Charter Travel - Used for the first & last time

[MILOMEG]

I booked our holiday with Charter Travel after reading reviews on here but would just like to issue a word of warning to others considering booking with them. We requested an allocated on arrival disney area villa & that it be the highest standard they offered on that basis. We were told that superior was the highest so that is what they quoted us for and we subsequently booked. When our paperwork came through it only said villa, it didn't state which standard of villa. We queried this with them but they confirmed that superior had been booked as requested.
On getting to our villa in Florida, it was absolutley awful, there are too many reasons to list on here but we immediately returned to the welcome centre to complain. They informed us that Charter Travel had requested the most basic accomodation for us. After numerous trips backwards & forwards and phonecalls we had to get up at 4am in the morning to make, we were finally moved to the accomodation we had actually booked the next day. Needless to say it wasted a great deal of our holiday & caused unnecessary stress etc sorting it out and having to spend the next day back at the welcome centre and then moving our stuff.
We expected some kind of apology and explanation from Charter Travel, only to be told we should see it as a gesture of goodwill that we eventually got we paid for! I have all the emails and correspondence stating a superior villa, yet they are falling back on the get out clause that our invoice didn't state the level of accommodation. I advise that you insist the level of accommodation you have booked and paid for, be stated on your invoice so you do not have to waste the first day and a half of your holiday like we did!

[monkey12]

OMG that so awful! I am so sorry you had such an awful start to your holiday. that happened to us last year with VH - it does cause so much stress etc. I am glad you posted as we were going to use them but instead went DIY! I really hope the rest of your holiday is okay

[MILOMEG]

Thank you, once this was sorted we had a fab time but they even messed up the smaller arrangements. Charter Travel said they had requested children's meals for the flight but Thomas Cook confirmed this had not been done and that there wasn't enough for our children to have them. We had also requested a cot at the villa, once again this was not done so a late night trip to Walmart was required!

[15isto2]

If you are geting nowhere with charter themselves than I would go to ABTA, this is extremely poor service

[Guest]

We are booked with Charter Travel for next year, as they gave us the most competitive price, but have paid a bit more for a named villa, whose web page we have also looked at.

There is no way I would ever do an AOA with any company, its far too much of a gamble IMHO

Glad you were sorted out and got what you requested in the end.

Thanks for the tip though, I will be keeping a VERY close eye on all our paperwork in the run up to our holiday.

[skelfbsfb]

Its so annoying when things go wrong that you have paid for. We were in the same situation last year regarding villa that we left it straightaway and were very luck we managed to get booked into BWV using our points.

[MILOMEG]

We have done AOA numerous times and have always had a lovely villa. We aren't even that fussy, but the one they gave us wasn't even clean etc and was full of ants, on top of being extremely basic. It won't put us off AOA, only booking with Charter Travel!

[shabba]

If you dont mind me asking, which community did they initally put you on?

Thats shocking, I really hope you get somewhere with your complaint.

[MILOMEG]

I think it was Indian Ridge, we were then moved to Lake Berkeley which was nice.

[ukeeyorelover]

That's awful! I really hope you get it sorted.

I'm booked with them for September, staying onsite at POR. Praying that I don't have any problems with them.

Good Luck