From their website;

Very Cheap Holidays are also members of The Global Travel Group.

fwh

Just confirm where you have been looking please

verycheapholidays.com doesn't seem to work but is registered to a company called Traveltek in Glasgow
very-cheap-holidays.com does exist but only seems to sell stuff to take on holiday (and it's priced in dollars)

verycheapholidays.co.uk does exist and does sell holidays. And it shows the logo of the Freedom Travel Group which is a scheme we've come across before. This scheme allows independent agents to use various facilities of the "The Co-Operative Travel" (who are the biggest, but not the only, Co-op Travel company) which includes ATOL bonding on some of what they sell - there is a warning at the bottom of the home page about possible exclusions. They are actually a company from Newcastle. You would have no contract with Co-op if this company let you down, although if they went bust you may be covered by the Co-op's bonds.

As Steve says, Verycheapholidays.co.uk are members of The Freedom Travel Group whose HO is in Stoke on Trent and who are the ATOL holder for any package holidays that they sell.
Any accommodation only or transfer only are not ATOL protected but are protected by The Freedom Travel Group in case of company failure.

The agency I used to work for were members of Freedom and the lady who owned the agency was very happy with the way Freedom worked (left The Global Travel Group to join Freedom).

That is not a recommendation of verycheapholidays though as all members trade completely independently. Freedom do provide the front and back office systems along with training and do make sure that things are being done as they should (or they used to).

Sorry guys, got my .com and .co.uk mixed up doh!

You are all right, looking a bit closer verycheapholidays.co.uk is a trading name of the Freedom Travel Group, with head offices in Stoke with the registered office in Manchester and the Freedom Travel Group is part of Co-operative Group Ltd.

I must admit as soon as I saw Co-operative Group I thought "must be OK"
Looking closer all seems to be in order, as the holiday I am looking at is a package, with only the transfer seemingly not covered, and as the price is right, may well give it a go.

Thanks for putting me straight. (should have looked closer first time, but, hey ho)

Cheers

Tony

Don't forget to come back and tell us how it all went.

fwh

it's very important that you read the web address carefully, here's 3 examples

http://www.co-operativetravel.co.uk

http://www.cooptravel.co.uk

http://www.co-opholidays.co.uk

all genuine (as far as I can tell), all will be called the same thing by those who book with them and all operated by different companies! You can see how confusing a good or bad review could get.

The Freedom Travel Group is run by the first one.

Just to update everyone on our Christmas break in Portugal with the above TO.

No problems whatsoever, easy to use website, booking easy and as it says on the tin "verycheapholidays"

Cant say any more really only that we will use them again if we can find a good deal.


Tony

PS. hotel review also done (Mouraliz)

Many thanks for the review, it is appreciated.

You may wish to review any hotels you have stayed at previously.

luci

I compared verycheapholidays against Sunshine.co.uk, TravelRepublic.co.uk (sites I use a lot to make mine and all my parents reservations) and lowcostholidays.com this weekend. (Boxing Day)

Lowcostholidays came out the cheapest on accommodation for 5 nights half board for a single person in Malta from 19th - 24th Feb 2011 plus a shared transfer.

I'm going out to surprise my parents whilst they are at the Soreda Hotel in Qawra for 4wks.

Shell
Limassol, Cyprus

i rang the company direct, it seems the price you are quoted on the web site is not the updated price you pay, the very nice lady told me the computer cannot update quickly enough to keep up with all the constant changes, i was then quoted for the exact same holiday, over £110 pounds per person more expensive than what was showing on line, apparently if you try to book on line, the computer directs you to the company direct, and they in turn will contact you,
new it was to good to be true.

Usual thing that happend you get a cheap headline price then they say is gone up. Onthebeach do exactly the same its impossible to actually get a confirmed price from the internet via the site. It is actually done by the staff. Funny how they have access to the accurate information yet the website is not live data.

I tried the same thing rang to get a price and accessed it online and no point did the price online reflect the telephone call. Two days later they were still showing the cheaper price.

Beware

All I can say about using Very Cheap Holiday telephone booking line is DON'T .....

Due to problems I was encountering with their website (they have tried to blame my internet connection, but it was working perfectly well with other websites) I was forced to use one of Very Cheap Holiday's telephone consultants.

BAD MOVE!!

As it turned out, had I been able to book online the holiday I booked would not only have been £42.25 cheaper, but the deposit would have been 50p per person instead of the £50 per person I was charged!

All the Administration Department have finally deigned to say (after me having to contact them SEVERAL times for a response to my complaint) is that they have acted in accordance with ABTA regulations and that, as I agreed to the price and deposit requested by their telesales girl, NO refund is due.

Since my ACTUAL COMPLAINT was that I ONLY ACCEPTED THAT PRICE because neither of the members of staff I spoke to had the common curtesy to tell me their prices would be more expensive than the online prices, I find their apparent "tough luck, we couldn't care less" attitude rather distasteful.

To date, Very Cheap Holidays have very skillfully avoided giving me an explanation of this. They have intimated that this is standard practice across the industry and have given me the impression that they are not even going to consider my actual complaint because I should have known it would cost more if I could not book online.

Over many, many years of going online to find the best offers and/or costs and always subsequently actually booking the holiday by ringing the holiday company concerned to book over the telephone, and NEVER ONCE having to pay more for actually speaking with a "human", I believe this may be their dubious practice but, thankfully, not a holiday industry standard.

To my mind this is totally unacceptable behaviour and not one you would expect to be used by any "reputable" company".