Hi and welcome to HT!

Sorry you had such rotten service from your tour operator.

I shall move your post to our Complaints forum where it should reach a wider audience and get a better response.

luci

I think you mean "travel agent" luci Sounds like a dynamically packaged trip that a travel agent has put together with different suppliers (air, transfers, coach). If a tour operator I would have expected all parts of the trip to link up together, particularly the transfer matching up with the right arrival airport.

I do hope the Poster can get this sorted for the return.

Sonic 74,

Did you not check your paperwork before you left? What airport did it say you were landing at? Regardless of whether you checked or not the onus should be with the TA and I would definitely put in a complaint.

I know everything's easier in hindsight but if you'd checked the paperwork and double checked how far the airport was from your final destination you could have saved yourself a lot of hassle. This is where sites like HT are of great value when researching holidays. Not sure if it's me being over fussy but before I book a holiday I have to check and double check everything, including how long the transfer the other end's going to be.

I hope you get something sorted for your return.

What a mess!!!
My initial thought was a travel agent not knowing what they were packaging. Thinking further that probably is correct but something is a bit strange. Why would they book a flight to Sofia but transfers from Burgas? Why had it got so far without being picked up? The agent would have had to have given flight numbers when booking the transfers. Does no-one in that agency check confirmations against booking forms etc?

sonic74
Did you read the booking form before you signed it? shirleyh is right. Check and double check everything that an agent does.

The agent would appear to be at fault but I cannot undertand why it was not picked up earlier, either by the agency or the OP.

Something very odd here. Which airline is this?

I've checked the airport's own website and their summer season schedule list shows no movements at all between 23:00 and 06:00 which suggests a night-time curfew like many other city airports have. So I dug deeper and their slot coordination rules show restrictions between 2000UTC and 0300 UTC - if I've done the maths right for summer time and time zone difference that confirms it. That restriction doesn't apply to charters but why would an airline run an inbound charter flight to Sofia when it's 300 miles to the resorts?

Is it possible that this was a Burgas flight that went wrong and had to land a Sofia, either because it had technical problems or because it was running so late Burgas had actually closed and only Sofia would accept it? If so the travel agent is not to blame and isn't liable - the airline should have sorted out the transfer.

And what happened to all the other passengers?

I wonder if the original poster will get back to us, to clarify a few of the points raised and to update us on the situation?

Steve
Anything is possible but without the OP coming back to clarify I doubt we will ever know.

thanks for replies
we booked the trip online about a week before we left,,finshed work friday night packed sat left sat night flight left about 10pm w6601
yes hindsight is a wonderful thing.......we assumed that sofia airport was called burgas like liverpool airport is john lennon.........
.........flight carrier was wizz air.there were no diversions......this flight was always going to sofia.
my wife confirmed booking over the phone......the person she was talking to ..had told her that she had been before...how wonderful it is.........we were shocked that she didnt pick up on that glaring mistake!!
we were the only passengers left standing at the airport.

on the third day of our stay i managed to get in touch with company........they had arranged a private taxi for our return to sofia!!

yes we are partly to blame for not checking.......but surely when u book a package holiday thats what u should get the full package..with out the hassle of worrying about flights/links/hotel.......

now if I had booked it with different suppliers i would certainly made it all link up!!!

thanks

sorry posting with wifes account

aka sonic74

Thanks for getting back to us with more details Izabela/Sonic 74.

If it was a package holiday (didn't realize Wizzair did packages) then I'd say they were certainly to blame and you've got a case to persue. Have you written an official complaint to them yet? Please keep us updated as to the outcome.

To the best of my knowledge Wizz Air do not do package holidays. Which website/company did you book this through?

Sorry didn't finish typing!!
Flight W6601 is the return leg Sofia - Luton. Given that you said that was your flight number I am presuming you flew from Luton. Wizz air don't have a Bourgas flight scheduled from Luton on a Saturday. Is that the correct number or did you fly from a different airport.
This is all getting very confusing.

my mistake w6602 w6601was leg out there.

wife booked with lowcostholidays.com 10 days sunny beach booked into regatta palace

we should have checked!!

sonic
The fight numbers you were on, according to Wizz Air are Luton-Sofia flights so I'm not really sure as to how you ended up in Bourgas.
It might not have been a package holiday but if you have an ATOL confirmation/receipt then it was.
I am now even more confused, but it is still early in the morning.

I'm confused too, Sunaddict.

If I understand things correctly, the OP didn't end up in Bourgas.
The flight booked were to Sofia but the OP was expecting to fly to Bourgas - is this the nearest airport to Sunny Beach?

It seems (to me) that the flights were arranged to Sofia and transfers were arranged at Bourgas (although in the first post there's a number of questions marks against this statement).

It would be helpful if the OP could document clearly exactly:
what happened with the flights
what they did about the return transfers (i.e. did they accept the 6 hour taxi transfer to Sofia?),
what (if anything) the agent they booked with have said since the OP & family returned home

If what I've said above is true (flights to Sofia/transfers arranged from Bourgas) then it would seem to indicate a cock-up on the part of the booking agent.

prettypollycat
I told you I was confused. I've missed read the OP.

If you look on lowcostholidays the only flights they seem to offer to Sunny Beach go to Bourgas, which is the nearest airport so I'm really not sure how the mix up has occurred.

The only thing I am really confused about is why the TC booked transfers from Burgas to the resort when they must have known the flight was to Sofia. When booking the holiday the OP should have been informed that the flights were to Sofia, although even then I am at a loss to understand how the travel company would use flights to an airport that meant a six hour transfer time to the resort.
If the OP was aware that the flight destination was Sofia then he/she must take some of the blame for having to endure the long transfer time. I understand that the discount airlines are a somewhat liberal with the truth where names of airports are concerned, but it is up to the customer to check exactly where the airport is. After all Sofia is not a small town, it's the capital of Bulgaria and easy to find on any map.
The OP should obviously be able to claim for refund of the expenses that he had to pay for a taxi but whether he is entitled to any more depends on how much information he was given before the holiday.
The employee who booked the taxi transfer obviously needs more training as to the names and locations of various airports before arranging any more holidays/transfers.
I would advise the OP to contact the TC by letter on return from holiday, make the letter short
and to the point. I hope he receives some satisfaction and will let us know the eventuall outcome of his complaint.
.

What a mess!

Wizzair 6602 is Luton -Sofia and really is scheduled (by them) to land at 02:55 daily, even though Sofia airport insist they are shut until 06:00 and that the flight only runs on 5 Thursdays in the Autumn and lands at 18:55 !!!! So getting down at 03:30 is not far off a good result.

Why lowcost even considered using this flight for a Black Sea resort is beyond me but they did and the tickets clearly show that Sofia was the arrival airport. They are at fault for having the transfer booked for Burgas and they are liable for refunding the replacement taxi from Sofia. If they said (in writing) that the transfer was about an hour then they may have questions to answer and some recompense may be due but if no journey time was quoted then they're off the hook.

But the OP has to accept blame as well. It isn't good enough to blunder around the world with no sense of what is going on - is it any wonder the UK Consuls are so snowed under with work! If you visit a foreign country it isn't too much to ask that you do a bit of research about the place, such as where the capital city is. That is important since you would need to know if you lost your passport and needed to contact the embassy. To say "we assumed that sofia airport was called burgas like liverpool airport is john lennon" isn't going to win any friends. You can imagine how a lost Bulgarian would be greeted if he said he thought Newcastle was a suburb of London - the distance between Sofia and Burgas airports is almost exactly the same as Luton and Newcastle!

I'm getting out here, I've already caused one row this week in another thread about people not doing research.....

It is true we have not checked the airports on the map, neither we have looked at the map of Bulgaria before we left for the transfer distance ( wife speaking ), the only resarch we did was to learn few frases and words in Bulgarian as I thought that the rest is sorted. If I was booking the hotel and the flights seperately myself I would make sure all is lined up properly ( now i wish i did). But since we involved the travel agent we trusted that it is their job to assure it is done reasonably well.
I have booked the holidays around 2 weeks before we were due to leave. I called them 48 hrs before the flight to ask about luggage allowance etc ( another chance they had to pick up on the flight mistake).
Myself and my husband were working very long hours before the holidays, as i am self employed and my husband is both employed and self employed.
I let myself to get false feel of security during the booking process as the lady who booked the holidays said she was in Bulgaria on holidays herself and id believed she knew what she was doing. It has never happend to us before so we did not expect any problems of this sort ( I am sure we will double check everything next time).
Steve maybe we are so optymistic but I think it is imposible to cover and prepare for any possible disaster which could have happend while on holidays ie. lost passport situation.
Thank you all for your comments and advise.