£285 Property Damaged During P&O Cruise

Katy93

Arrived back from our cruise yesterday - unsure what the best option would be to recover the damages – P&O have been extremely unhelpful so far, any advice would be appreciated.

This is what happened:
I brought two GHD appliances on board (a curling tong and hair straightener priced at £120 and £165 respectively) after checking the guidance on what is permitted to be carried on, it states that hair straighteners/dryers etc are fine to be brought on board the ship.
The curling tongs get used once a day and the hair straighteners are hardly used at all and practically brand-new condition.

After the first day housekeeping wrapped the wire around the products which GHD say not to do as it can cause it to break. They had worked on the boat initially with no issues however since housekeeping had done this, the curling tong did not work – the light flashes red, the product beeps and the plates don’t get hot.
We were not sure what was causing this so we left a note asking them not to wrap the wires around the appliances. The straighteners worked for the next couple of days until they then had the exact same issue.

We reported this matter and were passed to three different staff members and told we would be contacted which we then had to chase numerous times. We were then given different reasons, from it being caused by the voltage of the plugs on board and assured they will work once back in UK (they don’t) to being a fault with the appliance itself.

We were eventually given £50 on board credit and 2 dressing gowns (this was from housekeeping for the inconvenience caused and not as reparations for our damaged product) and told to fill out an incident form which needs to be sent to Carnival UK. When we asked what this form was for we were initially told a ‘refund’, we were sceptical of this and upon further questioning a different staff member then informed us the form would be sent to their head office who will then ‘look in to it’.

Since we have been back the appliances have both remained in the same state and are completely unusable. This is obviously very distressing and after researching we can’t seem to find information on what the next steps would be and are unsure whether to put a claim in with my partners travel insurance.

I am wondering where, if anywhere, I stand with this? Any advice/accounts of similar situations would be appreciated.

bris

Use the warranty that come with the items. GHD give 2 years with most products 1 year at worst. Why aren't you using that?

zoob

Obviously you’d told the housekeeper in advance not to wrap the cable around the GHD haircare product or left a note on them on how to care for them
Having sold 1000s of haircare products over the years I can say that the flex breaking internally doesn’t just happen after wrapping it around once
The flex uselly breaks at the plug end or where it connects into the appliance and is a comman issue but not a fault but a user issue
I wouldn’t expect the housekeeper to have specialist knowledge on GHD haircare products against other brands

Katy93

bris wrote: »

Use the warranty that come with the items. GHD give 2 years with most products 1 year at worst. Why aren't you using that?

Unfortunately the warranty ended last month as they were purchased March 2017

Katy93

zoob wrote: »

Obviously you’d told the housekeeper in advance not to wrap the cable around the GHD haircare product or left a note on them on how to care for them
Having sold 1000s of haircare products over the years I can say that the flex breaking internally doesn’t just happen after wrapping it around once
The flex uselly breaks at the plug end or where it connects into the appliance and is a comman issue but not a fault but a user issue
I wouldn’t expect the housekeeper to have specialist knowledge on GHD haircare products against other brands

We aren't entirely sure if this is what has caused the issue, the note to the housekeeping was more of a precaution. The fact that two appliances have broken in the exact same way over the period of 2/3 days having never had an issue previously, leads me to think it is either this or some issue with voltage/power supply on board somehow frying something?

I hadn't thought to write a guide to housekeeping beforehand on how to care for them unfortunately

davidmcn

Assuming it is simply a break in the cable, replacement cables are available for under a tenner.

Aylesbury_Duck

Katy93 wrote: »

Unfortunately the warranty ended last month as they were purchased March 2017

This all happened over two years ago?! That’s not the impression you gave on your opening post. I wouldn’t think you’re going to get anywhere this long after the event.

Takmon

Aylesbury_Duck wrote: »

This all happened over two years ago?! That’s not the impression you gave on your opening post. I wouldn’t think you’re going to get anywhere this long after the event.

March 2017 was when they bought them.

They clearly said they arrived back from the cruise "yesterday" in their opening post so the incident happened less than a week ago.

I'm not sure why your confused?

Aylesbury_Duck

You’re right, my mistake. I read “brought on board” as “bought on board”. I couldn’t reconcile that with “yesterday” and March 2017.

daveyjp

After two years of use it will be difficult to show that the damage was due to one incident.

Whilst they may cost over £200 to replace, you can't expect new for old after two years. In reality they are worth a few quid and I'd accept what was already offered.

Katy93

Aylesbury_Duck wrote: »

This all happened over two years ago?! That’s not the impression you gave on your opening post. I wouldn’t think you’re going to get anywhere this long after the event.

Apologies, the products were purchased March 2017, our cruise was 27th April 2019 - 4th May which is when the damage occurred.