Pursers Office

[Graham Taylor]

"Good Afternoon Ladies & Gentlemen and welcome onboard Queen Elizabeth 2. This is to advise that the Pursers Office situated on 2 deck by the F stairway is open. The staff will be happy to assist you with any queries you might have, the registration of your credit card for your onboard account, onward travel arrangements for the port of New York/Southampton, port and disembarkation information and stamps"

[Isabelle Prondzynski]

Thank you, Graham! This feels like the start of another QE2Story World Cruise!

I wonder can we reconstruct all the changes in the Purser's Officer over the years? I only knew the Purser's Office in the location it had at the end of QE2's Cunard life. I do, however, think that I also knew the foreign currency hatch facing the Two Deck alleyway, although I cannot remember it being in use.

I also went to the Purser's Office to ask when the Swimming Pool would finally open (reply : it cannot be heated, so it will not be opened...) and rang it to request some anti-seasickness tablets...

I found the Purser's crew to be invariably helpful, though not of course always able to do what I would have wanted to happen.

[Twynkle]

Graham - apart from Excursions and future cruises, as far as passengers were concerned,
wasn't the Purser's Office at the centre of the (hotel-side) universe on QE2 -
from receiving any sort of enquiry, phone call, visit, all the way to fielding complaints...?
Thanks to you for livening up Deck 2 with the special bit of carpet in the alleyway!
Rosie

[cunardqueen]

Im sure with Jamie Luke in charge it was a fun place, not to mention some of the characters that worked there.Adair with her non uniform jumper,Lynette,Janice,James and Steve, to name only a few. I always wondered with that mirrored glass there if the staff ever moaned behind the scenes oh theres so and so..No doubt poking fun at the poor unsuspecting passengers.

It would be nice to see photos of behind the scenes...i always did wonder what was behind there. and how on earth did you sort out and find all the various chits when passengers came up with a query about some item charged by mistake.
The paperwork must have been a nightmare.   
I used to in my early trips enjoy getting travellers cheques cashed at the Barclays Bank. no doubt your work increased ten fold when the bank was removed.   Progress eh !   

[Graham Taylor]

I wonder can we reconstruct all the changes in the Purser's Officer over the years?

Well seems a good place to start, but first lets just correct one small error that often crops up and that is there is no apostrophe in Pursers Office, grammatically incorrect I know.

First off I want to point out that being onboard from 87 to 92 I only knew the office in one stage of its incarnation. I'll try to start the process of piecing together the evolution of the office, however, I can't necessarily be sure of my facts where I have been told second hand.

The Pursers Office that I knew was constructed during the big refit of '87. It consisted of a suite of offices situated in the central space between the cross passageways of F & G Stairways. It was made up of the following: the Front Desk (Junior Pursers and Travel Pursers), the Chief Purser's office, Manifest Officer's desk, Berthing Officer's desk, Switchboard Operator, Purser admin section, photocopying room, office of the Chief Cashier, Cashiers and accounts computer/server on the G stairway side and finally attached to but not part of - the office of the Cruise Director.

To my knowledge, because I have not heard differently I am not aware of the office being situated in a different part of the ship, however, I have been led to believe that when the ship first came out there were two spaces in the Rotunda which were used as an Information Desk and Tour Office. These two spaces were situated on the aft side of the Rotunda - the Information Desk on the port side and the Tour Office on the starboard side. Certainly post '87 up to I believe the refit and remodelling of the Rotunda in '99 the two hatchways still existed but had been converted into showcases to match two on the forward side. The space on the starboard side was used by Pauline the Captain's Secretary and the other side became a store cupboard. In Pauline's office the original roller shutter was still evident.

The following photo shows the Information Desk in the Rotunda in use as well as the Pursers Office in its '87 to '94 incarnation (photos from http://www.rmsqueenelizabeth2.com)

[cunardqueen]

  The space on the starboard side was used by Pauline the Captain's Secretary and the other side became a store cupboard. In Pauline's office the original roller shutter was still evident.

   

On my very first crossing in 86 l remember being invited into Paulines office. A friendship that continues to this very day. A most amazing and beautiful lady .

[Graham Taylor]

I do, however, think that I also knew the foreign currency hatch facing the Two Deck alleyway, although I cannot remember it being in use.

I used to in my early trips enjoy getting travellers cheques cashed at the Barclays Bank. no doubt your work increased ten fold when the bank was removed.   Progress eh !   

Barclays Bank was situated on the aft side of the G Stair cross passageway and disappeared in the '87 refit to be replaced by the Safety Deposit Box Centre, nominally under the control of the Purser, but run by the Security Petty Officers.

Opposite the Pursers Office desk was the Foreign Exchange Office run by Travelex (before '87 - American Express) Any cashing of traveller's cheques would have been undertaken by them. For one thing we didn't carry large floats in our tills - mainly there for the sale of stamps and the odd payment of accounts on docking day. In the eventuality that someone needed to cash a traveller's cheque when Travelex was closed then we might have presented the check to the Chief Cashier directly, but I don't recall this happening too often, so no the closing of Barclays had little impact for either us, passengers or the crew.

One bone of contention for the American passengers on an Eastbound TA or a UK cruise was that they had difficulty understanding the need to change their Dollars into local currency. Those tourist destinations close to the US such as Mexico or the Caribbean tend to accept Dollars. Trying to explain that a Soton taxi driver is unlikely to readily accept Dollars was a regular occurrence at the desk and caused some dissatisfaction with the suggestion that Cunard should demand this off the taxi drivers, wasn't going to happen. In those days before the Euro, on Med Cruises, the amount of grief we got with American passengers upset that they had to change currency from Dollars to Escudo, to Pesetas, to French Franc, Lira, Drachma and so on. It was a bone of contention. Here, we are used to losing out each time we purchase currency due to the exchange rates and commission charges.

[Graham Taylor]

Graham - apart from Excursions and future cruises, as far as passengers were concerned,
wasn't the Purser's Office at the centre of the (hotel-side) universe on QE2 -
from receiving any sort of enquiry, phone call, visit, all the way to fielding complaints...?
Thanks to you for livening up Deck 2 with the special bit of carpet in the alleyway!
Rosie

Well we liked to think we were the centre of the QE2 universe!    In many respects we were the main contact point between the passengers and management. Yes handling complaints (but regretfully not always solving to a passenger's satisfaction) was a major part of our function as was fielding requests for cabin changes and upgrades. Whilst on that subject I'd like to clarify some misconceptions that I have read elsewhere regarding this particular sign (see below - photo from the collection of Leo Farnsworth) and that there are ALWAYS spare cabins:

I can't speak for how things were handled in Carnival's time, but I can categorically state that in my time that notice only appeared when the ship was a "sell out". This happened more often than not on the UK (or Limey or Tea Pot) cruises, particularly the Fjords or Party Cruises. New York and Pall Mall would not leave us with spare capacity, as company policy, for emergencies. Yes there might be a handful of vacant cabins, but they would be the unpopular ones such as the L's and M grades (under the old grading). A whole section, 5 deck aft, was taken out of passenger use due to vibration and some five deck cabins over the engine room were avoided for passenger use due to excess heat. These cabins were allocated to the German MAN engineers we carried for quite some time, poor men; they worked in a sauna and had to sleep in one!

Getting back to that sign; the Purser would take a decision to display it if cabin stock was limited, after all if someone had paid for a B grade or an E grade they are not going to want a J or an L such were the vagaries of the grading onboard (I'll cover that in more detail another time). Having said that, if a passenger was flooded out then they could be sleeping down on five deck or the hospital whilst their cabin was drying out. On the evening of sailing, when I came on duty, the Berthing Officer might hand over, if I'm lucky, a dozen cabins and if I was really lucky a few valuable high grades amongst the list (to be used with a high degree of discretion).

The Berthing Officer would receive from New York or Pall Mall Reservations a large computer printout of the passenger list the voyage before. Any signs that the cruise was heavily booked would trigger a long and costly satellite call to Reservations to clarify the situation. Concessionaires in some of the better 5 deck cabins would be asked to move and in some instances the Officers would be asked to "double up", so freeing up one of their cabins for a displaced Concessionaire crew member. This entailed two officers sharing their single cabins for a payment of I think (20 years ago remember) $10/day. Officers' cabins had a 4ft double bunk (for when wives travelled) and a day bed/sofa positioned at right angles to the bunk for those times of heavy seas; so one officer would get the day bed. With me working nights, sharing was easier as both of us could "hot bunk" by laying a second set of bedding over the first.

The Pursers Office did not get involved in tours (that was handled by the Cruise Staff from a desk in that dead space on the port side of the old Yacht Club. Similarly, future bookings were handled by dedicated Sales/Reservation staff at a desk in the Public Rooms.

The other functions of the Pursers Office with direct contact with the passengers were shipboard and shoreside information, selling of stamps and customs & immigration clearance of persons, pets and motor vehicles (the latter two needing documentation to be completed with officials on docking, held in the Card  Room).

In '87 the telephone system onboard received a major upgrade allowing direct dial around the ship using a computerised system from Nixdorf. This did away with the need for a dedicated switchboard office, which was situated below the Pursers Office on 3 deck. This was converted into a state of the art TV studio for the TV system that went ship wide at the same time. The telephone system had two switchboards; one in the Pursers Office and the other in the Radio Room. Another function of the new system was the automated wakeup call system, however, it wasn't entirely successful as the programmers set it to work using the 24hr clock (which unless from a military background is an anathema to your average person, particularly the Americans).

[Graham Taylor]

Im sure with Jamie Luke in charge it was a fun place, not to mention some of the characters that worked there.Adair with her non uniform jumper,Lynette,Janice,James and Steve, to name only a few. I always wondered with that mirrored glass there if the staff ever moaned behind the scenes oh theres so and so..No doubt poking fun at the poor unsuspecting passengers.

It would be nice to see photos of behind the scenes...i always did wonder what was behind there. and how on earth did you sort out and find all the various chits when passengers came up with a query about some item charged by mistake.
The paperwork must have been a nightmare.   
I used to in my early trips enjoy getting travellers cheques cashed at the Barclays Bank. no doubt your work increased ten fold when the bank was removed.   Progress eh !

Well Myles you certainly brought back to memory some names there!

Dear Adair, a lovely, sweet natured person from the American Deep South. Yes I remember that navy blue jumper, but it was acceptable navy rig so she got away with it. Believe me that desk could be bitterly cold in New York in December with the Midships and G Stair shell doors open, we guys had our reefer jackets the girls had to make do with the navy sweaters. I guess Adair felt the cold more at other times too.

I remember Lynette liked her Dom Perignon which we were able to purchase in the Public Rooms at discount, until Cunard realised they were selling it to us at below cost so put a block on purchasing premium wines!

Yes the Luke's (pic below) were fun, but it was James (pic below) and Steve who were the jokers of the office. There was a good relaxed atmosphere in the office, although it could get quite tense on the busy docking days when hours on duty jumped from the usual 10 hour day to 13-14 hour shifts. This was because the Terminal check-in was in those days completely manual so passenger lists had to be reconciled with paper tickets and lists of cabin changes. Without that extra work accurate passenger manifests couldn't be compiled, the accounting system would be inaccurate and we wouldn't have any idea of the actual position on which cabins were vacant. Sometimes we had to get the cabin staff to check their sections and report back which cabins were vacant!

Now as for those mirrored windows from the inner to the outer office it was difficult to see much through so no we didn't stand behind them making fun of the pax. We were far too professional (and if you believe that you'll believe anything). Cameras handed in as lost property might end up with an additional photo on them of someone's bare botty!

I have one photo of the inner office which is posted below.

The paperwork side of things ran pretty smoothly with everyone having their rôles in the team. The bar, casino and shop chits would come down to me at the end of the day and Peng my Philipino rating would sort them onto deck order and post them into individual cabin pigeonholes in the office. Any account queries in docking day it was then easy to find the relevant chits, providing Peng had posted them correctly, which mostly considering the amount that came in he did exceedingly well, but that was the Philipinos for you. Many were highly qualified professional people with degrees as doctors, teachers or their Masters ticket; like anywhere there were the exceptions though.

In the pictures are the Luke twins - Jamie and David with David's wide Sheryl - one the Purser and the other the Finance Manager. The two girls were Tara a CSM officer (employed by the same company as the hotel crew and not Cunard) - these officers had zig zag ranking and the other was the Manifest Officer, Marissa. Notice the old fashioned golfball typewriters. There were a couple of computers but for database entry only, such as the manifests or the dreaded Passenger Questionnaires, certainly no word processing then. The last photo is of James Todhunter with Tara again in one of the Hotel Officer cabins allocated to the Pursers on One Deck forward. I remember that cabin as it had a tiny sofa unlike the rest with a full length day bed.

[Graham Taylor]

Here is a picture of me during my time in Accommodation Services (or Housekeeping as it generally is known) I'm the one with the tinted specs (aargh!) the other officers are Jonathan Leavor who made Chief Purser on QE2 and is (or was) on QM2 and to the left Tracy Jessop.

[Rod]

WOW..some old names coming up there.
Just a point about the bank.
When I joined QE2 Barclays was located directly across from THE BUREAU!!!!main desk on F stairway. The G stair side was purely for the finance side.
I had an "in" with Barclays as my Father worked for them ALL his working life and when I first joined QE2 was responsible for picking QE2 Barclays staff!! Eventually Barclays moved to G stair (which became the safe deposit area) And the "bank became the shore excursions office run by Amex. Barclays eventually quit because it cost too much. Cunard actually charged them for their cabins 1118 and 1120. Amex then took over the banking service as well, with a lot more fees for the pax!

[Graham Taylor]

WOW..some old names coming up there.
Just a point about the bank.
When I joined QE2 Barclays was located directly across from THE BUREAU!!!!main desk on F stairway. The G stair side was purely for the finance side.
I had an "in" with Barclays as my Father worked for them ALL his working life and when I first joined QE2 was responsible for picking QE2 Barclays staff!! Eventually Barclays moved to G stair (which became the safe deposit area) And the "bank became the shore excursions office run by Amex. Barclays eventually quit because it cost too much. Cunard actually charged them for their cabins 1118 and 1120. Amex then took over the banking service as well, with a lot more fees for the pax!

So what was there before Barclays moved to the space on G stairway, Rod?

[cunardqueen]

The Berthing Officer   

On a Med cruise in 88 l remember on the Hotel Managers table we had Janice J as a host and she introduced herself as The Berthing Officer, the table was a fun table and it was only afterwards, that it dawned on me that it wasnt berthing as in docking the ship, but berthing as in cabin assignments. It was on that cruise the lady on my right offered me an inter-course cigarette..at the time l honestly had no idea what she ment..such innocense of a 19 year old.

  if I'm lucky, a dozen cabins and if I was really lucky a few valuable high grades amongst the list (to be used with a high degree of discretion).

 

On a round trip Crossing with a 5 day cruise upto Canada, one of your collegues (who will remain nameless ) kindly informed me l was moving cabins for the homeward crossing, Much to my surprise and sheer delight l was moved up from my XE on 5 deck to 3 deck and had the most spacious cabin ever, still assigned to Mauretania and the hosted table. Threw a small party in my cabin late one night for a couple of the waiters, which was (and still is)a strict no no . But those were the days.. and it was the only time I ever had an upgrade.

[Rod]

So what was there before Barclays moved to the space on G stairway, Rod?

Barclays Bank. They had 2 branches!