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Review summary
Princess Cruises has room for improvement based on customer feedback. Customers particularly appreciate service and professional, though some mention concerns about customer service and expensive.
Firstly, Princess Cruises turned out to be quite unreliable. We had six shore excursions planned, but the most important one — viewing the glaciers and icebergs — was canceled without adequate explanation. Another excursion, originally meant to take us to the city of Victoria, was substituted with a visit to a much smaller, unremarkable location, the name of which we don’t even remember. For these cancellations and itinerary changes, we were given just $200 USD per person as compensation — and even that had to be spent onboard. This felt insufficient and disappointing.
Secondly, getting access to drinking water onboard was surprisingly inconvenient. Guest cabins were located between decks 6 and 14 (we stayed on deck 8), but the only place with self-serve drinking water was on deck 15. Each time we needed water, we had to carry our own thermos all the way up, and elevator wait times could be long. Alternatively, bottled water (800ml) was available at the bar for over $3 USD each, but the bar staff were not always honest. On three occasions when two bottles were purchased, the family was twice charged for three. Refunds were only issued after complaints were made at the front desk.
Very disappointing.
This is the 8th cruise we’ve been on (including others from the same group - Royal Caribbean & Celebrity).
The ship (Sun Princess) is nice, but unless you are a meat eating American who likes X-factor style singers it isn’t for you.
The breakfast consists of around 20 stations, 17 of which seem to serve variations of exactly the same thing (bacon, sausage, beans, egg - and pretty much in the same format - e.g. there are no poached eggs or eggs Florentine.).
The buffet for dinner and tea is also poor. Same every day, and not great quality. It's also very bland. There are a couple of token Indian dishes, and even those are bland too.
The entertainment is naff singers for the main part. We had 2 dreadful comedians. The only bright spot was the magician (Mike Bones) who was great.
You have to pay for shuttles, the sunbeds get nabbed and left reserved all day without Princess doing anything about it, and even the kids sports area has basketballs but no football! It’s like non-Americans and non-meat eaters are second class citizens. Even the sandwich bar often only has a choice of meat sandwiches half of the time.
On top of that they force you to carry a tracker, and they state on their app that they are capturing your facial recognition data (no idea why, but it surely is unnecessary and seems a breach of privacy). I asked for a normal card rather than the tracker pendant (which is magnetic and emits EMF) but they said I couldn’t have a card.
I was looking forward to better entertainment and much better food, but left disappointed. This is the worse cruise we’ve been on for food, sport, entertainment and privacy.
I’m posting the review here, rather than at the end of the cruise, as if my experience with Celebrity is anything to go by, they tend not to bother listening to genuine feedback.
Realice 3 cruceros con Princess, el primero en 2023, a Islas Britanicas en el Regal, 15 dias. el segundo en 2024, trasatlantico en el Sun Princess 17 dias, el ultimo en junio 2025, fiordos, en el Emerald, 17 dias.
En el ultimo note una baja muy importante en calidad de espectaculos y comida.
Estos 2 itens para los cruceristas son importantes.
Los espectaculos con excepcion de una cantante, creo que se llamaba Lynda Evans, mediocres. Un hipnotizador que se veia claramente el engaño y encima lo repitieron. Un coro y musical de los propios tripulantes, imaginense.
Y otros por el estilo.
La comida. Mucha comida de olla y aspecto regular para abajo, los primeros dias habia salmon, despues lo remplazaron por otros pescados de regular preparacion. Carne poco. Fruta siempre verde. Postres repetitivos.
Un dia nos ofrecian croisants del dia anterior. Y varios dias faltaron.
Entre los puertos, habia 3, de pequeños pueblitos con muy poco interes.
Hubiera sido ideal, sacar por lo menos 2 e incluir 2 dias en Oslo.
He viajado en MSC, Norwegian, Celebrity y pense que en Princess habia encontrado mi naviera Premium.
No es mas una compañia premium.
We booked the Princess Premier Package and for 2 days now they've blocked my stepsons medallion insisting he can only buy non alcoholic drinks. He's 28 years old!! The ship is tired and a lot smaller cabins than other cruiselines we've used. Spent more time at guest services than enjoying the actual cruise
My wife and I have never been on a Princess cruise but have spent the last 2 weeks negotiating the online booking process. This has been a nightmare and thankfully it seems to be near completion. The process is very confusing and their system seems to be geared up to make things more difficult since when you complete one field you can find that this invalidates something else, We found the whole process very wearisome. Their whole "Medallion" system is difficult to get to grips with. All this trouble and we haven't been anywhere near Southampton yet !!
I have just been on hold to Princess for 1hr 24 minutes with no response. I had to hang up in the end.
I am trying to talk to someone about a cruise my parents have booked for Sep that takes them to Russia. Since they haven't been contacted, I am trying to find out what is going on or possibly cancel. What do people have to do to get a response from this company?
Sky Princess, 9th-23rd April, Western Europe. This was our 41st cruise but the first with Princess; also our last with them! We booked a mini suite through ROL, who did not mention that it was directly above the theatre, so from about 3.00 pm until 11.00 pm every day/night we were subjected to the noise of heavy drumming in our cabin. Also, there was no mention that we were one deck above the crew smoking area which was acceptable until the fine weather when the crew were outside and our cabin filled with smoke most days and the balcony became untenable. We complained, a crew officer came to investigate and told us it was coming from above. The lady from reception then told us it wasn't and that the crew smoking area would be moved. The improvement lasted one day! Avoid deck E forward! The food was variable from OK through peculiar to terrible. The best meal we had during the cruise was at the fish and chip bar in Casemate Square, Gibraltar. We like to have a glass of wine with our meals, but bar service was so slow that the drinks often arrived after we had finished eating. As for the shows, it is difficult to comment as we only looked in on a couple and thought 'no thanks!' Lots of screaming singers and we had already heard the drumming in our cabin. The Medallion system was too clever by half and only half worked. It needs further development. On the plus side the cabin was spacious, well laid out and clean. The staff were excellent in all respects, being friendly, cheerful, hard working and helpful but clearly short handed in some areas.
One major problem on the first day was car parking. We had booked through CPS for dockside parking. It took us 40 minutes to drive from home to the dock gate then nearly two hours to get to the baggage drop off area. There were not sufficient CPS staff on duty and some were not very well trained. A lady near us in the queue told us that CPS had blamed passengers for arriving at the wrong time. When we disembarked at a different berth there was the same problem with incoming passengers, so lessons had not been learnt.
Will never cruise Princess again even though a Platinum Member. Firstly, trying to get a seat was impossible as the boat was full and no one wanted to go outside (Fjords trip on 23rd April). If you were able to find a seat the next issue was getting a drink. The atrium was full, but only 3 staff members trying to serve the whole area. Customer service was appalling. It took over an hour to get drinks, in the end we went separately to the bar and ordered double the amount. Next issue, having spoken to the bar supervisor, we were told to use the Medallion App, (absolute joke). If you managed to get the app working, not all the drinks were on the app and in our case, when we did try to order a round, it never turned up....! As this was a daily occurance, I complained to customer service, I asked for senior management to come down and see for themselves, but this was ignored, they stayed locked in their offices..... having spoken to customer services supervisor, he admitted to me there were over 2000 complaints and the boat had 1500 more passengers than they had staff to cater for.
Where was Captains night, where were senior staff members. I can only assume they did not want to face their customers, and left it to the supervisors. The personal touch was missing, the serving staff were rushed off their feet and did a magnificent job in the circumstances, Princess has gone downhill and are not the company of 2 or 3 years ago.
Went on a P&O cruise in February and was fantastic, the service was great so Covid is not an excuse.
Just returned off the sky princess from Norway.First time with princess cruises never again.No staff on board for the amount of people.Took over 2.3 hours in restaurants the app was a waste of time.Ship had lots of covid people on board.We went as a group of 6,4 off us have tested positive since returning home.
Just come back from the sky princess at the fjords.
It was our first and last cruise.
All we did was queue. From the moment we arrived at Southampton to the moment we left. From the restaurants, bars, concierge, cafe, duty free, photo shop, trying to get a table, getting on or off the ship. That's all we did was wait around. If you want cancer this is the ship for you because all you can smell is smoke from the casino. The buffet was a free for all and the main restaurants food was average.
We couldn't get a table at the specialist restaurants as they were fully booked from day 1.
The medallion app was a great idea but didnt work, if you ordered a drink it was 50/50 if it turned up.
Don't be taken in by the art gallery, Google the artwork first when the Internet works. 1 piece they tried to sell for $32000 which was only worth $4000 max.
The crew worked really hard and were polite and helpful and the ship was spotless.
We have been on many cruises and just returned from the Fjords on the Sky Princess. I have to say although the Fjords were amazing the standard of service offered by Princess was way below the standard offered by other cruise companies and by Princess a few years ago.
It was taking up to an hour to get drinks, this wasnt down to inefficiency of the staff but the lack of staff. We would order by the App, a staff member and finally by waiting for at least half an hour at a bar. This was also the same in the buffet food area where it would take an age to get a coffee/tea, the staff seemed to avoid eye contact but i’m sure this is due to them being rushed off their feet as they were short staffed. I never received a hot cappucinno unless i went to deck 5 to the International Cafe but the food was fine and plenty of choice.
The service in the restaurants was also slow, taking us two hours to have our meal. We found The Soleil provided the best service. The food was fabulous.
Seating was an absolute nightmare, there were 4 in our party and it was impossible to get seating together in any of the venues we wanted to attend for entertainment. When we did eventually find a seat we wouldnt leave, knowing we wouldnt manage to get another one. There was not one night where we were able to sit somewhere of our choosing. The ship is catering for too many people without offering them the leisure areas.
On the penultimate day I was so frustrated I needed to address it with Customer Services, i had the unfortunate pleasure of meeting Katianna from Ukraine who seemed very insulted that I should even go to the desk to raise this issue. Although I addressed her in a calm manner she was very rude and just shrugged her shoulders at me asking me what i expected her to do about my seating problem! We know this was a major problem for many people on the ship.
We are so disappointed with Princess that we have to decided NOT to do the New Zealand cruise with them which was planned next year or any other cruises with them for the foreseable future. We expect a far better service and not just a Taxi service from one location to another.
We usually see senior officers walking around engaging with passengers and ensuring staff are being attentive, they were very elusive, probably due to the amount of complaints they were receiving, we were advised over 2000 complaints had been noted.
Princess management, if you have a ship to full capacity then ensure you have the staff on board to offer a relaxing and enjoyable holiday for your passengers, we have had a weeks worth of stress and disappointment.
Seasoned Cruiser, but first time with Princess. Just disembarked from Sky Princess, a 7 day trip from S'hampton to Norway. Have previously used Celebrity, Royal Caribbean, Cunard, MSC to name most but not all. Good points, Ship was commissioned in 2019, then Covid hit, so this ship, the Sky Princess is still almost brand new. I found the staff to be very helpful and friendly, with only one exception which I personally witnessed, which was understandable given the general failure of the Princess Medalion system. (More about that later). One evening the Captain made several worrying announcements about a fire in the incinerator, the last of which was a rambling explanation that the fire had been contained! In truth, I would have preferred either no such public announcement or just one stating there had been an issue that had been resolved. I fail to see why the guests needed to become involved as the problem was resolved without any guests intervention.
THE PRINCESS MEDALION SYSTEM. Basically, it worked sporadically, not at all when the ship had no internet, which was practically daily in the Norwegian Fjords, When it did work, several guests informed me they either waited thirty minutes plus for the delivery of a drink/meal, or despite notification of a delivery, no drink ever arrived.
The system is designed to allow guests to order food or drink from anywhere on the ship among other features to avoid queueing at bars. In fact what was happening was, the bars were overwhelmed by remote orders when the system was working, and couldn't also deal with the queues at the bars in front of them, resulting in fewer, rather than more guests receiving quick service. I spoke to many guests, none of whom I knew previously, and the broad consensus was, it's a good idea that simply didn't work on this cruise! Maybe in other parts of the world where the ship gets a consistent internet signal, it may be fine, for me the system was down for the majority of my trip. My fellow travelers had mixed experiences, which seems to indicate the type of phone you use may have an impact?
If not for the failure of the Medalion system I would probably have awarded 4 stars. But again, as the system was down, meaning the crew took orders based on room numbers, several guests had issues with their bills as drinks appeared on their bills that they hadn't ordered. Simple mistakes by bar staff or something else? Idk!
So would I cruise with Princess again? Yes with the proviso that their prices reflect they fall short of some of their closest rivals. If I had the choice of Princess as opposed to Celebrity for example, if the prices were similar, I would not choose Princess. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the cruise, and the crew was great, but the Medallion system failed for me, why reinvent the wheel?
We cruise 2 or 3 times per annum, I would cruise with Princess again, but current 2023 indications are they consider themselves worth as much as some of their better competitors imo.
Currently on the Sky Princess and cannot wait to get home tomorrow. I had high expectations for this cruise line so I'm quite disappointed.
The smell of cigarette smoke from the casino permeats the back area of the atrium. The casino should be closed off. We avoided the area!!
The room steward was great, however everyday when he wiped around the bathroom sink etc he used a dirty wet cloth. I know because there is a distinct smell from a dirty wet cloth. I had to wipe over it with wet wipes.
Not much choice for me in the buffet and watching the food being slapped onto the plate from the server was quite distasteful.
The Medallion App was hit and miss.
The entertainment was hit and miss.
The Norwegian cruise meant decks were empty but all inside areas choccablock. Queues for drinks and nowhere to sit.
On a positive note the evening meal and lunch in the dining rooms were nice and well presented, however, the breakfast in the dining room was nothing to shout about.
I got the impression from fellow first timers on Princess cruises that they too were disappointed. It is the worse cruise we've been on and we have been in lots.
It's a shame because I always thought Princess was a premium cruise line.
Shoutout to Jacob in the Southampton custom service team
I just wanted to give a shoutout to Jacob in the Southampton customer service team who I chatted to earlier today and helped sort out a slight error with a name on the booking. Sorted it as best he could quickly and clearly, offered guidance on what we'd need to bring with us to the terminal and even a bit of advice for one of the ports of call. Really friendly and light years ahead of the customer service I got from the travel agent I actually booked the cruise through! Thanks Jacob :)
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