Has anyone had the unfortunate experience of booking a tour with TripADeal, paying in full, then having the initial price dropped by TripADeal some months prior to departure. Then told by the company that they would not refund the difference in price paid to that now advertised?
Unfortunately that happens or can happen with any purchase from air fares, tours, vehicles, clothes, groceries, or any item one purchases that then goes on sale. You might review the T&C of your tour purchase to see if you might be due some refund resulting from a price drop and the agent you spoke with was not properly responding, but other than that I cannot offer any comforting advice.
Some companies have a āguaranteeā to reduce a customerās paid price in a stipulated time frame after their purchase, but that is uncommon, as are companies that will refund the difference on request. When they do it is usually in their T&C or advertising, and in a prominent way.
One sometimes makes a purchase decision and that is their ācontractā. On balance if the price rose would you be happy to pay them the difference? Consider also if the tour was almost fully booked but you missed out completely by hesitating until the price might drop and the tour was then fully booked.
It is complex, there will be varying views, but what you have experienced is ātrade as usualā.
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Further to @PhilT, discounting is very common in the tourism and hospitality industry. It is common where they are yet to reach the number of paid packages to make a tour profitable or havenāt yet achieved the minimum number to make up the tour group.
While it may be disappointing that your package is now discounted, when you booked you were satisfied with the price of the package. If you werenāt satisfied, you wouldnāt have booked.
If one can travel at short notice and not risk adverse, a way to get heavily discounted travel packages such as cruises is to let the relevant companies know that you are happy to travel on standby. Retired family members have done this and would get calls a few days out and ādisappearā unannounced with the rest of the family.
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I went on another Tripadeal tour to Jordan and Israel. It was very good. I then booked a tour to Turkey which was cancelled due to COVID. Tripadeal offered me a credit for the full amount less about $300 pp to be used within 12 months. I was able to claim the $600 on my insurance because it included pandemic cover. If Tripadeal hadnāt offered me the credit the insurance would have covered the total loss so I was a bit annoyed about the credit. However a year later Tripadeal refunded the credit amount. So my only loss was the cost of the travel insurance. I am now again booked on a tour to Turkey with Tripadeal. I hope Iām not disappointed like other Qantas customers. Btw I chose the insurance company, āGoā, because it got a good review by Choice.
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