Dr B Al-Shaikh

Apr 22, 2018

HOLIDAY FROM HELL

HOLIDAY FROM HELL! Do not use this company. Repeat, avoid anything to do with RSD! A BIG CON 1. They refused to tell us the names of hotels where we were going to stay so we couldn’t inform our families in the UK where we would be all week! Only two weeks before departure they informed us of the flight times instructing us to go to the wrong terminal at Gatwick They confirmed it was going to be the South terminal so we booked the car park etc but the flight changed to the North terminal. We had no warning from RSD but thankfully we checked in the morning of the flight. 2. RSD promised the outbound flight would be from Gatwick to Cyprus via a short stop in Turkey usually taking 5-6 hours. However, our actual flight from Gatwick took 9.5 hours! We firstly flew the wrong way to Manchester (not in the brochure) after waiting an hour on the Gatwick runway waiting for one late passenger! We then waited for a further hour in Manchester as we lost our slot over Europe due to the initial delay. After stopping off in Turkey for refuelling we eventually arrived in Arcan 2 hours late! No word of an apology from any of the flight crew! The plane used was designed for short haul flights (Ryanair style) and yet we were stuck on that plane for 9.5 hours with no onboard entertainment (TV), 2 small complimentary glasses of water offered and 1 cup of tea! 3. Due to the 2 hours delay we arrived after midnight (local time). We were then swiftly put onto a coach and driven for 45 minutes to the mystery hotel. As we were trying to recover form the very long flight, the guide immediately started selling us water, extra excursions and drink packages. We told him that we were all very tired and wanted to go to our beds which we did at about 2am the following day! All this hard selling could have been done the next morning and not at 1-2 am! 4. The next morning, we were then informed that the itinerary we had been provided in the brochure was over 2 years old leaving us with 2 “free days” instead of the promised 1! The included “excursions” consisted of wasted time going to a carpet, jewellery and leather factory were the spent the equivalent of a whole day – including a 6am wake up call!! Of the excursions that were included it mainly consisted of monasteries with little guidance or knowledge of the guide. 5. During many of the lunches we were forced to eat in predetermined restaurants which was highly overpriced. The guide consistently lied to us saying there was no other options for lunch and yet when we arrived at the restaurants there was always many places to go. 6. The guide himself was incredibly rude throughout to many of the paying customers including declaring “what do you expect when you spend £99?” when in fact we paid between £500-700pp! Do not be fooled by the initial cheap pricing of the holiday as there are many extras you are forced to buy! The guide continued to lie to us about what we would be able to do in our “free days” forcing us to pay £100 pp extra! But when we got to our hotels we found numerous activities to do leading us to ask for a refund. The guide point blank refused. 7. The flight home was also a disaster. Not only was it delayed again but we were all very rudely handled in the Turkish airport where we were all drug tested, scanned multiple times, felt up multiple times! This was for all passengers no matter if you were disabled, over 80s years old or even blind! 8. The only positives taken from the “holiday” was that the both the weather and hotels were lovely and of good standard. Overall, if you are interested in going to North Cyprus DO NOT go with RDS! They are a cost cutting, con merchants that do not care about their customers! The whole company is run very amateurly! PLEASE AVOID