Island Princess Problems

[LewiLewi]

I am on the Island Princess now. After reading about it over the last few weeks, I was very concerned about what awaited me onboard. Honestly, it has exceeded my expectations. The service, the crew, the entertainment and people on board are very nice. The food is quite acceptable, and even very good on occasion. The crew is very attentive and I have found my needs quickly met. I haven’t encountered any water leaks or a/c problems.

Yes the decor is dated, but clean and comfortable. My last few cruises have been on Regent and Crystal, yet I would not hesitate to sail on the Island Princess again.

[latebuyer]

Does anyone know what they are doing in dry dock in september? Are the problems isolated to a certain part of the ship?

[tml1230]

9 hours ago, LewiLewi said:

I am on the Island Princess now. After reading about it over the last few weeks, I was very concerned about what awaited me onboard. Honestly, it has exceeded my expectations. The service, the crew, the entertainment and people on board are very nice. The food is quite acceptable, and even very good on occasion. The crew is very attentive and I have found my needs quickly met. I haven’t encountered any water leaks or a/c problems.

Yes the decor is dated, but clean and comfortable. My last few cruises have been on Regent and Crystal, yet I would not hesitate to sail on the Island Princess again.

thanks for taking the time to post your thoughts...much appreciated!

safe travels

[geoherb]

I posted a synopsis of my experience on the Princess Cruise passengers complaint forum on Facebook. I ended up removing the post. Those people are vicious. The gist was that I should be thankful for receiving an upgrade and shouldn't have expected any follow-up. 

[latebuyer]

I would like to know the extent of the problem. Note i'm not minimizing people's concerns but would like to know how many people this happened too. It appears right now there are a few vocal people.

[azbirdmom]

28 minutes ago, geoherb said:

I posted a synopsis of my experience on the Princess Cruise passengers complaint forum on Facebook. I ended up removing the post. Those people are vicious. The gist was that I should be thankful for receiving an upgrade and shouldn't have expected any follow-up. 

Yes, you'll find some sympathetic ears but mostly people want to bash anyone who says anything less than positive.  I hope you did send an email to the Princess execs.  I did see on another thread that someone else received a nice amount of FCC before they disembarked for the problems they had on the same sailing.  Hope Princess will at least do that for you at this point.

[Therese S.]

51 minutes ago, geoherb said:

I posted a synopsis of my experience on the Princess Cruise passengers complaint forum on Facebook. I ended up removing the post. Those people are vicious. The gist was that I should be thankful for receiving an upgrade and shouldn't have expected any follow-up. 

I never post reviews for that very reason.  Thank you again for your review, I enjoyed following along.  

[RLK33853]

Unfortunately some people (lets call them cheerleaders) love to judge other people - especially when the OP states a problem they have had with a cruise line. 

 

Lets be serious, if anyone has the carpet in their room soaked - management should have addressed this issue way before you got off.

 

As for those who get personal with their defense of any cruise line on a public forum - ignore them.  Everybody other than others of the same ilk ignores them when they read such posts.

 

Myself, when I see someone with a complaint I look at their posting history before I even try to form an opinion.  Interesting that doing so provides some insight into most complaints.  If the individual has a number of posts, mostly positive, and they then post a problem they have had, I take the problem as stated.  In other cases, some posters have negative comments about every cruise they have ever taken - then I take their issues with a grain of salt.

 

 

[jeromep]

On 6/17/2024 at 6:49 PM, latebuyer said:

Does anyone know what they are doing in dry dock in september? Are the problems isolated to a certain part of the ship?

I would also like to know.  I wish we had a member that had some inside line on the dry dock schedules and some of the rehab details of those drydocks.  I'm pretty sure we used to have a member here that had that insight, I vaguely recall their posts, but they must have moved on.

 

As @geoherb stated, the ship is unscheduled for 3 weeks in September.  Most dry docks are only 2 weeks in length, so either part of that 3 weeks is moving the ship from the disembarkation port to the dry dock port, or from the dry dock port to the next embarkation port, or a combination of both.  A 3 week dry dock would allow them to do an exceptional amount of work and rehab on to the ship.  It is amazing what can be done in a couple of weeks in dry dock with massive numbers of tradesmen brought on board and an already developed schedule of activities they must accomplish, however, an extra week could really make a huge difference.

[geoherb]

18 hours ago, azbirdmom said:

Yes, you'll find some sympathetic ears but mostly people want to bash anyone who says anything less than positive.  I hope you did send an email to the Princess execs.  I did see on another thread that someone else received a nice amount of FCC before they disembarked for the problems they had on the same sailing.  Hope Princess will at least do that for you at this point.

 

I'm not really expecting any FCC. The person who posted about receiving some was in a suite. He received more in FCC than I paid for my base fare. I wrote the three Princess execs someone recommended. 

 

I had a problem with receiving the full amount of what I thought I was due in refundable onboard credit after my Caribbean Princess cruise in August 2022. I filled in the contact form on the Princess website immediately after receiving my final statement that showed me losing $23.21. Someone from Princess finally followed up this week about that complaint, giving me $25 in goodwill OBC on my next cruise. She still could not explain the math to me as to how the determined the amount that was refundable and what they determine was not.

 

[azbirdmom]

5 hours ago, geoherb said:

 

I'm not really expecting any FCC. The person who posted about receiving some was in a suite. He received more in FCC than I paid for my base fare. I wrote the three Princess execs someone recommended. 

 

I had a problem with receiving the full amount of what I thought I was due in refundable onboard credit after my Caribbean Princess cruise in August 2022. I filled in the contact form on the Princess website immediately after receiving my final statement that showed me losing $23.21. Someone from Princess finally followed up this week about that complaint, giving me $25 in goodwill OBC on my next cruise. She still could not explain the math to me as to how the determined the amount that was refundable and what they determine was not.

 

When you hear back from Princess I'm fairly certain they will offer you OBC.  That's what they have done for others who have reached out after experiencing similar problems recently.  As for your refund that is insanely long to wait for a response.  I really do wish that Princess would add more staff to their customer service positions so that it wouldn't take reaching out to senior management to get satisfaction.  I know they are strapped financially but there are just some things you shouldn't skimp on if you want to keep your customer base.

[ebeluga]

42 minutes ago, azbirdmom said:

When you hear back from Princess I'm fairly certain they will offer you OBC.  That's what they have done for others who have reached out after experiencing similar problems recently.  As for your refund that is insanely long to wait for a response.  I really do wish that Princess would add more staff to their customer service positions so that it wouldn't take reaching out to senior management to get satisfaction.  I know they are strapped financially but there are just some things you shouldn't skimp on if you want to keep your customer base.

Hmm, if they are strapped financially, they shouldn't dole out such generous compensation packages to their senior mgmt!

[pink845]

So sad but these accounts are downright hilarious.  Sad but hilarious.  Princess treats passengers like cattle being held to slaughter.  We sat down to dinner on Majestic last  year (Alaska in May) and I felt that the chair was a tad wet.  Hmmm maybe someone had suffered an accident.  Okay. My husband asked that the chair be changed.  Done.  Waiting for appetizer to arrive, water or something else not sure came gushing down from the ceiling.  Right onto the table.  Great.  Help.  So sorry was the reply from the head waiter.  Give us a minute we will find you another table.  Dining room was packed.   Found us another table.  Ordered meal. I got up from my table to head to the lady's room only to find that a new couple of now sitting at my old table.  Can you imagine.  

[Rick&Jeannie]

On 6/17/2024 at 9:17 PM, LewiLewi said:

I am on the Island Princess now. After reading about it over the last few weeks, I was very concerned about what awaited me onboard. Honestly, it has exceeded my expectations. The service, the crew, the entertainment and people on board are very nice. The food is quite acceptable, and even very good on occasion. The crew is very attentive and I have found my needs quickly met. I haven’t encountered any water leaks or a/c problems.

Yes the decor is dated, but clean and comfortable. My last few cruises have been on Regent and Crystal, yet I would not hesitate to sail on the Island Princess again.

We are on the Island now...it's been great. No sign of any bad issues. I'm certainly not trying to diminish the bad experience that the OP had...

[JGmf]

57 minutes ago, Rick&Jeannie said:

We are on the Island now...it's been great. No sign of any bad issues. I'm certainly not trying to diminish the bad experience that the OP had...

 

I'm looking forward to end-of-cruise comments you may want to share with us when your sailing is over.  Enjoy your cruise!

[Rick&Jeannie]

We are in an aft-facing suite (first time ever in a suite...I think maybe we are just too enamored with the surroundings to "see" anything bad! Really enjoying this...we may be permanently spoiled! That being said, on a couple of evenings we've had a rather noticeable shrill coming from one of the balcony doors...as if it were not totally closed. It is though, and firmly locked. The only thing that I've been able to figure out is to open that sliding door just barely...maybe 1/16th inch. That reduces the noise considerably. It doesn't eliminate it completely but it is then manageable to where we can sleep. If you open it to where the noise totally disappears then there is way too much warm air rushing in and we would have A/C issues. 

Also, today is the first day that we've noticed just a bit of vibration. It's not bad at all (IMO), but some people may find *any* vibration objectionable. We're good with it.

As I think/notice things for the rest of the cruise I will post.

Currently heading for Saint John...and cooler weather!

[BamaVol]

@geoherb thank you for the appropriate title on your post. Your comments follow the title. I sometimes see posts with titles like “Don’t ever sail Island Princess”. 
 

First of all, I don’t take orders from anyone. 
 

Second, even the cruiser with the worst experience ever can acknowledge that their experience isn’t universal. They just got unlucky. Your post is a warning of what can happen. Add all the posters with issues and subtract all the posters who had the best cruise ever and you have a balanced sense of what to expect. 
 

It does sound like there are problems that need to be fixed. I guess I’d be leery if I was one of those sailing between now and dry dock. But probably not leery enough to cancel. I’d just keep my eyes open wide and be ready to advocate on my behalf. 

[Treasure Hunter]

I did not have the intention of ordering anyone around . Just giving a heads up. Forewarned is forearmed. I hope everything is fine and everyone has a wonderful cruise. We love Princess. We just thought the dry docked should have been moved up as we had so many problems in our beautiful Aft Suite bathroom. But the generous FCC has us on the Enchanted in September!

[beg3yrs]

2 hours ago, Rick&Jeannie said:

We are in an aft-facing suite (first time ever in a suite...I think maybe we are just too enamored with the surroundings to "see" anything bad! Really enjoying this...we may be permanently spoiled! That being said, on a couple of evenings we've had a rather noticeable shrill coming from one of the balcony doors...as if it were not totally closed. It is though, and firmly locked. The only thing that I've been able to figure out is to open that sliding door just barely...maybe 1/16th inch. That reduces the noise considerably. It doesn't eliminate it completely but it is then manageable to where we can sleep. If you open it to where the noise totally disappears then there is way too much warm air rushing in and we would have A/C issues. 

Also, today is the first day that we've noticed just a bit of vibration. It's not bad at all (IMO), but some people may find *any* vibration objectionable. We're good with it.

As I think/notice things for the rest of the cruise I will post.

Currently heading for Saint John...and cooler weather!

 

We were in an aft suite in Oct/Nov of 2022 and also had the shrill "whistle" at times. Complained to the front desk and maintenance came up and replaced the seals around the door. Fixed the problem.

 

No, the seals were rubber seals, not harbor seals...

[memoak]

1 hour ago, Treasure Hunter said:

I did not have the intention of ordering anyone around . Just giving a heads up. Forewarned is forearmed. I hope everything is fine and everyone has a wonderful cruise. We love Princess. We just thought the dry docked should have been moved up as we had so many problems in our beautiful Aft Suite bathroom. But the generous FCC has us on the Enchanted in September!

You can’t just “move up” a scheduled dry dock. There are very few places this can be done and they are booked years in advance. 

[Rick&Jeannie]

2 hours ago, beg3yrs said:

 

We were in an aft suite in Oct/Nov of 2022 and also had the shrill "whistle" at times. Complained to the front desk and maintenance came up and replaced the seals around the door. Fixed the problem.

Many thanks for cueing me into letting GS know about the whistling. I sent a crew call chat message and then we left the cabin for about 30 minutes. When we returned, maintenance was already in the cabin looking at the problem!

Edited 22 hours ago by Rick&Jeannie

[Treasure Hunter]

Ok if you know that you can’t move up necessary dry dock then ask the passengers if they want to sail with no hot water for five out of ten days with no cancellation penalty. Yeah right. Or send everyone affected the nice FCC in advance. Yeah right. And don’t tell me **** happens on a 21 year old ship. My house was built in 1953 and I keep up the maintenance. 

[memoak]

Dry docks have gotten harder as the ships get bigger and there are more of them. Back when all ships had 1,000 passengers or less there were more skips that could accommodate then. When Carnival did the latest dry dock of the Panorama in Portland they had to remove the stack before it could get under the bridges

[memoak]

26 minutes ago, Treasure Hunter said:

Ok if you know that you can’t move up necessary dry dock then ask the passengers if they want to sail with no hot water for five out of ten days with no cancellation penalty. Yeah right. Or send everyone affected the nice FCC in advance. Yeah right. And don’t tell me **** happens on a 21 year old ship. My house was built in 1953 and I keep up the maintenance. 

When something happens in your house or with your car it is easy to get a plumber or mechanic to fix. Huge ships are something totally different 

[Treasure Hunter]

Sigh