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The Pathetic Princess
Do not pay for a Princess cruise
Lest many greenbacks you may lose
If you’re irate and lost
At inflated great cost
Strange stray charges you must refuse
These fees I won’t accept henceforth
My refunds maybe heading north
I pray Princess one day
Maybe I guess by May
Before May Day or May the fourth
Alan Grace
5 February 2024
(modified 24 February 2024)
Next week it will be four months since our cruise ended!
Last week we received an invoice through the post for USD $265.72 related to phone calls made by the previous occupants of our cabin.
My reply is below [Excerpts with images removed]:
Good morning
I acknowledge receipt of your invoice (scan attached) dated 13 February 2024, postmarked 14 February, which arrived in our (snail mail) letterbox on 22 February:
We do not believe we are liable for these charges.
You will see below that Princess now considers this matter closed.
Please acknowledge receipt of this email and email me your (Princess) address for service and responses to my queries below.
Please read below and confirm that you will no longer be seeking any money from us.
I need to seek legal advice before replying further. I cannot do this until next week.
I need the information requested before then.
Until then (originally a numbered list):
- You will see in the email forwarded below from XXX that:
After investigating the ship have confirmed that the telephone charges were made by the guests on the previous voyage who were in your stateroom. It appears that a system error occurred which resulted in the charges being delayed and incorrectly applied to your onboard account. - It appears that this system error existed for over two months. How long did it exist for and was it limited to Majestic Princess, All Princess ships or all P&O ships as well? I believe over 800 passengers boarded Majestic Princess in Auckland on our cruise like us and could have been affected by the same system error (computer Bug?).
- Please send me a redacted copy of the statement for the previous occupant of our cabin to confirm that there has been no double-dipping/ double billing for these charges.
- Princess now regards this issue closed:
…
- Also in the same email:
“As we know, you were unfortunately incorrectly charged for
phone calls that were not yours.” - After boarding one day late on Tuesday 31 October we immediately went to Reception.
- There was no money credited directly to our onboard account for our missed day at that time. Only USD $25 for incidentals and USD $17.69 port tax refund.
- I am still unsure if the port tax refund only applies to Tauranga (which we missed) or to one day in Auckland as well (it should have included both). Please confirm.
- On our onboard account (on 2 November) we were only given USD $18.96 (NZ $30.25 according to Princess later) directly for our day missed (for our minisuite!). We had been previously promised a one-day refund of the fare paid:
- We were told by YYY at Reception that any onboard credit remaining on our account would be paid by USD cheque. This was a problem for us since most NZ banks no longer accept payment even for NZD cheque. From Nicole in a phone call in 2024 we learned that payment by Princess in USD cheque had not happened for NZ citizens for over 12 Months prior to our cruise. Please confirm the length of time.
- I have been unable to obtain a copy of the Passage Contract relevant to our cruise despite a number of requests to Captains Circle and Customer service. The Princess App only links to the most recent Passage Contract after our cruise ended (dated 9 November and later 9 November 2023). Please email me:
- The Passage Contract effective on the date we booked (13 September 2023).
- Any updates to the Passage Contract prior to the end of our cruise (4 November 2023).
- For over two months, Princess failed to look into my claim/complaints. Princess said it would respond in 10 business days. Our cruise ended in Sydney on Saturday 4 November. We learned of the phone call charges in an email on 5 November and I complained though our NZ booking Agent ZZZ on Monday 6 November at 10:06 AM NZT.
- XXX (Princess) only responded on 9 January 2024.
- You are aware that Princess cannot contract out of the NZ Fair Trading Act or the NZ Consumer Guarantees Act.
- I assume this is true for the Australian Consumer laws. Please confirm.
- I believe Princess has breached these acts. The Passage Contract will not apply in this situation.
Regards
Alan Grace
For more posts about this see:
Green Bottles, Alan's Ark & COVID Odyssey: Alan Grace's vir[tu]al journey 