Trafalgar Travel has room for improvement based on customer feedback. Customers particularly appreciate service and professional, though some mention concerns about customer service and expensive.
This tour was exceptionally well planned. Our tour director was knowledgeable and organized. The coach was new and comfortable. We hit all the highlights from the brochure and so many wonderful additional surprises. It was a good experience all around.
I booked a trip and got my invoice with 3 days to pay the full amount. I got an email from compny that they can not honor the invoice. Request to speak to customer service i got no response. Very very poor customer service. I got an automated email from customer service stating that some one from their team will reach out to me to dicuss my concern. No one reached out. How can you possibly issues an invoice with full travel information and yet less than 24 hours not honor it. What if I had purchased my air line ticket in the mean time. I have never experienced anything like it. The thing is that i booked directly through Trafalgar not a third party. I was ready to make full payment on the day of booking. Surely this is not the way to start your vacation. 6 days has passed and still not a word from Trafalgar. Words are cheap what is important and counts is action and deeds!
First, our trip to Sistine Chapel and Vatican museums was cancelled which was only one of a couple tours included because of modified museum hours. I had to pay $350 to get tickets to go myself. You ride on a coach alot and when they say you see things, it is from the bus window. Small seats, provided no water and discouraged from using toilet. We were supposed to clap for driver because he did his job and not leave anything for him to clean. We were TOLD where to sit each day, they wanted luggage out an hour before departure time which means you had to get up two hours before breakfast. one hotel was 4 stars, rest were 3. Plan on spending ALOT of money to see things; everything costs more money spent $500 on tours. Food was OK at best. went on leather tour and glass blowing tour. These were sales pitches from store. We did see glass blowing 5 minutes then sales pitch for 15, same with leather store and gold store was not demonstration at all, it was them showing you pieces you can buy. Travel director sent out messages on whats app each day and was reachable. I got an attitude at first because I questioned vatican being closed but could get tickets. She told us we would go back to hotel so we could change, then said no, she changed her mind and so e were gone 12 hours from room and not prepared for day no apologies, just more like...that is that
My family and friend stay at a London hotel, the River park plazq here for a big family celebration, when I came to wait for them in the reception with my wife who not feelinng well. There were no seats, but a girl asleep on a chair. Who look like she just had food. She was with a sign saying Trafalger, is this hotel staff or the hotel agent? I went and told a staff. even if not hotel staff, we were very shock to see this.
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Gorgeous Greece. Moraig, our guide and Dimitri were excellent, they provided the best service- nothing was too much and the attention to detail was second to none. Brilliant tour, well organised, interesting and jam packed- awesome value for money. They were helpful, thorough, thoughtful and considerate. The local experts were phenomenal and passionate, our tour was the best of Greece and thatβs definitely what we got.
Date of experience: March 17, 2024
Follow up: Trafalgar, did in fact, contact us. We spent 6 months with either our travel agent advocating on our behalf or directly contacting them. In the end... THEY HID BEHIND contract BS. A terrible experience all around. They do not care about clients and as the formulaic response below demonstrates. You don't matter with Trafalgar... a billion dollar corporation protecting their bottom line. ---β--β------------------------------------ Donβt get injured with Trafalgar While travelling with Trafalgar on The Best of Italy Tour my wife fell on the marble floor of at The Grand Hotel in Sorrento on day 3 of our trip. She fell hard and was in shock at the breakfast table, shaking and cold. After the initial concern the Travel Director and hotel staff left us to our own devices. We were left to attempt to contact insurance in a hotel with phones that were not working and staff who apparently did not understand how to connect the phones so we could call out. On the advice of fellow travelers, we sought out medical assistance when we arrived in Assisi as the initial shock of the accident turned into significant pain the following day. It was as if the staff of Trafalgar had never dealt with an accident or injury before, and our Travel Director had 3 decades of experience! We requested assistance with the language barrier and were patronizingly assured that βsomeone would speak Englishβ. The only one who did was the doctor who saw my wife; and her English was faulty. We were left to Google Translate to try to communicate. Going into the hospital my wife and I agreed that if her leg was fractured or broken, we would return home. X-rays revealed that she had sustained 3 fractured ribs and (the doctor stated) a badly bruised tibia. Upon returning home 2 weeks later, follow up x-rays found a fractured tibia. Unaware of the severity of the injury to her leg and assured by the doctor that the swelling would go down in 2-3 days. We decided that we should go on as another trip to Italy was not in our plans. Our Travel Director was often dismissive, seemed truly put out when we asked for accommodations such as wheelchairs and seating at the front of the bus. Fellow travelers offered more assistance and support than our Travel Director. Upon returning home we contacted Trafalgar as the two travel agents we worked with were both aghast with the poor level of care offered and recommended that we seek some form of compensation. Trafalgar has consistently side-stepped accepting responsibility for the inadequate support of its team in Italy and hidden behind its terms and conditions. We did not blame the company for the fall, rather expressed our extreme displeasure with the level of compassion and care that Trafalgar staff provided after the fall. We sought reimbursement as the trip was mired with issues that could have been easily and proactively managed if protocols and compassion were employed. Our travel agents will never engage Trafalgar again and we will not travel with this corporation.
Date of experience: February 24, 2024
Overall, the tour was pretty fun, but there were some things that could have been done better in Milan. The hotel that was provided was fine, but it didn't have as many amenities as the other hotels that were part of the tour package. still, the itinerary was complete, including a lot of interesting things to see in the short amount of time that was available. The hotels were only average, but that's because they were on a tight budget.Β the coaches used for transportation were always clean and comfortable during the tour.,
Date of experience: February 12, 2024
US
We booked a Splendors of Japan Tour with Trafalgar and my husband was medically unable to go. We gave them 3 months notice and had to write 23 emails and make over 12 calls to get a partial refund. Their service is so poor and the right hand does not know anything about the left hand. We would NEVER use them again and tell all our friends how poorly they treated us. We mostly received these automatic, "no reply" emails and when you actually speak to someone, they put you on hold several times, for a lengthy hold and have nothing to offer except lip service! Terrible business, terrible service and we booked, they never shared with us they would penalize us for canceling 3 months advance!
Date of experience: January 11, 2024
Trafalgar is not a company that cares about it's customers at all. I paid for insurance for my Italy trip and paid to upgrade my flight both ways. On my way to Italy I was downgraded by United last minute.....literally 5 minutes before boarding. We won't even get into how awful United has been during this, but I thought for sure Trafalgar would make sure everything was made right....HAHAHA.....nope! Yes, I know United only gave them a 1/4 of what I paid for, for my flight, but Trafalgar should make sure their customers are treated right after such a horrible experience during a trip. I own a business and if I have to take a slight loss to make sure my customers are taken care of then thats what it takes. I have lost THOUSANDS and Trafalgar does nothing to make it better. What an awful company and they will never see another dime from me. Not like they care tho.....too busy just trying to take everyone's money.
Date of experience: January 10, 2024
Do not add the Glacier Park option to your Canadian Rockies trip unless you want to spend lots of money for a subpar option. Initially, we were scheduled to stay at a hotel in the park. A few weeks before the tour start date, we were rescheduled for yet another Hilton Garden. Although a nice hotel, it was outside of the park. I did not pay an exorbitant add-on fee to stay at another Hilton. I could have tolerated that if we had had time in the park to walk and take a hike. On the day we toured the park, we waited approximately 6 hours to take the tour bus to Sun Road, which was nice but did not allow any time to hike to the iconic lake at the top of the road. Why was our bus tour scheduled so late in the day when we arrived at the park early in the morning? Whoever scheduled this part of the trip had little or no scheduling experience or is incompetent. And Trafalgar's answer to the complaint was to offer a percentage discount on another one of its trip. Never again. I specifically signed up with this company because it was the only one that offered the Glacier option. Such a disappointment.
Date of experience: December 15, 2023
US
Terrible Trip 1) Keep selling optionals which cost over 800 USD and the tours are a rip off and good profit for Trafalgar. 2) Schedule was changed to ACCOMMODATE those optional tours. If you do not take the optionals, you are brought back to hotel at 3plus pm every other day, or wait in the hotel until noon doing nothing. Also sat in the cold doing nothing for 4 hours while waiting for optional tour to finish (and i wasnt informed/headsup that there was nothing to do there if i didnt take the optional). If these optional tour are not so optional, please just include in the price in the tour in the 1st place so people can budget accordingly and not get a big surprise that there is basically nothing much to do unless you join the optional. 3) I am paying more than 200EUR per day just to sit in buses for long hours and then brought to hotel to "rest" 4) Tour Director FORGOT the special gift for ONLY for myself as a returning traveller - maybe because i only joined less optional tour and not "important" enough. Other returning travellers got it. Better go to a budget tour, GoEUGo (google this) which i went in my student days and cost HALF of what trafalgar is offering and i had a much better experience there. The only difference i see is that Trafalgar provides porterage and 2-3 dinner meals during the trip compared to what GoEUGo is offering. Disappointing experience and never joining trafalgar tours again.
Date of experience: December 12, 2023
US
Best of Italy Tour for 13 days--actually 12 days. This was our 2nd Trafalgar tour--1st was Egypt---also terrible! 1) Could ONLY understand about 10 % of the travel director's harangue. Her name was Frederica. The same situation occurred in Egypt. 2) The bus driver named Theo was surly and rude. 3) The Travel Director constantly sold the extra excursions. These were 2.5 times more expensive then privately-made tours. Example in Rome--Crown Tours. 4) The food was terrible. 5) The hotels were at best 2-3 star. NO AC, low water pressure, and the breakfasts were poor. 6) Many hours were spent most days on the bus--4-8 hours. There were 49 passengers on this bus! You could not relax on the bus because the tour director constantly was speaking and selling optional excursions. Again, could not understand but 10 % of what she said. 7) We pre-paid gratuities, but wished that we had not done so. Neither the driver nor Travel Director thanked us. We will not prepay again, however, we will NEVER take another Trafalgar Tour.
Date of experience: December 3, 2023
We booked the Best of Italy tour 7 months in advance because it was a confirmed departure yet we stayed at different hotels than posted on the website - most way outside of the city centre with subpar facilities - non working air conditioning, toilets that took half an hour to refill, showers with no water pressure, obstructed views or views of a parking lot etc. and worst yet our visit to Florence for two days was basically cancelled. Beware: Their response was we have the right to make changes and changes they do make. Stay away from this company! You do not get what is advertised. The focus of the trip seemed to be solely on selling very expensive extras that added 2,000 euros per couple if all were chosen. If one did not do the extras they basically paid for a bus ride and out of the way hotels. You were then on your own to see the cities visited. Worst yet we were removed from our Florence hotel (with no explanation as to why β even when asked they would not give an answer) to a hotel 27 km from Florence in some industrial area by the airport for one night. Smelly garbage bins lined the road we had to back into to reach the hotel. As there was nothing to do by this hotel the expensive 74 euro next day dinner was moved to this day and we left early to get there to kill time. Time I might add that could have been spent exploring the beautiful city of Florence at night. For the short time in Florence (a rushed 4 short hours not the two days promised) we passed by the hotel we were supposed to be in only to see another Trafalgar bus staying there???? For what was supposed to be our second night in Florence we were driven back towards Rome (part of what was the final day's drive) to some hotel in the middle of nowhere. An extra horrible dinner was provided - a small bowl of soup, a very thin slice of beef with about 3 or 4 tiny potato wedges and a piece of dried gelatin with jam on top for dessert (the dessert was not edible). Absolutely horrible. The next day was a total write-off with a delayed departure to waste more time and then a stop at Tivoli Gardens (added as compensation for the lost visit to Florence) to kill more time because we could not check into the final hotel until 3:30 pm. Again this final hotel was outside of the city and by the airport where one had nothing to do until the 6:30 departure to the disappointing goodbye dinner. A cash refund for the 2 of 11 lost days was asked for but denied. Instead a useless 10% discount on another trip - yeah right - was useless and worthless. 5% off is regularly offered on their trips and return travelers get an additional discount so essentially NOTHING was offered. What a letdown this was for our 31st anniversary and retirement trip. Avoid this company at all costs
Date of experience: November 28, 2023
