Having travelled with P & O many times, I was aware that their quality had gone down in recent years but have been appalled with the service received on this last cruise.

Things started badly when I booked direct with P & O several months before sailing. Living in the far north of england, manchester was the nearest airport they appeared to offer. NO, we were told, only flights left from Gatwick ( a 290 mile drive from home). I asked for a price that did not include the flight so that | could arrange my own flights but was told no discount would be provided and that the total cost would be the same, with or without flights. I reluctantly accepted a gatwick flight and booked hotel and parking which cost well over £200 only to find much later that flights were still available from Manchester as little as one week before and some people were given a £200 reduction in the cruise price for arranging their own flights. I even met one passenger who lived 5 minutes drive from Gatwick who was told the only flights available were from Manchester!

On embarking the ship, we discovered that we had been given late sitting dinner. As I need to eat much earlier for medical reasons, I went to see the restaurant manager and asked if we could change sittings. His attitude was appalling and extremely rude and told me that as we had booked a saver fare no change was possible and if I needed to eat earlier, I should have either paid more money or I should eat upstairs in the buffet and my medical needs appeared to be irrelevant!. This despite the fact that 1st sitting had very many empty seats. Luckily, our cabin steward knew of 2 people in a nearby cabin who wanted to change so we did a swap. No thanks to P & O! Read more