Tripadvisor

To everyone reading this, I am not usually the type of person to leave reviews but our experience was so atrocious that I wanted to warn others so that know body else would have the type of experience we did with TripAdvisor. After looking online we decided to use TripAdvisor to rent out a vacation rental. Everything seemed fine until the day before our trip. Barely 24 hours before our vacation was supposed to start we received an email from TripAdvisor that the rental was no longer available. I of course assume they would make things right and help us find another rental. Instead when I called I was directed to a foreign call center where I was left on hold for over an hour and a half. Yes they sent me emails but with less than 24 hours before my trip the urgency to be able to speak to someone to resolve this should have not been the experience it was. They did absolutely NOTHING to help me. They did not help me find a new rental, they did not offer to help me with any additional cost as now there was nothing left to rent with such late notice.
I than preceded to email the president of the company thinking they would care about loosing future business as me my friends and my family have all used their platform in the past. I was redirected to another blow off email. The lady stated that this basically was not there problem and that they would be happy to help me with a future rental. Why would I ever use this company again after they ruined my family vacation? Lesson learned is to not put your trust into this platform, renters can steal your money and cancel last minute and you have no recourse, know body to talk to you, and the company DOES NOT CARE ABOUT YOU. BEWARE WHEN USING THIS PLATFORM.

My husband and I were at DreamsMacao Beach Punta Cana. We were there to attend a wedding and booked our room from April 29-May 1st 2023. I am very well acquainted with most hotels in the area, but again I was not there because it was my choice hotel but for a family wedding. The rooms are comfortable and clean, they come equipped with a steamer and sun tan lotion which are little things that not many hotels offer. The staff is friendly and all was well until my last day at this resort. On Sunday May 1,2023 the family came together for breakfast at the buffet. We all live in different parts of the states and were saying our good- byes, some were checking out at 11 am. As we were chatting, I decided to get a capuccino. As I sipped my capuccino I felt something weird and looked down on my cup to find a dead roach on the rim of my cup. I was in shock and asked my husband to see if what I was seeing was correct, when he confirmed it was a roach, I immediately called the waitress and she removed my cup from the table. I was still in shock and my reaction was to sit still and do nothing, which is weird for my type of personality because I am used to voice my feelings. So I will be voicing it now.

The people to see this roach were my family sitting at the table and the waitress who I called to remove the cup. After about 15 mins of my family speaking and I am still in shock, a man comes over and introduces himself as the manager and shows me the picture of the roach and how he sent it to his supervisor and explained that was not a norm in the restaurant. As I was checking out of the hotel, I explained what happened in the restaurant and was told to write an incident report. I wrote my incident report.

This incident left me in shock and disgusted to say the least. I expected a letter of apology or something from the hotel. It is May 8th and I have not received a word from them.

TRIP ADVISOR and Flipkey -FRAUD
I booked apartment in central London via Tripadvisor paying also for their "peace of mind policy" insurance (88 $). I gave visa card number and instead of blocking money on my account they collected it immediately.
I tried to contact the owner Martin C., I wrote him several times on his e-mail stated on flipkey but he did not respond. So I called the number provided in booking and man picked up: he said that I got the wrong number, that he is Martin indeed but he does not rent any apartments...
I tried to find property on flipkey or trip advisor but... It was not listed anymore... They removed it as they "found out that this individual does not have right to rent those apartments" but they were happy to keep my money on tripadvisor account (quite profitable business if you think about number of clients) and they didn't bother to inform me about the situation!
I contacted flipkey and they said they will "cancel" my booking of non-existing property and return me money. I got 1 day to find a hotel in London and I do not have to mention that prices were overwhelming.
Trip advisor returned my money (US$2358. 00) after 10 days (payment on 4.04, return on my account on 18.04) but... I am from Poland so to my horror I noticed that I miss 910,47 PLN (about 300 $, which is actually half of my monthly salary) - there was the spread!
I paid the insurance so of course I complained to tripadvisor to give me back that difference: without any result, they said that they reimbursed fee in full (so even if that was totally their fault, I had to bear the cost of this transaction. Their insurance is obviously meaningless. Contact with support desk is not so easy and stress I had trying to find accommodation for 5 people just before departure was terrible.
It is a disgrace for renown service to behave like this. So: never ever again!
Summary:
- seek other agencies DO NOT book via Trip advisor or Flipkey, - they do not take any responsibility of whatsoever they advertise, just your double fees you are paying
-never give them your card number- they do not block money like booking.com but collect it and keep on own account. They call it safe way- think for yourself for whom it is safe and profitable. Pay after arrival and if it is not possible, seek other accommodation (that was advice from their support desk 1 day before my departure, when money for my hotel in London were still on their account!)
-do not bother with this insurance- it is worthless- they said it covers up to 10.000 $ but just try to get something of cost you paid (actually they should also give me back money for my hotel- it was much more than cost of this apartment)

I travelled with a girlfriend of mine for 9 days in Morocco, starting in Essaouira and ending in Tangier. While we wanted to mainly backpack on our own through the Country, we were very happy to have made the decision book a 3-day tour with Morocco Excursions in the middle of it.
Having made a lot of research, I found that Morocco vacation tour were the most receptive to my emails. They required a 100Euro deposit through Western Union (Most companies in Morocco don't accept credit cards) and the transfer went without problem.
Rashid (our driver) picked us up promptly at 8am in Marrakesh and made all the stops promised (and more) along the way. Because he is at our full disposition, we were able to ask him to make specific stops (such as stopping in non-touristy super market to stock up on drinks, or stopping for a special picture, etc). Rashid was very friendly, kind and knowledgeable. He answered all our questions and talked about his life, his childhood as well as Moroccan culture and history in general.
And took us in the desert. The camels were wonderful and the desert guides were very nice. We sand-surfed, had tea, dinner and they even played music for us. We proceeded to sleep under the stars in the middle of the desert (the tents were there, but the weather was nice and fresh, so we slept outside). We woke up before the sunrise and walked up the biggest dune to see the sunrise before returning to our hotel to get our bags and take a shower.
All the meals included were great; and the ones that weren't included (lunches), we could ask our driver to stop somewhere else, if we didn't like what they had.
Rachid is an excellent, careful, good driver with lots of charisma. We did Essaouira, Marrkesh, Fes and Tagier on our own but saw so much more and learnt so much more than we could have seen those 3 days in the desert. It includes A LOT of driving but it is absolutely worth every penny and the car is new and comfortable. I would recommend this tour to anyone. Feel free to ask me questions, if you want.

Our family loves reviews on Tripadvisor. We use them all the time for food and stay. Unfortunately, we cannot say the same for TripAdvisorPlus. My wife booked our trip to Puerto Vallarta using them. Without going into all the details, it essentially boiled down to the hotel TripAdvisorPlus booked for us in Puerto Vallarta telling us we did not have a reservation on the day of our flight. We then informed TripAdvisor Plus of their failure to book/properly coordinate a reservation with the hotel, and then quickly made alternative reservations after asking them to cancel the reservation, so our family wouldn't be without shelter on our first night of travel. About a week later, give or take, TripAdvisor Plus' Customer Service informed us they could not refund us. They stated they could not get the money back from the hotel, and claimed the hotel stated that they found the reservation. To be fair, Customer Service listened to our concerns and appeared to understand our issue that we shouldn't be financially responsible for paying TripAdvisor Plus when the hotel they booked told us they did not have the reservation in our name. However, they failed to refund us. Then we were informed that contacting their Legal Counsel was our only chance at getting a refund. We were told we couldn't email them, only physical mail was allowed. We mailed them and about a month went by with no response. It wasn't until we found a legal department email online that they ever responded. In that response, Legal Counsel implied we were lying about the whole situation of the hotel not having the reservation. Legal Counsel then proceeded to write it didn't matter if we were telling the truth anyway, because in their contract they are not liable for the actions of third-parties like hotels. In other words, the hotel could have told us all day long they don't have a reservation for us, but TripAdvisorPlus would never have to refund our money, even though we paid TripAdvisor Plus to get us a working hotel reservation. I'm glad to share more about this story or provide an email for anyone who needs to get in touch with TripAdvisor Plus' Legal Counsel. Please contact me at