October 14, 1999

To whom it may concern:

We have recently returned from a cruise through the Panama Canal on Sea Princess. We wanted to write a letter to inform you of the many problems we encountered during the planning and duration of our trip. We had hoped that this trip would be a trip of a lifetime but instead it turned into a nightmare in many respects.

Initially, we reserved and paid for a stateroom that our agent handpicked for us with our needs in mind. We overheard the conversation our agent had directly with a representative with Princes Cruises and we circled our stateroom (C427), which was on level 9, in the middle, and with a private balcony. Our choice was based on engine noise and consideration of placement to minimize possible seasickness due to the motion of the ship. Any layperson would know that more ship movement would be felt in the cabin assigned to us(A634) than in the cabin we were originally told had been reserved for us. Our intelligence was insulted when we were told by the purser's office that there is no difference in movement anywhere on the ship.

Shortly before the cruise we received a message from AAA telling us that we had been "upgraded" and that we had no choice of cabin, nor could we be told what stateroom would be assigned to us. After questioning three agents with AAA and making several phone calls we met with a dead end and were only given the run-around. Basically we were told that we had no say in the decision! Apparently we had no stateroom assigned to us until one week before the cruise and it was two levels higher, on the other side of the boat, and near the stern rather than in the middle.

Also we were given a stateroom that had a serious ventilation problem and had a strong odor or urine/ammonia in the head throughout the cruise. The odor got worse as the cruise progressed and nothing could be done to deal with this serious problem. In addition, the people we talked with, who had also been given supposed "upgrades," were given cabins in the rear or front of the boat when they had requested middle cabins.

Our travel arrangements also did not meet our expectations. We were told we would not have to handle our luggage until we arrived in Acapulco and instead had to secure and move it ourselves in Dallas, where we were given incomplete information regarding the location of our connecting flight. Consequently, there were 32 confused people (many of them elderly and some handicapped) who had to lug their luggage from one terminal to other without knowing exactly where they were supposed to be going. There was really no excuse for that kind of mix-up and it was exhausting and frustrating for those of us involved in it. We had the same kinds of problems with handling our luggage when we disembarked. Because of all the confusion and wasted energy and time, it would have been much simpler for us to travel on our own rather than part of this "supposed" escorted group tour. The same is true of our flights. Had we had the opportunity to arrange for our own flights we would not have been subjected to flying with a charter service that did not seem safe or secure to many of us (Miami Air from Dallas to Acapulco). Although the weather was a factor that no one could control, many of us would have been more confident flying via a larger more comfortable and "safe-feeling" airplane.

When we arrived at the Sea Princess we found the stateroom to be spacious and comfortable even though the location was inferior to that which we had chosen. Our steward gave us excellent service. He was also honest and told us that the stateroom had a history of having a bad odor, when the purser's office failed to help us. His honesty was a welcome relief from dealing with some other staff members.

In addition to the problems already mentioned we had numerous problems that we will list by category:

Sanitation:

1. We saw one waiter drop a roll onto the floor and replace it in the basket on the table when he thought no one was looking. (Not our waiter.)
2. Twice we had hair in our food (once in soup and another in salad). It did not belong to anyone at the table or our servers. Our waiter looked appalled when we pointed it out to him, but there was no apology offered or any other action taken. Needless to say, it did affect our appetites throughout the rest of the cruise.
3. The odor in the bathroom was overwhelming at times and made it impossible to spend any more time in the head than was absolutely necessary. That meant no relaxing showers or time for a leisurely shave, etc. Once the steward scrubbed down the bathroom but it did not help as the smell obviously was coming from the ventilation of the toilet itself.

1. Although the stated smoking policy suggests that people refrain from cigar and pipe smoking, that was only a suggestion and nothing was done to discourage those who chose to smoke either. A man who was in a cabin two doors from us smoked cigars on his balcony that caused our balcony to be filled with the noxious smoke. Thus there were times on the cruise when we couldn't even use our balcony and if we opened the door to our balcony the smell filled our room.
2. Although the dining rooms and some other areas were supposed to be smoke-free, those policies weren't always enforced and the public areas that one had to transverse to get to the smoke-free areas were so polluted with cigarette smoke that those of us who are allergic to smoke became sick from inhaling the pollutants. There was no way to avoid it. In fact to get to our cabin we had to walk through hallways that were thick with smoke.

Safety and security:

1. At one point we were locked out of our cabin for about two hours because the batteries in the door lock were bad. We received neither an apology nor anything else for our inconvenience.
2. For several days we had no phone service. That seems to us to be a serious safety issue. However, at the very least it was a problem of inconvenience. We were not able to reach our friends on the boat or get a wake-up call when we needed one. Instead we had to have a member of our group knock on everyone's door early in the morning to wake us up in time.

1. It appeared to us that many of the crew seemed controlled by fear and anxiety. Rather than having the energy to serve us and attend to our needs, they seemed more self-focused in their concern about getting good evaluations. In fact, several actually requested good evaluations of us. Therefore, we found ourselves wanting to take care of them and reassure them rather than relaxing and enjoying ourselves. This is quite different from earlier experiences we have had with cruises.
2. We found most of the personnel in the purser's office to be condescending and patronizing. We found this insulting. On one occasion, we asked to have the policy of "upgrading" to be clarified when we reported our problems with the cabin and the smoke. The person who took care of us, Kathy, was very patronizing and passed the buck to the AAA. (AAA had told us it was a problem with Princess.) Later Kathy sent chocolate covered strawberries to our room with an apology for our problems. Later we received a recorded message from her. With a follow-up call we told her that the problems were not resolved with the stateroom, she said she would look into the problem again but no further action (or apology) was forthcoming for the duration of the cruise.
3. We learned that it was not a good idea to bring any complaints to anyone at the purser's office, as they would be dumped on some of the lower level staff who were neither responsible or at fault, but who would end up getting blamed and punished in some way. One example of this was when we were preparing for disembarkation and discovered that our account had been overcharged. In the most egregious display of passive aggressive behavior we have ever seen it took an inordinate amount of time for the person at the purser's desk to clear up one minor charge. We were not about to try to clear up anything else, even though we were aware of other inaccurate charges on our bill. It was easier to just pay the bill than to deal with the personnel at the purser's counter.
4. In fact, most times we had a problem or question regarding the cruise it felt like we were being treated as if we were trying to "get away with something" rather than being treated with dignity as human beings who were passengers who had paid for a leisurely cruise. We felt that in many cases the staff were not honest with us but were trying to brush us off. How different from other travel experience that we, and members in our party, had experienced in the past!

Other minor problems included food that was often lukewarm, rather than hot, at the Horizon Court buffets and the overall mediocre quality of food. In addition, we were annoyed by the constant hawking of items for sale on the ship and for the high prices charged for certain items. Examples of the latter include $2.95 for water, $6.99 for a small container of insect repellant, $1.29 for five cough drops and $1.50 (plus service charge, "for your convenience") for a small glass of grapefruit juice. Other things are even more minor, but make of the fabric of the whole cloth of this travel adventure. They all are part of why we would be unlikely to take another Princess Cruise. Likewise we have advised our friends to avoid the line and have written about this travel experience on our travel site on the Internet.

We were not surprised when we returned home and looked up the ratings for the Sea Princess on the Web (@cruise2.com) and discovered that it failed in its sanitation rating. We were also not surprised that the other ratings for food, entertainment, etc. matched ours. However, we were grateful for the reality check.

We think we are entitled to something for the inconvenience, unpleasantness, unhealthy conditions and discomfort that we experienced as a result of cruising with the Sea Princess, let alone the doctor's bills that we have had to pay as a result of this cruise. However, we do not want a coupon for money off on a future cruise, as we will choose another line for cruises we want to take. Unfortunately some in our party said they would never cruise again and others said they would never cruise with Princess. We are aware that most people do not take the time or energy to write a letter. We wanted to do so because we think you are entitled to the feedback.

We think a cash compensation would be nice.

We look forward to hearing from you in the near future.

Sincerely,

Tom and Marie Grant

November 1999 - UPDATE:

We received a standard form letter in response to our letter.  With it was a nontransferrable gift certificate for money off on our next cruise.  In response to that, we wrote another letter.