Amateurs are allowed to make mistakes - but anyone trading as a business they come under the Supply of Goods and Services Act which requires reasonable care and skill and I'd say discussing the wrong accomodation falls under that!

And I would take an offer of £14.28 as a bigger snub (they admit they're wrong but think that's what you're worth) than a refusal to pay anything.

But as I said earlier, this should have been challenged as soon as the tickets arrived.

It surely doesn't matter what the hotel voucher says. The confirmation invoice is the base of your contract.

I personally would have queried the hotel voucher with First Choice but I personally can't see how First Choice can talk themselves out of messing it up given the fact that the confirmation invoice is the one that counts.

Mark

There are often complaints here on HT because ticket details are wrong and people have to pay for them changing because they have not checked it until to late. The advice given is you should always check all the paperwork when you get it.

That is not to say that your complaints is not legitimate but it makes things more difficult after the event.

fwh

We did check the tickets to make sure all the names etc were correct I would never have thought to check the hotel - When I book with travel agent rightly or wrongly I put my faith in them that they will book the correct accommodation. We had no reason to think that we were going somewhere different as our contract and invoive both said Club Candan.

In my eyes we were totally miss sold our holiday, if the agent priced the wrong accomadation and told us we are going somewhere then thats the shops fault not ours. And to the its just a job comment I think that is completely ridiculous, he would have gotten a good wack of commission for that holiday.

I think the "its just a job comment" was probably meant that you have to remember these people working in this type of job will not have visited every single Country, resort and hotel so playing devils advocate here, it can be quite difficult to advise customers when you yourself have absolutely no knowledge on resorts hotel. Obviously they will have the brochures etc but again, limited information and we all know how the brochures draw very pretty pictures.

I speak from experience working for a TA for a very short time (8 months in total) and I certainly did not know many of the destinations, resorts etc. Yes that may seem wrong and this knowledge will only come with experience, however I would have always checked with someone else. I had a terrible fear of sending a couple wanting a relaxing quiet holiday into an 18/30 resort

I think what is extremely unfortunate for you is the fact there are two accommodations with very similar names in the same resort. However good luck with your complaint.

In my eyes we were totally miss sold our holiday, if the agent priced the wrong accommodation and told us we are going somewhere then that's the shops fault not ours.

There is a difference between being miss sold a holiday and someone not reading the information correctly and sending you somewhere else. Yes it is the fault of the shop management in not ensuring that staff are checking, although your invoice says one venue and tickets another makes me suspect there is something more to it.The booking is made on a system that shows hotels/destinations. I suspect it was programmed incorrect.

And to the its just a job comment I think that is completely ridiculous, he would have gotten a good wack of commission for that holiday.

We unfortunately suffer from it more and more. The customer is often regarded by some as interfering with their cosy existence. As long as they get paid then fine. As soon as they can find another job then they are off. Those who really are interested in giving a good service to customers are becoming a rare breed.

fwh

just a thought, if you booked through a TA, did they not check the tickets against your booking. we have just picked up our tickets for a holiday in two weeks time and on our envelope was a note saying **slight flight change**, the flight has been moved by half an hour, but the TA told us about it. If your booking confirmation shows one hotel and tickets another, surely they would have seen the difference. Have you checked your booking in the TA to make sure it definitely shows your original invoice details????

It all sounds a bit fishy on the part of the travel agent to me.

If a travel agent showed me a picture of a 4* complex with a specific name above it and great facilities and I paid in good faith thinking I had a great deal, I would trust the travel agent to know what they were doing. Especially if my invoice confirmed what I thought I had booked.

Otherwise what's the point in using them. Seems really odd as they must have had two sets of prices showing in the brochure, surely a good travel agent would have thought 'that's a really cheap price for a 4*' and double checked what they were doing before they put it through their computerised system ?

I maybe a bit of a cynic but am wondering if it was done deliberately by the agent to secure the booking, ie showed a picture of the 4* and then booked them a 3* so he could give a good price and secure the sale ? As it was a seven person booking I assume the overall cost was quite high and a fair amount of commission was up for grabs. If that was the case then it would definatly be mis-selling rather than a rather dubious mistake.

I suppose there are two kinds of mis-selling but if it's c*** up or conspirousy surely it's still mis-selling if you dont get the acccommodation you have booked.

wondering if it was done deliberately by the agent to secure the booking, ie showed a picture of the 4* and then booked them a 3* so he could give a good price and secure the sale ?

As I mentioned in another post, the 3*candan appartments are actually more expensive than the 4* Club Candan

I suppose there are two kinds of mis-selling but if it's c*** up or conspirousy surely it's still mis-selling if you dont get the acccommodation you have booked.

I don't think that it's quite as simple as that. Generally speaking 'mis-selling' refers to where there is a conscious attempt to deceive the buyer. In order to prove that you have been mis-sold something you need to prove that they knew that they were selling you the wrong thing. I think in this instance it's possible to prove incompetence - the TA should have noticed the discrepancy - but a lot harder to prove that this was done knowingly in order to defraud the buyer.

If I sell you a 'Louis Vuitton' bag at what is clearly a fraction of what the real thing would cost and I tell you it is a fake then I definitely haven't mis-sold it. If I do the same and don't tell you it's a fake but don't claim that it is the real thing either, then generally speaking I haven't mis-sold it to you either because I haven't tried to defraud you - you've paid a fair price for what it is. If I sell it at a bargain basement price, but tell you it is the real thing then the courts generally take the view that it wasn't reasonable for you to have expected that you were getting the real thing at that price.

However, if I sell you a fake but tell you it's the real thing because I too bought it in good faith at what seemed the right price for the real thing and sell it on to you for the price you'd expect to pay for the real thing then we've both been mis-sold and the issue is a bit murkier. But if I sell you something that I know is fake and that I only paid a very low price for in the first place but tell you it is the real thing then I have consciously set out to defraud you and have mis-sold it to you. It all rests on the intent of the seller and what they tell you at the point of sale. I'm not sure that there is enough evidence here that would stand-up in a court to justify an allegation that there was a conscious attempt to deceive or defraud the buyer.

SM

Not sure that people are getting the point here. Why would the TA tell you you're getting a 4 star and charge you the 4* price when the 3 star was more expensive? If they wanted to earn extra commision then it would have been better being upfront and showing all the details of the 3 star as that was the property that was more expensive

What I should have added in my last post was that financialy the holidaymaker had a better deal as they paid for the lower price Club Candan and got the more expensive Candan apartments. Now probably the holidaymaker doesn't care about the price. What they're complaining about is this wasn't the property they thought they'd booked.

In summary, I don't think the TA deliberately mis-sold the holiday as it wasn't in his/her financial interest to do so.

In summary, I don't think the TA deliberately mis-sold the holiday as it wasn't in his/her financial interest to do so.

Exactly, Shirley, you've made the point mich more succinctly than I did - whatever went wrong here it almost certainly wasn't a deliberate case of mis-selling.

SM

I see what you are saying Shirley, based on when you price checked it.

But we have no idea if that was the case at the time when the OP made his booking.

Generally speaking 4*'s are dearer than 3*'s and places with more facilities dearer than those with lesser facilities. (I know I will probably now get loads of quotes where this isn't the case now).

We will never know 100% if it was deliberately mis-sold or just a mistake on the part of a sales consultant, but we do know the OP didn't get what they booked, didn't get what was shown on their invoice and are unhappy about it !

Would be good to get an update from sheklep1 now the Manager of the shop is looking in to it.

I don't think this was mis sold, just a mistake on the part of the agent. As for getting a good whack of commission - the Hypermarket itself will have got commission on the booking but that doesn't mean the person who sold you the holiday will see any of it. Lots just get a basic salary and some companies do target based bonuses.

Hello, quick update on how we have got on so far with the manager....she has been useless. Said she didnt know what the problem was considering it its in the same complex basically meaning that the candan apartments are in club candan when actually this is not the case. She offered us £150 and we still have had no apology. She has now passed this onto customer service as we are still not happy.

Given the amount of people that are complaining about exactly the same situation, I think (as somebody suggested in another post) that the details for both complexes have been fed incorrectly into the system

It the 3* is coming up more expensive than the 4* then I tend to agree that they have the wrong information in against the wrong apartments in their computer.

I wonder how many other people this has happened to??