Island Princess Review

Sixty Days South America

Review for South America Cruise on Island Princess
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StripedCat
10+ Cruises • Age 70s

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Cabin
Value for Money
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Sail Date: Jan 2018
Cabin: Mini-Suite with Balcony

Island Princess refurbished since last on it, very elegant. Spa amazing. Food fine, not up to previous quality, especially in over-salted Buffet. Internet sporadic and unreliable entire voyage. Itinerary was fabulous, but Ship went into too many Container Ports. Typically in unsafe areas of city w/few to no taxis nor tour offerings. Passengers should take ship excursions rather than go off by themselves in these Container Ports. Ship-sponsored excursions from container ports not surprisingly did not have same expertise Tour Guides as available in regular cruise ship ports. This didn't used to happen with Princess. Certainly container ports must have cheaper dockage fees, but more profit, more unhappy passengers. I would never knowingly book a cruise going to a container port again unless it was the only port, which is usually not the case. Many Princess crew handling excursions and tenders were inattentive and careless. Regularly placing the wrong excursion stickers on folks, which delayed excursions departures with time that could not be made up due to ship departure times. Some tender lines were mass confusion while Princess crew stood by doing nothing to direct crowd. These were regular occurrences the entire voyage. Embarkation line was hours long, especially for Elites. Disembarkation likewise, sat on ship waiting to disembark for over two hours past assigned times. Passenger Services desk had long lines and only two crew on at busiest times (e.g., checking out) while several crew stood around with empty drink trays - as just one example of a misalignment of personnel position training/resources. Passenger Service crew rarely had useful solution/answer, after standing in lengthy lines to learn that most didn't know and didn't care. Expedited luggage was the biggest incompetent disaster: crew simply never took care of arranging it for many, despite several days of advance deadline detailed flight paperwork, then making up unbelievable excuses. Some ship crew were fantastic. The majority had excuses, an attitude of no accountability. Crew explained inadequate service on too many Elites. Princess knows in advance the number of Elites: should allocate adequate personnel/resources accordingly. Princess needs to invest in better customer service training and accountability. If Princess is making more profit now by lowering quality, this seems short-sighted. There are plenty of other cruise lines, some even reciprocate Princess's loyalty program. Princess cruises used to be a wonderful experience: I hope they return to their former excellence.

Cabin Review

Mini-Suite with Balcony

Cabin was excellent as always on Princess. Cabin steward seemed apparently new to his duties and/or had too many cabins to attend. He clearly gave his best effort, but seemed very inexperienced or lacking training.

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