New Embarkaion Procedures (again)

[qbman1]

They probably learned their skills on the ZX Spectrum. *RND usually sorts it out !

[daib GC]

I suspect the times are allocated in exactly the same way as the disembarkation times - ie totally at random!

As far as I can asserting they are done by deck. But not in the order you may think, top to bottom or bottom to top. So it may be E B C A D. On larger ships they also appear to have sub divisions, C- stern, D - centre etc. This could be to do with the order in which the bags are delivered to the cabins. Remember we have new luggage labels as well which look to be machine readable.

Sorry to give a sensible answer to your question and the overall concerns of the thread.

BTW I don't care as we get on first whatever way they do it.

Merry Christmas

Happy Crusing

[barney]

I think you are giving them far too much credit Dai

The only system is that there isn't one

As you say, what the hell!

Hardly makes a difference in the grand scheme of things

Merry Xmas

[Gill W]

OK - end of that good idea.

Now I know that this will sound stupid - but why cannot P&O tell us the basis of the allocation, if there is one, so that we would then have the ability to possibly influence our arrival time?

Because people will rush to book the decks that board early, and no one would want to book a late boarding deck - they wouldn't be able to sell the cabins at any price!

[Meg 50]

so with 8 (?) decks..... and music has an octave....

perhaps they are done in the order of someone's fave tune that day?

[qbman1]

Reckon it must be the Resurrection Shuffle then !

[Ray B]

The computer say's " "I'm giving the passengers all the right times—but not necessarily in the right order "

[Mervyn and Trish]

I think Cubie should ask his mate Edgers over cocktails one evening

[Whynd1]

Whilst waiting in the lounge for embarkation on Oriana I heard a P and O representative complain that even he didn't know all those who have priority embarkation. There was a gentleman and his good lady who should have had priority and had complained. Apparently he was a diplomat and it seems they are a priority.

[allatc]

I've sussed it.

They take your combined ages, multiply by 100; divide by the number of passengers on the cruise.
Multiply by the number of goals scored in the last England match
Multiply by the number of tries last scored by Wales
Take away the score of the highest scoring pair in Strictly
Divide by the number of elapsed days since booking
Take the resulting figure which is in minutes to calculate the embarkation time

[david63]

I've sussed it.

They take your combined ages, multiply by 100; divide by the number of passengers on the cruise.
Multiply by the number of goals scored in the last England match
Multiply by the number of tries last scored by Wales
Take away the score of the highest scoring pair in Strictly
Divide by the number of elapsed days since booking
Take the resulting figure which is in minutes to calculate the embarkation time

... in other words - they make it up as they go along

[Peter D]

On our 4 day on Oriana out of City Terminal, 5 December:

Normally we drive down the day before from NE Wales. However, this time because we visited family in London our journey to Southampton should have been short and sweet. So, with a boarding time of 1:30 we left Twickenham at 11:00 for the 1hr 30 mins journey. That would allow for any problem time and hopefully pull into the City Terminal with plenty of time to spare. We actually arrived at the terminal at 1:30 exactly. Our 1hr 30 min journey actually took 2hrs 30 mins, a full 60% longer, road works, traffic etc etc

Check-in was...... After all the hype of you must arrive at your given time, well we were slightly late, 13:30 arriving with the car at suitcase drop point. Then everyone who entered through the door, irrespective of the time on their e-ticket, were shown straight to security and then onto the snake queue and check-in. No tickets checked, no boarding cards, no sitting down, no waiting straight to security then check in and on-board. So we were on Oriana by 2pm. Rooms ready, case dropped off and relax.

Whether this was because it was a short cruise, small ship or what I do not know. But it worked, no queue no fuss. Back to the good old system.

[Peter D]

Now, on the 'is it by deck, is it by cabin' or is it to infinity and beyond.

Big complaint on P&O Facebook page a while back. Someone who had booked two cabins, adjacent to each other, one for them and one for their daughter and son in law, full price, same day of booking, direct with P&O were given two different boarding times. One of 2pm and one of 3:30pm. She was not a happy cruiser, I read the post.

The mystery continues......

[The Tinker]

Hey you guys - it was all done to save money! Check in staff do not start work until 1 hour later on longer cruises. Think of the savings in wages over the financial year.

The system works in all Baltic, liguarian, and suites have 1230 embarkation times, then after them the carribeans and the rest on some sort of deck system.

[daib GC]

On our 4 day on Oriana out of City Terminal, 5 December:

Normally we drive down the day before from NE Wales. However, this time because we visited family in London our journey to Southampton should have been short and sweet. So, with a boarding time of 1:30 we left Twickenham at 11:00 for the 1hr 30 mins journey. That would allow for any problem time and hopefully pull into the City Terminal with plenty of time to spare. We actually arrived at the terminal at 1:30 exactly. Our 1hr 30 min journey actually took 2hrs 30 mins, a full 60% longer, road works, traffic etc etc

Check-in was...... After all the hype of you must arrive at your given time, well we were slightly late, 13:30 arriving with the car at suitcase drop point. Then everyone who entered through the door, irrespective of the time on their e-ticket, were shown straight to security and then onto the snake queue and check-in. No tickets checked, no boarding cards, no sitting down, no waiting straight to security then check in and on-board. So we were on Oriana by 2pm. Rooms ready, case dropped off and relax.

Whether this was because it was a short cruise, small ship or what I do not know. But it worked, no queue no fuss. Back to the good old system.

It worked Peter because half the ship had not turned up at 12.00 wanting to get on first.

They have said that if there is no one waiting they will not hold to times and board people when they can.

[towny44]

On our 4 day on Oriana out of City Terminal, 5 December:

Normally we drive down the day before from NE Wales. However, this time because we visited family in London our journey to Southampton should have been short and sweet. So, with a boarding time of 1:30 we left Twickenham at 11:00 for the 1hr 30 mins journey. That would allow for any problem time and hopefully pull into the City Terminal with plenty of time to spare. We actually arrived at the terminal at 1:30 exactly. Our 1hr 30 min journey actually took 2hrs 30 mins, a full 60% longer, road works, traffic etc etc

Check-in was...... After all the hype of you must arrive at your given time, well we were slightly late, 13:30 arriving with the car at suitcase drop point. Then everyone who entered through the door, irrespective of the time on their e-ticket, were shown straight to security and then onto the snake queue and check-in. No tickets checked, no boarding cards, no sitting down, no waiting straight to security then check in and on-board. So we were on Oriana by 2pm. Rooms ready, case dropped off and relax.

Whether this was because it was a short cruise, small ship or what I do not know. But it worked, no queue no fuss. Back to the good old system.

It worked Peter because half the ship had not turned up at 12.00 wanting to get on first.

They have said that if there is no one waiting they will not hold to times and board people when they can.

No Dai, it worked because it was at City terminal which is geared up by RCI to provide such a slick service, just a pity that they possibly used RCI check in staff which doubtless will have prevented the slow methodical P&O staff from learning how to do it better.

[gravy1955]

We are Oriana departing on 6 Jan.We booked full fare probably well over a year in advance. We have an inside cabin (so not allocated on status ) on E deck ( so well down in deck order) but still have an arrival time of 1:30 so there maybe something to the op's initial theory.

[daib GC]

On our 4 day on Oriana out of City Terminal, 5 December:

Normally we drive down the day before from NE Wales. However, this time because we visited family in London our journey to Southampton should have been short and sweet. So, with a boarding time of 1:30 we left Twickenham at 11:00 for the 1hr 30 mins journey. That would allow for any problem time and hopefully pull into the City Terminal with plenty of time to spare. We actually arrived at the terminal at 1:30 exactly. Our 1hr 30 min journey actually took 2hrs 30 mins, a full 60% longer, road works, traffic etc etc

Check-in was...... After all the hype of you must arrive at your given time, well we were slightly late, 13:30 arriving with the car at suitcase drop point. Then everyone who entered through the door, irrespective of the time on their e-ticket, were shown straight to security and then onto the snake queue and check-in. No tickets checked, no boarding cards, no sitting down, no waiting straight to security then check in and on-board. So we were on Oriana by 2pm. Rooms ready, case dropped off and relax.

Whether this was because it was a short cruise, small ship or what I do not know. But it worked, no queue no fuss. Back to the good old system.

It worked Peter because half the ship had not turned up at 12.00 wanting to get on first.

They have said that if there is no one waiting they will not hold to times and board people when they can.

No Dai, it worked because it was at City terminal which is geared up by RCI to provide such a slick service, just a pity that they possibly used RCI check in staff which doubtless will have prevented the slow methodical P&O staff from learning how to do it better.

No it would have been the P&O staff. Or rather the firm they use the staff do not stay with the terminal. So you have it wrong. I know this because we have a friend who works for the company who does all the non P&O / Cunard ships.

[towny44]

On our 4 day on Oriana out of City Terminal, 5 December:

Normally we drive down the day before from NE Wales. However, this time because we visited family in London our journey to Southampton should have been short and sweet. So, with a boarding time of 1:30 we left Twickenham at 11:00 for the 1hr 30 mins journey. That would allow for any problem time and hopefully pull into the City Terminal with plenty of time to spare. We actually arrived at the terminal at 1:30 exactly. Our 1hr 30 min journey actually took 2hrs 30 mins, a full 60% longer, road works, traffic etc etc

Check-in was...... After all the hype of you must arrive at your given time, well we were slightly late, 13:30 arriving with the car at suitcase drop point. Then everyone who entered through the door, irrespective of the time on their e-ticket, were shown straight to security and then onto the snake queue and check-in. No tickets checked, no boarding cards, no sitting down, no waiting straight to security then check in and on-board. So we were on Oriana by 2pm. Rooms ready, case dropped off and relax.

Whether this was because it was a short cruise, small ship or what I do not know. But it worked, no queue no fuss. Back to the good old system.

It worked Peter because half the ship had not turned up at 12.00 wanting to get on first.

They have said that if there is no one waiting they will not hold to times and board people when they can.

No Dai, it worked because it was at City terminal which is geared up by RCI to provide such a slick service, just a pity that they possibly used RCI check in staff which doubtless will have prevented the slow methodical P&O staff from learning how to do it better.

No it would have been the P&O staff. Or rather the firm they use the staff do not stay with the terminal. So you have it wrong. I know this because we have a friend who works for the company who does all the non P&O / Cunard ships.

I only said "possibly used RCI personnel", so if you're right maybe the P&O staff will have learned how check in can be so much better, and maybe they will implement that when back at Ocean or Mayflower, whoops there goes another flying porker.

[sunseeker16]

Just back from the Ventura 4-nighter which left Mayflower on Sunday.

We booked a P-deck inside cabin way back in January. We are not golden, or special in any way

Our boarding time was 1pm but being a Sunday we could only drop the dog off during a one hour time slot and even ensuring we left her at the latest time we possibly could we still arrived at the terminal at 11.50. CPS took the car and luggage and we hesitantly went in to the terminal. I flashed the e-tickets and started to apologise for being too early but was assured there was no problem and we were given Blue 2 embarkation cards. The display screen said boarding would commence at 12.15.
A few people seemed to drift towads the check in desks and get processed but I couldn't be sure about that. At noon they called 'anyone with grey cards' but only a very small number went forward, so Blue 1 went next and we Blue 2's were processed shortly after that. We were onboard and had found our cabin by 12.15. No-one said anything about cabins being ready or otherwise but whilst we were lunching at about 1 a general announcement went out that cabins were now ready. Oops!

All very smooth, for us. as was disembarkation this morning (though we did get in an hour early to avoid anticipated high winds) General disembarkation was permitted from 7.45am

[towny44]

Yesterdays strong winds and problems with the air bridge seemed to cause long delays boarding, resulting in a resurgence of complaints on CC and FB, I don't think we have heard the last of this just yet.

[barney]

I read that on Cruise Critic and some folk just take your breath away.

Apparantly P&O are now responsible for the weather as well.

As for the few who said that they will not travel P&O again, I say good.
At least we will not have to put up with their trivial whinging anymore.

I sometimes dispair of the human race.
When considering some of the things that are going on in the world and some folk find a short wait 'like hell'
Give me strength

[david63]

My experience on Saturday joining Arcadia.

We had a 13:30 "arrival time" and arrived just after 12:30. We were given a Blue "C" card. We were called to check-in at 13:30 and were in the cabin by 14:00 - despite comments of "organised chaos". It was well organised and most definitely not chaotic.

As far as I can see nothing has basically changed other than you are now given cards relating to your arrival time rather than in the order in which you arrive.

[Mervyn and Trish]

My experience on Saturday joining Arcadia.

We had a 13:30 "arrival time" and arrived just after 12:30. We were given a Blue "C" card. We were called to check-in at 13:30 and were in the cabin by 14:00 - despite comments of "organised chaos". It was well organised and most definitely not chaotic.

As far as I can see nothing has basically changed other than you are now given cards relating to your arrival time rather than in the order in which you arrive.

Which is how I've maintained for a while it should be. Board those arrive at the time requested as near that time as possible. If others arrive early then board them when there is a gap, or if not make them wait till their time. After all almost everyone on here who has commented has said they're quite happy to wait in the terminal, just don't want to hang about in Southampton or risk being late. Sounds to me as if the "new" plan is working.

[barney]

Exactly David

Our experience was exactly the same although we did board slightly earlier than expected.

But then we didn't have strong winds to contend with.