Grand Princess 8/9/07 Ups and Downs

[mike35]

Just returned this morning from the 12-day 8/9/07 Grand Princess Northern Europe cruise. Never heard so many complaints from fellow passengers - "lousy food in Horizon Court", "Poor Selection in dining room", "Worst coffee I've ever tasted in Horizon Court", "Imagine paying $4 for an ice cream cone", "indifferent service in DaVinci dining room", "mold in my bathroom", "toilets didn't flush half the time", "horrible lumpy mattress", "Last time I'll ever sail Princess", etc., ad inf. As a TA, I'm always attuned to fellow passengers' comments, and I passed many of them on to Princess management.

 

Personally, we had a wonderful time. The Grand is due for a bit of updating, but we found the crew to be terrific, the cabin service to be exemplary, Captain Perrin to be exceptionally personable and open to comments, the CD (Billy London) to be friendly and on top of things, and most of the show acts to be professional and very enjoyable.

 

I would be interested in hearing from other passengers on this cruise to get their critique.

[suron]

Just returned this morning from the 12-day 8/9/07 Grand Princess Northern Europe cruise. Never heard so many complaints from fellow passengers - "lousy food in Horizon Court", "Poor Selection in dining room", "Worst coffee I've ever tasted in Horizon Court", "Imagine paying $4 for an ice cream cone", "indifferent service in DaVinci dining room", "mold in my bathroom", "toilets didn't flush half the time", "horrible lumpy mattress", "Last time I'll ever sail Princess", etc., ad inf. As a TA, I'm always attuned to fellow passengers' comments, and I passed many of them on to Princess management.

 

Personally, we had a wonderful time. The Grand is due for a bit of updating, but we found the crew to be terrific, the cabin service to be exemplary, Captain Perrin to be exceptionally personable and open to comments, the CD (Billy London) to be friendly and on top of things, and most of the show acts to be professional and very enjoyable.

 

I would be interested in hearing from other passengers on this cruise to get their critique.

 

 

We were on the Grand for the Norwegian Fjords and North Cape cruise on 16th-28th July. There were a lot of negative observations from members of our Roll Call for that sailing. We were given little or no information on the various ports of call (no maps available for independent sightseeing as we have had on previous Princess cruises) and as we cruised the majestic fjords no-one gave us information as to what we could expect to see as we journeyed along (on our Alaskan cruise we had announcements regularly throughout the day as to what we could see ahead). Lots of people were less than complimentary about the Captain (Bommarco). We never saw him or any of his officers around the ship, he said barely two sentences at the Captain's Cocktail Party (which was really a waste of time attending in our view) - apparently this captain left the ship on the next cruise once it reached Belfast and Captain Perrin took over - lucky people who had this chap as from all accounts I have read he was very good as were his officers. Billy London was the CD and our sailing was the first he had undertaken on the Grand for that particular itinerary and the British Isles cruises - he was superb.

 

We are still amazed how the American market seem to be able to book so so far in advance. Some of our Roll Call members already had bookings for late 2008 and into 2009 - here in England we are lucky to get our hands on the 2008 brochures six months in advance and even if we manage to get the Early Bird Brochures we are restricted to certain cabin categories. If we choose to upgrade and pay a high price for doing so we are lucky if we can get any cabins as they have usually been booked by the American passengers some great time ahead. If we opt to go 'guaranteed' and get an upgrade we have to accept it and cannot revert to our orginal choice of cabin (this means we could end up in a part of the ship we do not like). One of our Roll Call told us that they get to have a say in whether or not they accept an upgrade from a guaranteed booking - another example of things working differently for the UK and US markets!!

 

We have written to Princess UK about these and other observations but whether they will bring things into line so that everyone gets the same chances who can tell.

 

I have written a review which can be found at www.cruisecritic.com/memberreviews/memberreview.cfm?EntryID=31110

 

Our experiences have not put us off travelling with Princess but it would have to be a very special itinerary, a very competitive price and we would want to get a good choice of cabin before going with them again. Some of the other shipping lines we have used in the past (MSC, Thomson, Costa, First Choice, Star Lines) are looking just as attractive in these areas and they seem to give everyone an equal chance when bookings open at the start of each season.

 

Good Luck with any future sailings

Suron in Bristol, England

[Spikesgirl]

Mike, we were on the 7/28-8/9 cruise and must have gotten all the happy people. I never heard anyone grumbling about much of anything, with the exception of no being able to get the excursions they wanted (overheard while we were checking something out).

 

We did find Captain Perrin to be exemplary when it came to making time to chat with passengers. We welcomed him aboard at the Captain's Circle and he starting talking with us as if we were long lost friends. It was rather surprising, but he did that with everyone. he truly enjoys interacting with folks.

 

We had traditional dining and didn't have any problem with the food. I did find the waiters in the Da Vince to be less personable. The husband of couple traveling with us is a master chef and he was pleased with the food, especially pleased with the steak house. Both cabins were clean and our stewarts freindly and outgoing.

 

It's very odd to have such swings in passenger satisfaction from one cruise to the next, but as you mentioned, as you are a TA, you might be more attuned to concerns and/or complaints. For our part, none of us noted any complaining folks.

 

Charlie

[DrivesLikeMario]

Suron, I think some of your problems have to do with your TA, not with Princess.

 

Your TA should've told you that you can look online and find the itineraries at the same time we, in the US, can. Most of us that book 1-2 yrs. in advance have not done so by looking at brochures, but by looking online or having TAs find out what the itineraries will be.

 

Also, when a booking is marked "will consider an upgrade" at Princess headquarters, that means that Princess is supposed to tell the TA that you're being offered a move to another cabin and at which time, you have the option to decline or accept this offer. Many times, the faxes with this information will get lost, mis-placed or never even leave the Princess headquarters to arrive at the TA's office. Whether the TA gets this information to the client is another question.

 

I'm not sure on the competitiveness of pricing in the UK, but I do know that generally, it really, really pays to shop around for the best price. Some agents discount prices by using a portion of their commission and some don't. Some get group space, some don't. Some are part of a very large conglomeration, some aren't.

 

Wishing you the same chances & experiences we have here with booking future cruises. :)

[spongerob]

We were also on the July 26 cruise with Charlie. We had previously taken this itinerary in 2005. If I had read the OP's post 2 years ago, I might have agreed. This time, we didn't encounter nearly as many little issues and I thought the cruise came off quite well. The dining was greatly improved compared to 2005.

 

I often read the complaint that there just aren't that many breakfast selections in Horizon Court. The question I have is, what else do you want? They've got all the standards, and some interesting items we normally wouldn't find in the US. I'm a bit surprised that more people don't make use of the dining room for breakfast, where you can pretty much get what you want.

 

I've also found, working in sales, that if you seek complaints, you will get them. It's all information that can be used, but I have to say that there will always be those who can take something small and make it sound like the world is coming to an end. It's hard to compare experiences and objectively evaluate statements that people make unless of course you can investigate yourself. All I can say is that my experience this year was entirely unlike what the OP reports, not that it was perfect, but there weren't complaints "ad. inf." either.

[Shogun]

Hi Folks,

 

First of all Captain Perrin is very good, might even go as far to say he is the best I have come across.

 

Reasons being,

 

He was to be seen almost every day some place around the ship.

 

He always spoke to you when he passed you, this is not so easy when you think how many people he might pass by when walking the ship.

 

When people asked to get there photo taken he was happy to stop and smile.

 

We sat next to him while he had a burger on deck, always like to see ships crew eating what we eat.

 

He gave a positive unbeat feel to all of his daily talks, which were longer than most captains but contained good information.

 

At captins cocktail party again he chatted well and told us about the crew and different passengers on board.

 

At Captains circle again he chatted well stayed around and mixed and chatted to people.

 

As to the cruise we had no problems of any type our table mates again had no problems, and I did not meet any one with any complaints while on board.

 

While sailing out on Oslo the ship had a speaker onboard to tell you what you could see.

 

 

While rounding the north of Scotland the captain told us what we could see.

 

Princess are poor at giving local info out, however with so much info out there I do not need the ship to give me a free map when there is already a place on the dock to get info.

 

However the cabin TV shows non stop info on the ports where to shop what to see etc, and there are talks to go to to get more info.

 

As to food, a couple of times I went to Horizon court and did not stay, because I could not find a seat if the food was that bad why was Horizon court full on so many days.

 

As to the Dinning room, again with people ordering seconds or even trying out different main dishes at the one meal, if food was so bad why would they do this.

 

Ok some folk did not like there steaks , these were replaced with ones which were either more cooked or less cooked, depending on what they wanted.

 

Some people will have real problems, if your loo is blocked, your tour cancelled and you go to the dinning room on a fish evening not liking fish then you will feel the whole world has it in for you,

 

For me those around me this was a fine cruise, for the folk that had not cruised with Princess but had cruised tbefore, that I met, they said they would return to Princess, so it could not have been that bad.

 

Could it have been better, yes, knowing what I know now would I have done this cruise or picked another,... I would still have done this cruise.

 

yours Shogun

[Bestbubba]

Suron, I think some of your problems have to do with your TA, not with Princess.

 

Your TA should've told you that you can look online and find the itineraries at the same time we, in the US, can. Most of us that book 1-2 yrs. in advance have not done so by looking at brochures, but by looking online or having TAs find out what the itineraries will be.

 

 

 

 

Actually, no! Sorry, but in the UK you CANNOT access Princess cruises online and book before sales open (usually at least 6 months after the US) in the UK. The only way around this is to find a US TA that will book UK cruisers, most will not:(

 

Happy cruising:)

 

Sue

[DrivesLikeMario]

Sue, are you telling me you can't go to http://www.princess.com ? Are you also saying that TAs in the UK can't pick up the phone and call Princess and get itineraries for past the dates in the brochures? :confused:

I'm just trying to understand how it works there - thanks for clarifying this for me.

[Bestbubba]

Sue, are you telling me you can't go to http://www.princess.com ? Are you also saying that TAs in the UK can't pick up the phone and call Princess and get itineraries for past the dates in the brochures? :confused:

I'm just trying to understand how it works there - thanks for clarifying this for me.

 

Hi there:)

 

Yes we certainly can log on to Princess.com, what we can't do is BOOK anything:eek: An example is the Exotics that went on sail in the US back in June. Telephone calls to UK TAs got the response "Not on sale till late August", going on-line showed up as unavailable, contact Princess.co.uk who gave the "Not available until late August" answer! It's enough to make you pull your hair out!

 

You will find lots of threads on here about the vagaries of trying to book a Princess cruise from the UK. RCI doesn't seem to have any problem taking our money but Princess is something else:rolleyes:

 

Sue

 

 

[Sanibel*Gal]

Wow - Folks in the UK cannot just log on, book cabins with Princess for future sailings, until they are released:confused: That seems very strange, does anyone have an answer for this or know why?? Just curious......

[Shogun]

Hi There,

 

While on the Grand I got an email from Princess UK saying Exotics on sale today follow link to book,

 

So I tried it and got NA

 

No problem just go and see the Future sales Girls who were only yards away,

 

Sorry not on Sale to UK folk for a few weeks yet, but I have an e mail, know one told us.

 

OK then but we still can not book anything for you ,we need to phone or e-mail Princess UK to get prices cabins, if you were from US we could go on line and have a look.

 

So the next day in port I went into a TA and booked .

 

Princess US and Princess UK are not the same from what I am hearing Princess AUS could have its own rules .

 

As a rule Princess UK sells a package holiday which includes a cruise, flights could be charters.

 

Were Princess US any flights are just add ons as them acting as agents.

 

As such when things go wrong with flights US folk are left almost high and dry while we Brits are Princess's problem to look after etc.

 

yours Shogun

[DrivesLikeMario]

Thanks for that clarification, Sue, I appreciate it. That's really bad business IMO on Princess' part. I don't understand why they would limit the UK citizens like that. :confused:

[suron]

Hi there:)

 

Yes we certainly can log on to Princess.com' date=' what we can't do is BOOK anything:eek: An example is the Exotics that went on sail in the US back in June. Telephone calls to UK TAs got the response "Not on sale till late August", going on-line showed up as unavailable, contact Princess.co.uk who gave the "Not available until late August" answer! It's enough to make you pull your hair out! [/size']

 

You will find lots of threads on here about the vagaries of trying to book a Princess cruise from the UK. RCI doesn't seem to have any problem taking our money but Princess is something else:rolleyes:

 

Sue

 

 

 

 

Dear Sue

 

Thanks for adding your post to this - I know that our American Roll Call members found it hard to believe what I told them about trying to book, get decent cabins etc etc. Our TA is one of the best locally and he gets really upset if he cannot get us what we really want. Am loathe to go away from our local TA and use an American agent because some UK friends who have done this say it can be risky and we could lose the backup of ATOL and ABTA if we did not use UK TAs.

 

We cannot even use the Future Sales Dept to the full as they won't take any reservations on board and just tell us to take the confirmation letter to our TA or contact Princess UK when we have decided and when the brochures are available in the UK! (Thanks Shogun for pointing out this problem we encounter)

 

I think it really needs more UK passengers to try and put pressure on Princess to give us a fair chance in all respects.

 

Thanks for your support in this matter.

 

 

 

Suron

[Shogun]

Hi There,

 

Princess UK has told me more than once, that cabins are held back for UK market and to stop all cheap ones going on day one, As this makes people book more expensive cabins.

 

yours Shogun

[cactusrose]

suron. . .I really don't think it's right that you must wait for bookings for several months after they open here in the US. It doesn't make sense that Princess would do that.:( It would be interesting to find out what their reasoning is. As to our ability to refuse an upgrade with a guarantee. That just isn't true. If we book a guarantee we get what we get. We an refuse an upgrade if we book a spacific cabin and Princess decides to upgrade us. That is if we are notified by our TA which doesn't always happen. So if we don't want our cabin changed we ask that our reservation be marked "no upgrade".

 

Please let us know if you get a response to your communication with Princess.

[h & m]

suron. . .I really don't think it's right that you must wait for bookings for several months after they open here in the US. It doesn't make sense that Princess would do that.:( It would be interesting to find out what their reasoning is. As to our ability to refuse an upgrade with a guarantee. That just isn't true. If we book a guarantee we get what we get. We an refuse an upgrade if we book a spacific cabin and Princess decides to upgrade us. That is if we are notified by our TA which doesn't always happen. So if we don't want our cabin changed we ask that our reservation be marked "no upgrade".

 

Please let us know if you get a response to your communication with Princess.

 

Hi there Cactusrose & other cruisers

 

We have the same problems in Australia - bookings open much later here, and the prices are higher than the US.

 

By using a US TA, we are saving over $3000 for a 31 day Sapphire Princess Transpacifc for 2008. This is partly because the exchange rate is working in our favour at the moment, even so the US pricing is much better.

 

Other advantages with using a US TA - got the cabin of our choice when bookings opened in the US, paid only small $100 pp deposit which is fully refundable, and can get information much more quickly through this TA.

 

Princess Australia gives out very limited information, eg could only tell us we were on a wait list for a mini-suite, but not how high on the list. Even putting in a request to share a dinner table with our US friends was a major drama last year.

 

We cannot join the Captain's Circle, which is annoying too.

 

I prefer to give my business to a local TA, but Princess makes this too costly.

 

By comparison, had no problems booking on line with Royal Caribbean this year, and their Australian representatives were very helpful, and obviously had full access to the system, were able to help me with cabin changes with no problem at all.

 

Despite these gripes, we love Princess (Royal Caribbean too), but keep hoping for their booking system to improve for us.

 

Hilary T

[hma109]

I just came back from the Aug 9 sailing of the Grand, and I had a fantastic time. I loved all the ports. This was the 4th time on this ship, so I knew what to expect from the ship.

 

In regards to the comments, I enjoyed the selection of food in the dining room. Our waiter and our assistant waiter were superb. As far as the horizon court, I ate up there for breakfast and a few lunches. I thought it was fine. I'm not a big breakfast person, so I didn't really have any of the hot entrees for that. We also ate up there after coming back from Tatoo at 1am. I think everyone else had that idea because it looked like it was 1pm with the amount of people there, but we still found a seat and the food was plentiful. I didn't get of the ice cream that you had to pay for. I waited for the free stuff at 3:30. But, I saw that the cones were only about $1.50 which is more than reasonable. The sundaes and shakes were more. I don't drink coffee, so I can't comment on the taste of it.

 

I agree with the person talking about Captain Perrin. He was great (it didn't hurt that he's very good looking :) I was also very happy that he was able to get us into Dublin. I was looking forward to a tour of Guiness. We had gale winds that prevented us from docking at our time in the morning and having to wait until the afternoon. Luckily, we were there until 1am. But, that meant that all the tours except for the Irish show at night. Around the time of docking, there was a huge line waiting to get off the ship despite the purser's desk making announcements saying not to line up. No one got out of the line. Everyone wanted to get off the ship because the shops in Dublin would be closing soon since it was a Sunday. But, they did have a bunch of shuttle busses to take us in and we didn't have to wait to get one.

[junglejane]

I am puzzed by this "discrimination" and have a notion. What follows is merely my speculation as to the answer. The parent company (Carnival--CCL) would only preclude early non-US bookings if there were some rational economic reason to do so. The answer may be to mitigate exposure to currency fluctuations. Because CCL is an American company, in the end everything must be converted to US dollars--and since one US dollar will always be worth one US dollar, currency fluctuation is not an issue for US bookings. But sterling and Australian dollars can and do fluctuate, and the risk is greater the farther ahead bookings in foreign currency are accepted. Once the cruise is sold for a fixed price in sterling (or whatever), CCL is bearing the currency risk. A non-US cruiser can get book farther ahead by booking through a US travel agent at a price fixed in US dollars, because then the cruiser--not CCL--is effectively bearing the risk of currency fluctuations.

 

Just speculating here.

[Shogun]

Hi There,

Re comments about US dollar,

 

Princess UK and P&O both operate out of Southampton, as such the more £ they can bank the better, as all docking fees etc will be in £.

 

Why Princess does not just have one set of rules the world over ,

 

yours Shogun

[Hlitner]

We have long heard of problems that our friends in the UK have in booking Princess and a few other US owned cruise lines. Personally, I find this somewhat outrageous and its hard to understand why Princess would want to create problems for the Brits. But I do have a question. Is it possible for you Brits to simply book directly on-line through many US travel agencies who have on-line booking engines? The transactions are done using credit cards so that would be no problem for Brits. I am just not sure if they prohibit English residents from booking via the US TAs.

 

Hank

[bubbadog]

it just doesnt seem right that you guys cant see princess like we can:mad:

[Bestbubba]

We have long heard of problems that our friends in the UK have in booking Princess and a few other US owned cruise lines. Personally, I find this somewhat outrageous and its hard to understand why Princess would want to create problems for the Brits. But I do have a question. Is it possible for you Brits to simply book directly on-line through many US travel agencies who have on-line booking engines? The transactions are done using credit cards so that would be no problem for Brits. I am just not sure if they prohibit English residents from booking via the US TAs.

 

Hank

 

Hank some do but very few (hey, I'm a poet!:)), mostly the TAs that you have to actually email your request. The majority of the TAs that you can book online require a US address and when you try to put in a UK one won't accept the address as valid. Very frustrating!

 

Sue

[CraigRDR1]

Just returned this morning from the 12-day 8/9/07 Grand Princess Northern Europe cruise. Never heard so many complaints from fellow passengers - "lousy food in Horizon Court", "Poor Selection in dining room", "Worst coffee I've ever tasted in Horizon Court", "Imagine paying $4 for an ice cream cone", "indifferent service in DaVinci dining room", "mold in my bathroom", "toilets didn't flush half the time", "horrible lumpy mattress", "Last time I'll ever sail Princess", etc., ad inf. As a TA, I'm always attuned to fellow passengers' comments, and I passed many of them on to Princess management.

 

Personally, we had a wonderful time. The Grand is due for a bit of updating, but we found the crew to be terrific, the cabin service to be exemplary, Captain Perrin to be exceptionally personable and open to comments, the CD (Billy London) to be friendly and on top of things, and most of the show acts to be professional and very enjoyable.

 

I would be interested in hearing from other passengers on this cruise to get their critique.

 

Anyone one know if the Grand is due for a drydock overhaul in the near future? We are looking at doing the British Isle Cruise next Aug...We were on the Crown in 2005 doing the Med Cruise..Great cruise but we did have some plumbing issues on the Plaza deck...backups in the shower...yuck...

[pj-atsea]

Just returned this morning from the 12-day 8/9/07 Grand Princess Northern Europe cruise. Never heard so many complaints from fellow passengers - "lousy food in Horizon Court", "Poor Selection in dining room", "Worst coffee I've ever tasted in Horizon Court", "Imagine paying $4 for an ice cream cone", "indifferent service in DaVinci dining room", "mold in my bathroom", "toilets didn't flush half the time", "horrible lumpy mattress", "Last time I'll ever sail Princess", etc., ad inf. As a TA, I'm always attuned to fellow passengers' comments, and I passed many of them on to Princess management.

 

Personally, we had a wonderful time. The Grand is due for a bit of updating, but we found the crew to be terrific, the cabin service to be exemplary, Captain Perrin to be exceptionally personable and open to comments, the CD (Billy London) to be friendly and on top of things, and most of the show acts to be professional and very enjoyable.

 

I would be interested in hearing from other passengers on this cruise to get their critique.

I was on the same cruise and although we did have a good time there were lots of things that bothered me. We were one of the people whose toilets didn't flush. I would sday that at some point on every day of the cruise, the toilet didn't flush. I had to make numerous calls to the pursers office to try and get service. It was always fixed, for a while... I found the the dining room staff in Da Vince to be indifferent, and I found the Head waiter to be downright rude to me. We ate in the Michaelangelo dining room after that and it was much improved over Da Vinci. The elevators midship were extremely slow and I think there should have been stairs there as an option.Most times we went out of our way to the aft or forward stairs and walked down. At the time we arrived for embarkation, there were huge lines and then huges crowds in the waiting area. I later found out that the ship arrived late so maybe that was just a one time problem. The cabin staff were always friendly and cheerful. No complaints on the cabin either. Met a lot of nice people but they too complained of either cold food at dinner or no seating in Horizon court. I have sailed on Princess twice before but while I might sail with them again, it would not be on the Grand. pj