Tim H.

I selected the cheapest company (as you do) from a comparison site: £194 compared to £195 on two or three other well-known names. On the final screen there was "Total cost of the booking: £193.90" beside a 'Confirm' button. When I got the receipt I had been charged £217.52! I complained. The final answer given was that the total cost offered had below it in small print "Promotional price includes a discount of..., valid when paying with JCB". Now Ive never heard of JCB, except if youre talking about the mobile diggers! Its a credit card, apparently. I checked; JCB has only 1.12% of the world market! Other companies (the ones quoting £195) may well not have had such a sneaky clause in them.

They had me! There in the small print was an 'addition' to the 'total cost'. The discount with JCB would not apply to the 99% of us who use VISA, MasterCard, AmEx, etc... IF they wish to state "discount for JCB card users:" then fine. That small print is so easily missable under the BIG CONFIRM button right after the total cost lie! Thats what it is: a lie! A very clever lie since they have you legally. Its not illegal but it IS immoral! Ryanair had a very similar legal scam a few years ago, but they had done nothing wrong!

To think I went with this company just to save £1! Ended up costing me £22.52 more than the next company!

UPDATE!:

My previous review of these charlatans produced a response from the company and an offer of a voucher (NOT a refund) of the amount they scammed from me. Since I knew I would be booking a flight the following year, I accepted.

When I went to use the voucher, it would not work properly, so I rang the service centre. They put me on hold. Until I got fed up waiting. They apologised, said they would get someone to ring me back. About four or five times this happened, in various forms. Since I was getting nowhere, and had to get the flight booked, I went ahead on a different site (which turned out cheaper than their flight WITH the voucher!) and emailed them about this problem. All I get back are the standard "your voucher is for the value of £x, it is valid until x date. When you go onto our booking page, on page 3, enter the code..."

Doesn't matter how many times I tell them by email or by phone that THE VOUCHER DOES NOT WORK!, I get nothing, nada, zilch! I have demanded a cash refund. What do you think I've got in response to that? Yeah, **** all!

Even if another company is charging a few pounds more, I'd say go with THEM. There could NOT be a worse travel company. Could there? Please, God, no!