Princess Cruise Lines
Reviews and Complaints

Booking no. CR7P4M Gift ordered on June 20 2019 for Mrs. Myrna Courey on
12 day voyage British Isles Southampton to Southampton.
Box of Godiva Chocolates was never delivered to room C612 as ordered and paid
by James Atto on Visa card. The flowers on the same order were delivered as
ordered. The gift in question is # 01 6116 I am very upset as this was a special
occasion .James Atto

Passenger - Maxine Beck
Booking Number WQ7NVJ
Voyage E916 - Europe Mediterranean

Having returned four days ago from a Mediterranean cruise aboard the Emerald Princess with our granddaughter, I have definite reservations about recommending Princess to anyone I know and even greater concerns about our upcoming voyage to Japan booked for August 15-23, 2020 for my husband, grandson and myself (conf. # WM7T8P). The destination and duration of this voyage are unique in the cruise industry at this point, or I would seriously consider cancelling.
After reading the account of our experience, perhaps Princess might consider some sort of compensation be applied to our upcoming trip for the lessons I've learned for future voyages. Had I used a travel agent, I may have missed some of the pitfalls we encountered. I admit some responsibility for the problems, but believe sincerely that a lack of more proactive policies on the part of Princess contributed as well - especially in the case of customers new to Princess.

Please respond to this communication to confirm that the issues have been heard by appropriate Princess officials with the authority to act appropriately.

Rome Excursion/Flight Conflict
November 2018 - booked extensive Rome excursion through Princess
January 18, 2019 - booked air travel with Princess agent Lisa (*note - agent was distracted by
conversations with husband during booking. Conversation was difficult, confusion with understanding the options she was giving regarding times, prices, etc.) Received email confirmation that looked accurate.

March ? 2019 - called to confirm debark procedure and luggage transfer in combination with the
debark tour of Rome. Agent Jamie confirmed that tour would end at the airport and Princess would deliver our luggage. NO mention was made of any conflict.

May 3, 2019 - received Travel Summary from Princess and I discovered a conflict with our
debark excursion booked in November 2018 and flights booked in January 2019 - both through Princess. Flight departure needed to be after 5 pm. to accommodate tour, but was booked for 1:20. Working with Princess agent Paul it was determined that rescheduling flights wasn't an option because (1) I would be charged $2, 500 + increased airfare totaling more than $3, 100 although Princess had done both bookings and (2) even if I were willing to pay this, the flights available at this late date required two layovers and nearly a 24 hour return time. I suggested that Princess might waive the late cancellation fee because they had created the conflict that, again, I discovered. Paul apologized and forwarded me to customer service. That agent said the best he could offer was $50 onboard credit for the three people in my group. I requested a confirmation that the "front office" or whoever was his superior had received the details of my complaint hoping they could offer a more acceptable solution. Instead, within an hour I received a phone call from a travel agent I didn't know in Florida (Peggy Mellen @ 610-952-1927). She told me had received an email from Princess that she ascertained was intended for me regarding my cruise. It contained no new information regarding my complaint. How did she get this information and why? To date I've had no confirmation that this issue was forwarded. I then canceled the debark tours for refund hoping something else might work out but not wanting to incur further useless cost.
June 8, 2019 - checked with the shore excursion desk on board ship to attempt to arrange
something to allow us at least a "drive by of St. Peter's Square" in route to the airport as our granddaughter, a devout Catholic, really wanted to at least see it. They were unable to help.

June 12, 2019 - checked with an agent at the front desk for advice. He suggested that we get a
private taxi portside to take us on the desired route. I hesitated because I was totally unfamiliar with the situation at the port in Rome. I asked if anyone on staff could assist me with this, but was told I needed to make the arrangements on my own. He assured me that it "might sound scary, but wasn't really that difficult." Otherwise, they were unable to help. We were considering his suggestion, but the next day the Princess Patter arrived describing the debarkation process with a warning in bold letters that taxis at the port often take up to four hours or more to secure.

June 13, 2019 - checked at the front desk about the discrepancy of the information and was told
that the Princess Patter was accurate and that I needed to hire a private taxi to confirm transport before cancelling our scheduled ship to airport transfers. Agent Annie was very sympathetic and helpful. She searched for taxi companies in Rome but found that all but one taxi company required online confirmation. I would have to book personally which required me to pay an onboard fee of over $150 for personal email access. She did find one company that would book by phone and allowed me to use the ship's phone line, but that company never picked up. At this point I gave up. Rome wasn't going to happen for us at all.
After all that, the transport bus dropped us at the wrong terminal for our Lufthansa flight to Frankfurt.

Barcelona Hotel Transfer Complaint

Late May - called to confirm time of transport from Gallery Hotel in Barcelona to ship. As
Princess offered no tours that I was made aware of for this port, I had booked tour tickets on line in advance and was checking to see if there was any timing conflict. The Princess agent took over 30 minutes to discover that departure from the hotel would probably be at noon, but the hotel could probably hold our luggage. I was luckily able to reschedule the tickets I had purchased to suit this only to find out when we arrived at the hotel that the only transfer would be at 10:30 although the dock was only 4 miles away. This allowed almost no time that day to explore Barcelona as planned for which we had paid an additional $647.91 in hotel charges. Our only choice was for my husband to accompany our luggage to the ship at 10:30 while my granddaughter and I explored the city and then made our own way to the ship at additional cost. This situation was very poorly considered and communicated by Princess.
Based on the two major complaints detailed above, I suggest the following "upgrades" to communications between Princess and its future customers:
1. When booking air reservations, give Princess agents access to the debark excursions booked by the passenger they are working with in conjunction with the flight schedules to avoid timing conflicts.
Customers are consistently alerted about any conflicts when booking excursions, so the mindset is that this will continue forward in the process.
2. When passengers extend their trip prior to the voyage, timetables regarding transfers from hotel to ship should be available to allow passengers to plan their activities avoiding timing conflicts.
Onboard complaints

All of the staff on board were wonderfully helpful and worked exceptionally well to please us. Our granddaughter especially liked the youth coordinator if The Beach House for teens.

However, some of the policies of Princess worked against the goal of satisfied customers. Most notably:

1 - additional costs that weren't clearly defined when booking such as charges for soda, coffee offerings and cover charges for upscale dining for suite customers
2 - the annoying overkill of marketing art and jewelry. Prime example was the "fun" art scavenger hunt competition that we later discovered required us to be present at the art auction to claim our prize. So much for fun.
3 - most disturbing - the exorbitant charges for wifi access and even basic texting. The option of logging into the ship network to allow texting within the boat was not explained as an alternative to the $59 per device "social" offering of which we purchased two.

I repeat:
Please respond to this communication to confirm that the issues have been heard by appropriate Princess officials with the authority to act appropriately.

Thank you for your thoughtful consideration of these suggestions and requests.

Maxine Beck
beck.[protected]@comcast.net
[protected]

To whom it may concern,
My name is Margurite Underwood we was on Alaska cruise May 22nd -May 29 Th 2019 booking # WHHLGH, then we took train to Denali on Fairbanks there we flew home . I purchase a WFI internet plan with Princess 64.99 for sea on May 24 TH, I thought I purchased it earlier It wasn't to later I went to internet station and talked the person working desk I wasn't hooked up till May 24 Th . I was thinking I knew how use it the plan. But I thought as long as you was at sea and Bars towers I could use my phone like I was on land. Either I didn't ask enough questions or things was not explained well to me at internet desk. When I got my AT&t Mobility phone bill I had roaming charges of 186.92 over my original bill for month. At&T was nice enough rewrite me cruising contract for 100.00 so it saved me 86.92 .My second time cruise with Princess lines . I had no problems when I purchased WFI February 2018 15 day cruise to Hawaii. I would please like ask Princess for refund for my 64.99 for WFI internet . My Folio NO: 4393. Thank you ! Margurite Underwood

Ref: Princess Cruises WP5X7R-5906-Manchester [protected])

With regard to the illness experienced on board the Golden Princess last February, a refund of $300 was offered by Helen Shamuel, Senior customer solutions coordinator, which we accepted on 1st May 2019. To date, have not received it and after several emails since, have not heard anything apart from an automated reply, stating that we will receive a reply within 24-48 hours. As this has been going on since February, we just want to get this resolved and receive the refund promised to us.

Hello,

I would like to lodge a complaint please.
I cruised with you recently on booking number WJ7QHW.
Whilst on board this cruise we were all offered the option of cancelling any flight excursions, due to the very unfortunate incident involving Princess passengers, for a full refund of said excursion.
I took up this offer, and by the time I disembarked I was owed $206.15 USD on my cruise account.
My travel agent called Princess 3 times to follow this up and was told it would be paid at the latest on June 10.
June 10 passed and I called twice myself.
The first call I made yielded no response via email to confirm my query.
During the second call I made today, I was told this had been refunded to my credit card today.
I then received a call back to let me know that, in fact, I have been posted a cheque, which will take up to 6 weeks to arrive, for my refund.
I am absolutely shocked.
Princess took all of one day to process the payment from my partner's account on his credit card, however I will be waiting approximately 2.5 months for a refund via cheque?
What kind of company uses cheques in this century?
This is very clearly a means to delay payment to customers in order to retain funds in the Princess accounts for as long as possible, this kind of practice is normal within corporations to an extent, however 2.5 months to process a refund when you have the ability and technology to refund this to my credit card is absolutely unacceptable.
I would like a response please, explaining to me why this practice has persisted into 2019, and whether there is a way I can be refunded immediately instead.
I do not believe Princess should offer refund options if they very clearly do not want to honour these promptly (or at all if I and my agent had not called 5 times) and will certainly be repeating my experience in reviews verbally and online.
The feeling is that of a scam if I am entirely honest.

Regards,

Zoe

Hey Team,
I have searching job that time I have offer for princess Cruise hiring manager told to pay some money you will got visa and flight ticket so I am pay money but hiring manager not send to anything he is ask again and again ask only money nothing to send to me.once you see this message response me ASAP

Note:I am got offer letter and confirmation letter and also visa those all of get it through mail

Just got off Star on 5-9-19. I would like to talk on hone regarding multiple things on board, broken toilet two days to repair, woman falling in elevated dining area who was with a walker and dog no one came to here aid expect passengers, wait staff at one table delivered wrong wrong twice to our table, waiting for steak knife while she was talking, food was worst I have eaten out of three princess ships I have been on, no sharps container delivered when it was on contract so took our needles home. ship in disrepair and needs to dry dock for inside improvements.
[protected] landline, [protected]) cellular.
And just so you know, Princess is the only line I will use and plan on another trip, but you have to make improvements, especially in the food. All I heard on board was the food was horrible, this is not Princess-like from before.

I was travelling with my sister who is disabled and uses a electric scooter, I booked well in advance and filled in a mobility form giving dimensions of scooter.
Unbelievably Princess cruises still managed to give us a unsuitable cabin, the only place we could store the scooter was against the entrance door, which contravened your own safety code.
I hope you realise your complete failure to read mobility form led to a very difficult holiday.

Having sailed on this ship from the 16th April to 27th. I feel I must complain on two points that have been of concern and disappointment .
Firstly, one evening we enters the Wheelhouse bar and were served a round of drinks . No sooner had this happened, and we had all sat down, we were asked to leave as the bar had been booked for a 'vip event' Not only do I find this discriminatory, but the person who informed us was very rude.(Not one of the ship's crew) The staff in the bar felt embarrassment by this person's behaviour. Why were we served drinks, then asked to leave? Totally unacceptable behaviour.
Secondly, we took advantage of the tour of Madeira excursion. This was a horrific tour of the Island, with the bus travelling small roads high in the mountains.
To my horror on our return home, we discovered that a bus had crashed on these roads in the same week, and sadly many people had lost their lives.
These roads are totally unsuitable for buses to be travelling on. And it is a disgrace that Princess cruises are promoting such trips.

I made a mistake booking with Expedia I didn't notice the nonrefundable deposit, I booked this a week ago and it's a year from now the trip is March 2020, they offered me the deposit towards another cruise in the next 12 months, but we can't afford it for another couple years at least, it was a simple mistake and I was told I was able to get my deposit back, I talk to Expedia for 2 1/2 hours yesterday and I called princess cruise lines and they said there's nothing they can do, I know you could sell this cabin within the year, can you please help us we can't afford this, my booking number is CLVPXH, I would really love to recommend princess cruise lines to people because I've had friends that of been on it but I just need some help with my deposit if I can just get some of it back at our HAlf, Can you please help me this is been extremely stressful, I accidentally pushed the wrong button I didn't check it right, but now I'm being punished by losing $330, please help and get back to me, thank you so much cheri

I currently have a booking on the Sky Princess on 2/8/2020. Caribbean East/West Adventure. Booking # CJCQVG. I received an email re Come Back New Sale and noticed that EZair of $250 discount was included in this email. Under cruise details and at the bottom of the itinerary saying view details did include the EZair discount. When speaking with the agent I reached initially and then your customer relations agent, I was frustrated with their response that it was for select sailing only and that this cruise was not on the select list even though I pointed out that it was indeed indicated on the web site for this booking. The customer relations agent was talking over me and insisted I was wrong. I feel I am entitled to this promotion of EZair as it was included for this booking. We are Elite members and we are concerned that the web site was incorrect and deceptive. Please consider and respond to our concerns.

My wife and I both suffered from influenza and were "isolated in our cabins.
On the second last day of the cruise, I was infected with a virulent strain of some intestinal bug.
I was prescribed Lomotil but had to spend 2 days in bed in Singapore, I should have been in hospital. I then had to travel 22 hours in very difficult conditions.
The hygiene warnings on the ship were innifective and insufficient.
Our holiday was ruined, and I would like s refund.
I have all the necessary paperwork,

We just got back from a cruise from Sydney Australia, Nov. 5th around New Zealand and then another cruise from Sydney to Tasmania following ending Nov. 24. The last days on board, I got severe diarrhea. We only ate on board the ship - not on land. The food on the Majestic was probably the lowest quality I have ever seen from Princess. Foods were not served hot in the dining room. We ate at all three specialty restaurants and were quite disappointed, except Crown Grill. Even my experience there wasn't the best. The filet was tough and my baked potato was black inside. The waiter quickly replaced it. The second time at the Crown, the potato was again black. Not very appealing. I went to my doctor upon returning home and had many tests run as I felt horrible. Was dehydrated and had e-coli and salmonella. We have been on 20+ cruises and never had food poisoning. You may want to check up on the food served on the Majestic and how it is kept.
Donna and Frank Dolf - Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

My husband and I have just got back from a cruise on the Majestic. We have cruised with you 6 times before and are Platinum level. This cruise was the worst that I have ever been on. If this is what your standards have dropped to it might just be our last cruise with you. We were in room R103
List of complaints
1/ First of we get told that we are no longer in dining room with fixed time and same table companions, we are now booked into anytime dining and ring and book when required, not good enough seeing as you had confirmed our dining booking months ago.

2/ Food in Market Buffet cold and boring same thing every day for the length of the cruise. Dirty dishes let pile up on table with waiters walking by looking at them but not taking them until you asked someone to move them. Most time you had to get your own tea or coffee, mugs and glasses on table dirty with lipstick and hard sugar on the bottom DISGUSTING. No one was there to make sure people washed their hands so quite a few just walking in DISGUSTING.

3/ We seen a waiter drop a pile of clean plates on the floor and instead of taking them to be rewashed they were just added to the stack for guests to use. DISGUSTING.

4/ I forgot to update our credit details before we left and instead of customer service either ringing our room or dropping a note in they had our cards rejected. I have never been so embarrassed in all my life when I walked up to a crowded bar and asked for a can of coke and told my card had been rejected SHAME ON YOU embarrassing me a elderly traveller and Platinum member.

5/ Went to customer service and spoke to a very rude Adrian and asked him why with $67.40 credit on our account is it being rejected, Adrian raised his voice and talked down to me until my husband told him to watch what he is saying, he said it was all to do with the credit card and I explained to him bank had cancelled because someone had broken into and issued another one which had not arrived when we left. I asked him to lift the reject because we are in credit but he refused, so I demanded he give me the money. Which again with a raised voice he got me to sign form and gave me money.

6/ Entertainment was pathetic, no bingo nothing extra to do on rainy days.

7/ Our room was hardly ever done we did it ourselves. We would leave the room about 6.30 and come back about 1.30 for a nap only to find our room still had not been done. Not good enough
As we were leaving the ship we heard quite a few people say it was their first and last cruise with Princess.

Again I can not stress enough how rude Adrian was and how much you embarrassed me. If this is how you treat your valued customers its just not good enough.

I would like to ask you to refund us our money. As we never got the cruise with your usual excellent service it was a disaster from start to finish and we were very disappointed that you have let your standards drop so low. We have always recommended Princess to all our friends with quite a few of them sailing with you. This will not happen again because of the stress and embarrassment you put us through on this cruise. I again ask for a refund of cruise.

Very Unhappy Customer
Marilyn Bond

This is the letter I sent to Princess Cruises and they responded to me in a week with compensation that is not close to what would match our inconvenience we dealt with a complimentary 2 people dinner in restaurant on a ship when I book before November 2019 for a future cruise.

To Whom It May Concern,

This was my first cruise with Princes and I was so excited to travel on Princess. I have taken cruises on Royal Caribbean and been very happy with them, but I was told by friends and family that Princess is much better and was excited, but I was extremely disappointed. My husband, parents, in-laws and family friends went on a Caribbean Cruise from Oct 18-28 for my husband's 50th birthday. My in-laws have done 16 cruises with Princess and they admitted this was not a normal experience and they were very disappointed as well.

Here are some examples of the reason we were not satisfied with our cruise.

-The over all customer service was not even close to the exceptional customer service of Royal Caribbean. We seemed to be a bother to the staff about 80% of the time. Also, they seemed to be extremely short staffed. Staff seemed to be overwhelmed, running around, bumping into each other, dropping and breaking trays and plates almost every situation. Overall, most of the staff lacked good customer service skills. I have been in the customer service field for 35 years and a flight attendant for the last 24 years and I was surprised with the lack of service.

-The ship smelled like sewer most of the cruise. We informed the Guest Services and they said they had complaints and were working on it. I asked why it was happening and they said they didn't know. I checked back in again a couple of days later and they said they didn't have an answer and were still working on it. It was very disappointing to have to smell sewer throughout our whole trip. We feel like they should have taken the ship out of service and correct this instead of making us suffer through the whole trip.

-I booked our dinner at the Crown Grill online 6 months in advance online. We received a reminder on paper under our door about our dinner in The Crown Grill and had the wrong time for the reservations. I had to call and fix the problem.

-Our service in the Crown Grill was not even close to the service that was expected. When they sat us, they sat nine of us at a small round table. We asked for a bigger table and the hostess curtly stated this is only table. She then stated we could sit at a 4 and 6 table separately and we of course declined because we wanted to sit together to celebrate my husband's 50th birthday. The dinner took 3 hours. The service was extremely slow. We missed our special picture sitting that was at 9pm. The only good part of the dinner was the food.

-While in each in port, maintenance was working on the the ship hammering and using a saw from 8am until 5pm. We were not informed it was going to be going on. The noise woke us up several times, tried to take a nap and just relaxed and it was impossible. I would call Guest Services each time to ask it to stop. It would stop for a little while, but it would start back up again. It was very frustrating. Again, we feel the ship should have been taken out of service if it needed all this work because it was a huge inconvenience.

It was very frustrating and disappointing on a vacation that was supposed to be very relaxing and as Princess Cruises promise is "Come Back New". We did not come back feeling that way. I will not be choosing Princess as my cruise choice. I have shared this experience with friends.

Today, I noticed that our Caribbean cruise booking showed a new section in the Payments menu that we can "prepay gratuities." We fully reviewed your website description of this cruise and saw NO MENTION OF GRATUITIES BEING EXTRA.

Additionally, we NEVER ;had any webpage during the booking process alert us that our deposit was non-refundable.

Our last cruise with Princess had all gratuities included AND the deposit was refundable.

Princess has intentionally hidden this information from us as returning Princess customers when we booked our Caribbean cruise, so that we could not see anywhere that the cruse deposit was non-refundable, nor that the gratuities were not included this time around.

Sonja, in Princess Cruise's Customer Relations Department, a supposed "supervisor, " refused twice to allow me to speak to anyone else above her. She flat out refused. I asked for her employee number and her last name; she refused to give either. She simply provided her extension, as if we would ever call her or work with her again. Her phone voice and attitude was snippy, terse, and rude, and she refused to refund us.

Sonja would not take responsibility for Princess's deceptive website information for their Caribbean cruise (March 2019) and Sonja noted tersely, that it as "all in the fine print." Again, snippy, rude and not in the least bit interested in helping a returning Princess Cruise customer. She would only dump the $200 into a cruise account we had to use within the next year...would you cruise ever again with a company like this?

Sonja refused to refund the $200 and was quite happy to lose a Princess customer over it. She seemed highly empowered to make things difficult and deny a refund for a measly $200, and made it quite clear she worked for no one else who I could speak with and I could not go above her ever. I asked her if she was the CEO perhaps, as proudly proclaimed I could not go above her to speak with someone else...

We will be filing a formal complaint with our credit card company. Deceptive practices on Princess's website will not win them new customers and certainly won't retain old customers.

Signed,
Former Princess customer

We had a 15 day cruise 7/18/2018 to 8/02/2018 and had a mini suite, we had been looking forward to this cruise for over a year, after we were bought out on another cruise Princess had overbooked. Now get this, we are in a mini Suite with sewer gas for 7 out of the 15 days cruising and Princess said all they could do is offer us $75 each and a specialty dinner. That is it for 7 days putting up with this smell when this was to be a cruise we had dreamed of and to make matters worse it was a cruise for our 25th wedding anniversary. I assumed from what I was told a major upgrade on the next cruise was the norm but I guess not anymore. We already cancelled 2 and we have 2 more cruises booked now but we are looking at other lines other than Princess or Carnival ships. and hope to find another cruise line before final payment on both cruises. Very sad when we were 2 cruises away from Elite but life goes on and if that is what they think is fair C'est la vie!

Please be advised this is the second letter I received a email stating someone from customer relations would contact me but they are a little behind, I wrote on 8/27/2018
and heard they are busy. No one has contacted me concerning my complaint
I was on the alaska cruise and would like to speak to someone. you can contact me
at [protected] Elena Bell
my email is [protected]@comcast.net

This cruise is allowing jewelry sellers to advertise on board to sell jewelry. They sold my mom(81 yr old) 65k worth of jewelry( 32k engagement ring). When I called the jewelry company by the name of Diamonds International they refused to take the items back. They stated that she signed the contract so they cant do anything for her. This is a complete scam. They had so called Miss Texas advertising for them. Took her to a Juneau port and drove her to the jewelry store. They then gave her alcohol( two glasses) on and empty stomach. There were two reps, one on each side pushing her to buy the jewelry. They whole situation and the way they go about it is very shady. BE WARNED!