparison. Which is saying something....🤯

Celebrity has run several “flash sales” on excursions recently that are real sales, meaning price reductions up to 50% for a limited amount of time.  I saved a lot by booking excursions during those flash sales, and now I’m having the heart failure looking at prices for excursions on my 2025 Princess cruise!   Based on the information here, no sales on Princess and they only get more expensive closer to the cruise.  We better start planning . . . 

Edited February 21 by Joanne G.

[Eno]

Guess what.... a 'sale' has started on the excursions.  Most went back to regular (pre-increase) prices.  One stayed 20.00 more.  Sale runs until Feb 25th

[rosevew]

8 minutes ago, Eno said:

Guess what.... a 'sale' has started on the excursions.  Most went back to regular (pre-increase) prices.  One stayed 20.00 more.  Sale runs until Feb 25th

Just spotted this too. The excursions we wanted are still more than they were a couple of weeks ago and the other is sold out.

[dickinson]

My one excursion booked went up $60 and now with the "sale" it is $10 more than what I paid.  Some sale.

[cr8tiv1]

Is this really a “sale” or push back due to the amount of feedback from disgruntled passengers?

[rosevew]

6 minutes ago, cr8tiv1 said:

Is this really a “sale” or push back due to the amount of feedback from disgruntled passengers?

Not sure but I'm still not booking.

[MissP22]

22 minutes ago, rosevew said:

Not sure but I'm still not booking.

The only time we book with Princess is if it's a complicated tour and if it's a considerable ways from the ship. Caribbean tours are usually close by without much driving involved.

Europe is entirely different. 

[karatemom2]

Feels like a bit of gamesmanship on the part of Princess. Hike up the prices by ridiculous amounts and then put them on "sale" to make unsuspecting consumers think they are getting a bargain or big savings if they hadn't been following these pricing maneuvers. We see what you are doing here, Princess, and we aren't falling for it!

[rosevew]

48 minutes ago, MissP22 said:

The only time we book with Princess is if it's a complicated tour and if it's a considerable ways from the ship. Caribbean tours are usually close by without much driving involved.

Europe is entirely different. 

Yes and we are heading to the Med. Some of the locations are quite a distance from the port.

[MissP22]

25 minutes ago, rosevew said:

Yes and we are heading to the Med. Some of the locations are quite a distance from the port.

I would still shop around & see some reviews of the independent tour guides. 

You might be surprised. 

People tend to post unsatisfactory reviews if something went wrong real quick.

[Torfamm]

15 hours ago, rosevew said:

Yes and we are heading to the Med. Some of the locations are quite a distance from the port.

Many tour operators will guarantee your return to the ship. It’s an important question to ask, especially on longer tours. If for some reason you don’t return in time, they will get you to the next port. 

 

It’s not that different on a ship sponsored excursion. While they may be able to wait a short time, if an excursion is seriously delayed, they have no choice but to continue the sailing.

Companies that operate tours build in time to address typical problems whether they run the tours privately or as a ship excursion. They don’t want people missing the ship. The cost to get their reputation would be enormous.

 

 

Edited February 24 by Torfamm

[leck57]

Just got the 20% off Northern Europe excursions email. Of course the small print has that the 20% is off the original launch price (who would remember anyway) and of the 4 excursions I had already booked, they were all above or equal to what I paid and the one excursion I haven't booked yet had not decreased at all. A great sale.