Me and my partner have just got back a week early from Cyprus because we did not enjoy our holiday.
Having never used a travel agent before and always booked online ourselves so we decided to try it! What a mistake that was. We went to First Choice and told the lady what we did and didn't want from our holiday, we had no specific budget in mind- pretty much anything up to £1000 each would be fine, no preference to what country we want to go to as long as it has the things we wanted. To make it easier for you to read I have put them in bullet points;
What we specifically requested from the travel advisor:
*A very hot climate- we are both mediteranean so love the heat, we are used to over 40degree heat in the summer.
*Nice sandy beaches.
*No need to hire transport while we are there, we would like to have everything within a reasonable walking distance or reachable by bicycle.
*No children at our accomodation- we dont have kids ourselves!
*We have always stayed in 4* hotels or above.
*We would like to stay in a hotel and not a resort, somewhere where it is not too built-up and has lots of local shops/cuisine.
*We are not big drinkers so would not like to be surrounded by pubs/bars/clubs etc. and great big high-rise hotels
*We would like to go somewhere unspoilt and not too English! Somewhere with history and culture, not sports bars and English Cafe's!
* Our recent favorite destinations include; Dubai (Hyatt Regency Hotel 5*), Taormina Sicily (Baia Toarmina Hotel 4*) etc.
And this is what we got;
*Latchi in Cyprus
*In the middle of nowhere with nothing to do
*Had to hire transport to get around- an extra 200 euros a week
*Nothing but English bars, pubs and restaurants (you could even have a roast dinner on the beach on a sunday!)
*2 star hotel!
*children in the hotel!
*Pebbled and littered beaches
*Average temp 30degrees C
*Very little historical sites/places to visit (managed to cram all there was to see in one day!)
This was pretty much the opposite of everything I had asked for! Not only did we put up with the above, I found Cyprus generally as a whole had a very bad atmosphere and completely lacked charm. I feel as though we had been completely mislead by the agent and mis-sold our holiday. She assured me and my partner that where we would be going would have everything we had asked for!
When we complained to our rep out there, it was a minimum of 600 Euros to change to another hotel so I asked if we could come back early. We originally flew from Bristol but had to settle on flying back to Gatwick for 400 Euros and then to sort out transfers to Paphos airport and then getting home to Bath from Gatwick! (2.5 hours away!)
Now we obviously want to be comped for this as it has turned out to be a nightmare and we are seriously out of pocket- I managed to get back to work the day after, however, my partner is self employed and cancelled 2 weeks worth of clients to go on this holiday so he is even more out of pocket than I am! I understand that It is my word against the Agents' word, we havnt managed to speak with her yet as she has been away and we dont want to deal with anyone else at the travel agents because they wern't involved in the conversation.
We were not given a holiday brochure to take away with us and didnt feel the need to research it further as we were fully assured this holiday would meet our every need and I thought that was whole point in putting your trust (and money!) in a travel agent!
Please let me know your thoughts on my situation, I am feeling really taken advantage of by First Choice
and dont think I will ever use a Travel Agent again!Thank-you,
Alishia.
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