“We had booked our sailing with Brittany Ferries Portsmouth to Cherbourg for a 2.pm sailing. A few weeks later we were informed the sailing had been cancelled so we rebooked for the 7.am sailing and booked accommodation as we were travelling from the NW. Again we were contacted and told the sailing had been cancelled. This of course leaves us with accommodation we now do not need. Brittany Ferries would not help with accommodation costs and told us to claim it back through our insurance. I am not sure what we will do about the accommodation but I am certainly sure we will never use Brittany Ferries again.”
“Just goes to show how a monopoly service can turn a once good service into something which at its best is just very very average. Overpriced fares, food and boats where one feels confined to soulless lounges offering indifferent service and refreshments. No consistency in catering and the hype about tapas bars is a fancy label for skimpy plates of uninspiring food at premium prices. Gone are the days of providing water, ice and microwaves to customers - everything they provide comes at a price! One starts and ends a journey home hoping it will be, at best, ok”
“My Review is about Brittany Ferries booking system and membership.
We have traveled with them for many years many times.
The experience is always great, prices yes have gone up in food and tickets, the fact the Portsmouth ferries to Spain take forever has a bad impact on our holiday days. Not happy with that this year I’ll go via Plymouth but this takes 5 hour to get to the port. Before everything in general was much much better.
My main dislike with BFerries, My partner is a member and because every year I travel away before him or travel back after him with our children and with our car I can never use his full membership discount, because in one of our trips going or returning he won’t be with us. So I have to use the guest discount and this is supper frustrating and we have to buy separate tickets we are partners we have 3 children we are a “family”i should be able to use the membership, it’s not like it’s a cousin or the parent or a friend. This year we renewed our membership but we really thinking of not renewing anymore, and this is the main reason for this decision.
It’s a shame has been very much pleasant travelling with Brittany Ferries but paying a yearly fee and not being able to use it as a family it’s very unfair.”
“This relates to the reservations and land customer service and not onboard.
My second booking with Brittany Ferries and the second very inconvenient rescheduling.
I booked an early bird fare, five months in advance, Rosslare to Cherbourg to arrive in daylight as I have a long onward car drive. When they rescheduled, the offer was a refund or another date if the new times did not suit. I found that they have a sailing from Cork the next day, which suited better, which actually cost €13 less, so I asked reservations to change it for me. They agreed, but, but despite the lower fare, they refused to refund me the €13 difference. If I cancelled the booking, I could get a full refund and book the Cork leg myself, saving the €13! It took 4 days before reservations cancelled the Rosslare leg, by which time, the Cork fare had increased by €40. After several emails and telephone calls, they eventually gave me the sailing at the original fare, but not the €13 refund. I asked for a free gesture such as some meal vouchers or a cabin upgrade to make up for the inconvenience and extra petrol expense and this was flatly refused.
The website says the Salamanca ships offers a “cooked ENGLISH breakfast”, on a France-Ireland sailing, however as the ship arrives at 6AM, the restaurant is not open!
Now, two weeks before travelling, I discovered the price of the outbound sailing and cabin have dropped by €71. I wrote to Brittany's customer services for Ireland-France, based in England! They have a 28 WORKING DAY response time, presumably due to a massive amount of complaints. After a long wait, I received a partial response and a flat refusal of any refund,or gesture. The attitude and lack of any willingness to help or retain customer goodwill from senior agent Charlotte Murray was despicable. She is a disgrace to her profession. She hid behind the company’s terms and conditions and simply did not care about the customer. While Brittany Ferries prices are good, I am very reluctant to trust them again as their land based customer service is terrible. Perhaps the ships and crew will be better.”
“This relates to the reservations and land customer service and not onboard.
My second booking with Brittany Ferries and the second very inconvenient reschedulling.
I booked Rosslare to Cherbourg to arrive in daylight as I have a long onward car drive. When they reschedulled, the offer was a refund or another date if the new times did not suit. I found that they have a sailing from Cork the next day, which suited better, which actually cost €13 less, so I asked reservations to change it for me. They agreed, but would not price match, so despite the lower fare, they refused to refund me the €13 difference. If I cancelled the booking, I could get a full refund and book the Cork leg myself, saving the €13! It took 4 days before reservations cancelled the Rosslare leg, by which time, the Cork fare had increased by €40. After serveral emails and telephone calls, they eventually gave me the sailing at the original fare, but not the €13 refund. I asked for a free gesture such as some meal vouchers or a cabin upgrade to make up for the inconvenience and this was flatly refused.
So I wrote to Brittany's customer services for Ireland-France, and this is based in England! They have a 28 WORKING DAY response time, persumably due to a massive amount of complaints. Again, after a long wait, I received a partial response and a flat refusal of any gesture. While Brittany Ferries prices are good, I am very reluctant to trust them again as their land based customer service is terrible. Perhaps the ships and crew will be better.”
“So after paying the poisonously expensive fee,about twice the price of a dfds ferry (standard Brittany) I though ah I’ll save myself the 2hr drive on the uk side home….. we’ll let’s say it gets more painful!! Cabin…. £105 ya what!!!( didn’t realise it was a floating Hilton….then add the booking fee £20 and you can keep that one) Compulsory to book a seat for the over night crossing £5 … so she sails at 9ish French and lands at 7am uk time, thought to myself my lord that must be half speed over night !! Wrong im currently sat in my £5 chair for the night and we are a mile out from Cherbourg at a sand still!!!
Hour 2 at current…(great) didn’t mention that in the splurb did you
Don’t start me on the food and drink rip off … anyway so 8 and a half hours of crossing might as well of booked a Dieppe Newhaven.saved myself £75 crossed in 4 hours driven for 2 and and not had to pay the £5 seat fee the hideous cost of light refreshments
Plus not lost hrs of my life sat on the edge of the English Channel not moving”
“We bought a flexible ticket thinking we change our return crossing if needed. However the flexi part finishes 4 hours before your outbound crossing. So it's not really a flexi ticket at all. I know it's in the small print but I think it is misleading. I will use a different company next time.”
“We have just traveled back to the uk on the new Santona ferry
The rooms were very clean and comfortable beds
But the meals on board were over priced and very poor quality
The english break fast was disgusting and swimming in grease
And the two chef special courses served in the tapas restaurant were .inedible the food service was also incredibly slow.
One person on meals and two serving drinks
Every thing except the special was re heated in an oven while you waited
The rest of the ferry was clean and spacious”
“We made a return journey with our children and grandchildren in May 2023. We recommended the boat journey to our children but this was a completely different experience. The boat was badly laid out with no thought to children. The whole experience ruined the end to a pleasant holiday.
The facilities for children were non existent. The soft play area for children was appalling and there was barely anything there. Even one member of staff apologised for the poor facility. Nearly all the games in the video area were out of service. This is a long crossing and there are no facilities to keep young children entertained. The journey was painful and unpleasant trying to entertain 3 young babies and children. Priority was given to adults watching the FA cup final so there was no entertainment for children. The boat is big enough to allow adults who can entertain themselves space to watch TV and provide a safe space for children’s entertainment. Why was there nothing in place?
Regarding the disembarkation process this was appalling. It is not acceptable to have to wait nearly 2 hours with young children and babies late in the evening. We had screaming children in the car whilst they had to wait for a ridiculous random exit procedure from the boat ending in a huge queue for entry into our home port. We were a party of 3 cars and 1 car was lucky and took only 30 minutes despite being on the upper deck, one car waited an hour and one car had to wait over 2 hours.
Why was no planning made after Brexit to ensure that disembarkation was improved? Why was a better and fairer system not put in place? Brittany Ferries and the Port need to invest in improving this ridiculous antiquated exit system. Why could the passport control not be simplified and take place on board or simultaneously on departure from France which was a much better experience.
I am so disappointed as I recommended the service to our children but it was a disaster. I am still waiting for a response to my email of complaint nearly 28 days later.”
“Until my last trip I was reasonably impressed with Britanny Ferries - based on around 20 years of using them. However if you have the slightest risk of making a late change (medical emergency or car problems) DO NOT trust these people with your money. Their use of amendment fees is fine - but their definition of "cancellation" charges is utterly scandalous - and partly obscured by stating - I quote - that "their terms and conditions were implemented years after our internal software was created" when challenged on the terminology. That really does take the biscuit!!!!
The end result in my experience was that a move for 2 people in the most expensive cabins to just 1 person in the lowest cost accommodation resulted in being charged a very substantial "cancellation" fee on top of the original cost. You really couldn't make this up! And all this still under the same booking reference. Not a cancelation at all - just a change.
The responses from the customer relations outfit then defend the utterly indefensible.
I will never use these cowboys again - flying for us and our family from now on.”
“Return Trip Portsmouth/Santander Santander/Portsmouth.
Went from Portsmouth to Santander at the beginning of January and returned Santander to Portsmouth at the end of March. Outward journey was on board the Galicia and the return was on the Santona.
Both Ferries more or less identical.
The Ferries were cold, uncomfortable and lacking atmosphere. Two adults shared a 4 berth cabin which was barely big enough. How 4 adults could be accommodated in such a small space truly baffles me!!!
Continental breakfast sub-standard and very poorly presented. Queuing in corridor for evening meal until dining room doors were opened also not acceptable.
On the way out which was a 2 night crossing no entertainment in what proved to be a very uncomfortable bar area.
Return journey 2 young men (being the entertainment on offer) were an embarrassment both to themselves and anybody being subjected to the nonsense.
All in all neither crossing was enjoyable as should have been the case.
Pont Aven gave the feeling of being on a mini-cruise. Much, much better in every respect - comfort, entertainment and food on offer so why can't that type of Ferry (updated of course) still be on offer after all we pay enough for the experience?
Just to finish the staff were far from customer friendly.
Felt I needed to put all the above on record.
Laraine McDermott”
“The €19.25 traditional breakfast was the worst I've ever paid for. Half slice of toast half a small tomato, small spoon of scrambled egg, 2 rashers of streaky bacon and 2 tiny sausages. If I could wait for 5 minutes I could have beans. Told we didn't need to book for evening meal, then turned up at 6.45pm. no queue, 80 plus empty seats all set, but told we couldn't eat until 8.15pm as we hadn't booked. Then had clap cold paella at the tapas restaurant as nobody appeared to know how to clear an error on the till. Arrived 3 hours early to board and then guided into a niche on the lower car deck so we were almost last to disembark. New Santona boat is lovely, but process and cost cutting onboard ensure that my bromance with Brittany Ferries is over.”
“Currently onboard the Brittany Ferry to Santander.
Purposely booked a room with a window due to claustrophobia. Stated must have a window. We got a middle cabin! they were unable to move us which I understand if they are full but I had a full night without sleep.
We are in shifts for meal times which no one is notified of till you go for food and ours is 8.30pm… I asked if it could be moved earlier as after what had happened, and again I’d be kept awake eating that late.
They have absolutely no interest in helping resolve any issues from any customer. I watched the queues of complaints from boarding and everyone was sent away without sorting.
Disgustingly poor service from start to finish.”
“We are relocating to Spain from Ireland and looking to book the Salamanca unfortunately we were waiting on the sale of our house to complete and we’re unsure of dates.
I rang customer service and got to speak to Cathy (in the cork office)who was just amazing.
We needed to bring our dogs and book dog friendly cabins all the cabins were booked up for the dates we thought we would be able to go only one date left but we needed to get clarification that the sale would be done by then.
Cathy went above and beyond for us no idea the stress she took away from this situation such a lovely pleasant lady to deal with you are very lucky to have her as an employee she is a superstar and I hope she gets recognition for her hard work.”
“Brittany Ferries check in jobsworth refused to let us baord with out yellow lab....claimed her French passport was incorrect and ashe would be denied entry on arrival in France . We pointed out it had been used multiple times without issue. But like talking to a brick wall "computer says no". We ended up giving up on a club cabin booking and drove 5 hours to Dover where we crossed the next morning - without issue of course.
We have taken dogs to France 30 or 40 times in the last few years and think we know more than these idiots as to what is and is not acceptable documentation. Not that the French ever even look at it.”
“Ferry cabin was nice. Had the fish and chips and it was terrible. Quality is better in a hospital.
My body also thought it was terrible and ended up with food poisoning.
Luckily I was staying with family, so redecorating the hall way wasn’t as embarrassing as it would have been in a hotel.
My advice. Take your own food”
“The ferry is great clean and tidy friendly service.
The food not so good fish and chips the fish was as stale as it comes straight out of a box frozen rubbish I mean it sails from Plymouth harbour and rod off harbour and they can’t manage to source some decent fish”
“The ferry is great clean and tidy friendly service.
The food not so good fish and chips the fish was as stale as it comes straight out of a box frozen rubbish I mean it sails from Plymouth harbour and rod off harbour and they can’t manage to source some decent fish”
“Got to St Malo in plenty of time for the ferry, but were held in a line that didn't move for ages. We were amongst the last to be boarded, by which time the self service restaurant at which we had hoped to get breakfast was closed! Nowhere to sit comfortably as everyone else had got to the seats first. An absolute joke.”
