“I booked my holiday for 2 adults, 1 child and 1 infant to Kos with transfers. The total cost was £1592.11. I wasn't happy with my room so I requested an upgrade and added an extra night. My request was accepted and charged accordingly, and I was sent the amended paperwork. This brought the total cost to £2317.97. after having completed payment I received a message to say that the supplier couldn’t give us the room we’d paid for due to my party exceeding the room’s capacity and they offered me I quote ‘a complimentary upgrade to a family 2 bedroom suite mountain view with sharing pool’ which was the exact room I had originally booked! I have all the supporting paperwork to prove this is the case. So what they tried to do here was pull the wool over my eyes by pretending my original room was an upgrade from the room I’d paid to upgrade to?! I of course objected to this and we went back and forth a few messages but still the supplier was adamant I could not have the room I paid for. I then decided I would call the hotel directly myself. The reservations manager explained that he received 2 requests to upgrade and rejected both due to the fact that the size of the party exceeded maximum capacity of the room. So at no point in time did they have a booking secure for me in the room that I had requested and been charged for. He advised me that I needed to query this with the supplier or the agent as the fault lay there and not with the hotel. So I did just that, I explained everything that had happened and simply asked for the extra that I had paid to be refunded to me. During this time my flights had also been cancelled, so I requested a refund and paid extra to book new flights completely separately. At this point I was advised that I would receive a refund for my flights (total £420.91) which is usually in 7 days. I didn't, and had to chase it. The refund was then issued to a card that I have never had which leads me to believe there are data protection issues here also. I received a message to say that the supplier would offer me a refund of £274.48 despite having paid an extra £725.86 for this upgrade. In my response I did express my frustration, but also did say that I appreciate I'd also booked an extra night in the hotel So would like the cost of that in my original room deducted from £725.86 and felt that this would be the only logical and fair amount that I should be offered as a refund, taking into account that this entire scenario has been at absolutely no fault of my own. In this message I also asked for a proper breakdown of how that figure had been reached. I went through a mock booking on the hotel website to checked the cost of 1 night in the family suite room which came to 225 euro’s which is approximately £194. So I’m aware of how much should roughly be deducted for that. I Then received a message back to say that the £274.48 was based on my hotel costs only and didn’t include flights. I saw this as a huge insult to my intelligence and the second time someone had attempted to pull the wool over my eyes as the cost of flights would of course not have any impact on the refund amount, as they were already included in the original booking total. This is simply a refund on the EXTRA I had been charged for the room only. Also despite having asked for a breakdown, I did not receive one, I just had the same figure thrown at me again and another attempt to push for me to accept it. I declined and expressed I would make a formal complaint, to which I then received a further couple of messages offering me the same plus an £80 gesture of goodwill which I also declined. Then to add complete insult to injury, 1 day before we were due to fly I received a message from an agent called Bruno A to say I quote’ good afternoon and thanks for your message (which just said that I was not accepting the refund amount offered) please note that the hotel cannot accommodate you in the original room. Apologies for any inconvenience’ and that was it! No solution, no explanation, no anything! This put my stomach in knots! I for a second time had to spend money calling the hotel to check they still had a booking for us which thankfully they did. It is now working day 74 since I complained and I still have not received a refund nor response to my complaint. My bank has been investigating and since, on the beach has unethically and totally against protocol, directly taken money back that had been temporarily refunded by my bank without going through the proper channel. Not only have that but now taken an extra £531.86. Words can’t express the infuriation. I will be pulling out every single stop and fighting this all the way until justice has been served here.”
“The worst agency ever !! We had a flight to Mexico but obviously from Mexico with no reason they send us home the same day with the same plan. No one was expected anything why. Ok that’s fine. When we back to UK, was trying to contact on the beach agency and they couldn’t help me at all!! Obviously I paid over £2000 for NOTHING! For flights to both ways at the same day !!! And the lady who was on the line she didn’t even said at least sorry, was really rude ! AVIOD this company!!!”
“We travelled to Antalya, Turkey on 6th September to 16th September and was overall a horrible experience. Our flight was cancelled a week and a half before we were due to fligh out and the options given were pay £700 extra for new flights or cancel the holiday all together. When i enquired about changing dates/airports they found same dates for a different airport at no extra cost so was peeved they didn't offer that to begin with. When we arrived at Antalya airport we met the rep for our transfer shuttle which was booked with Golden Sea travel and after an hour and a half of waiting and constantly asking for an update, we were told they have no idea when or if they were coming and was told to book a private taxi at our own cost. The rep booked the taxi for us and made us pay 2800 lira (I later found out average price for a taxi to our hotel were 1100 so the rep ripped us off to line his own pockets!) We stayed at Eftalia Splash resort for 10 days which was advertised as a 4 star hotel but its definitely a 3 (at a push)! The whole experience was horrible, the food was worse than what you would get at a hostel, just chicken nuggets, burgers, chips and pizzas. The photographs of the food served was nowhere near as good at what we got during our stay and my 2 year old would only eat chips for the whole stay as there was nothing on offer to cater for children.
Quite a few facilities were closed as well like the Effes bar and the kids pool was closed 4 of the 10 days we were there also which wasn't great.
The rooms were fine and housecleaning was regular so no quarrels with that but the walls were paper thin and could hear all the neighbouring rooms arguing and partying until the late hours which kept us all up. The pools were nice enough but again the photographs made them look much nicer than what they actually were. Eftalia island was a quick shuttle away and we spent most of our time there. The food on offer was pretty much the same but much nicer pools and better choice for small kids.
We ventured out to the surrounding streets just to look around once and had every shop owner trying to scam us left and right so we stopped going out for fear we would be tricked into paying for something eg a photograph with a camel that quickly turns into a camel ride and then demanding 800 lira for the experience despite stating we didn't have any cash on us in the first place.
The 'clientèle' was just parents looking to let their kids run wild while they inhaled as much free booze as they could get their hands on which made for the hotel to be extremely loud and rowdy when everyone was trying to sleep so stay away if youre looking for a quiet, relaxing holiday with your family or young children.
On our way home our flight was leaving at 8.15am and our transfer shuttle (Golden Sea travel) told us they would pick us up at 4am which didn't give us much time but there wasn't anything we could do about that. 4am rolls by and no shuttle....My family and 3 other families waited until 4.30am and despite several phone calls to the company they advised they didn't know where our driver was or if they were even coming. After chatting to the other families we learned they also did not get picked up from the airport either and had to pay for private taxis.
Another 1000 lira to pool with another family for a taxi and we finally got there at 6am so it was a mad dash through airport security etc and made our flight with minutes to spare!
Overall this has to be the worst holiday experience I have ever had and unfortunately was our daughters first. Luckily she will forget the horrible experience over time but I sadly will not.
If you are thinking of staying at this hotel or you have already booked it and are looking for transfers DO NOT use Golden Sea travel and change hotels if you have time (or cancel your holiday with On the beach if you still have time!). Their customer service is shambolic, their responsibilities to you are a service provider are non existent (as they like to state all over their website) and it will take weeks or months to get back to you with a reasonable response due to closing their customer service call centre, which is convenient for them but not for you as a customer.
Go with TUI if you can or just don't book an all inclusive holiday in Turkey and expect a high quality hotel with the 'great' facilities they advertise with aesthetic pictures that aren't the same in person.
I've made a complaint directly to the transfer company in Turkey and one with On the beach for my out of pocket expenses (4000 lira) and the £98 I paid for the airport transfers that we did not receive and will make sure I book with a more reputable company in future
I would advise you all to avoid On the beach and Eftalia resorts like the plague!”
“I had a holiday booked with on the beach and my brother passed away suddenly...! on the beach refused point blank to refund me... !! what they did say was " I should of told them sooner " which for me was a kick in teeth..!! it was Impossible to let them know something that had not already happened...!! anyway I took them to a small claims court and won... ! however thats when they were still with ABTA... !!”
“Had a fabulous holiday in Cyprus, Completely happy with On The Beach, Jet2 and the fantastic Queens Bay Hotel in Paphos. Everything went smooth, the Hotel, the Hotel Staff, the food, the location. I would highly recommend this hotel to everyone.
The only down side to the holiday, was in my opinion, Manchester Airport ( Absolutely Shambolic ). I don't blame Jet2 at all, I just think Manchester are under staffed and SO UNORGANISED ).”
“The most stressful experience ever! Company is based only on automatic payment online, after taking payment no support is offered at all. Firstly, our outbound flights were cancelled and I was told that on the beach is taking care of that, however several weeks later I had no any information about new flights. I had to chase for weeks to find out what could be done, however no support were offered! They didn't answer any of my messages. After many weeks they sent me message that nothing can be done. I had to arrange the flights by myself, but it took me weeks to get their confirmation that I can arrange it on my own. Meantime, all cheap and convenient flights were gone. Now, I'm abroad but my inbound ticket, that was arranged by on the beach, is nowhere to be found. "Help line" doesn't work due to COVID, they don't respond messages ( of course). I'm 17 hours to my trip and I cannot obtain boarding passes.”
“Our holiday was cancelled in 2020 due to covid and all we could see and hear is others having trouble getting their money back. We accepted it was a tough time for holiday companies and was patient and we didnt wait too long to get a full refund from Onthebeach. We booked a holiday this year to Turkey and everything was great with OTB except details for transfer which was our fault for not reading the instructions fully. We are travelling again very soon to Tunisia.”
“MYB11295620B
Reference for holiday on the beach, we had the worst experience ever and I don’t want other people with young children to go through the same, we booked our first holiday after covid and thought that we would use on the beach as they are a reputable company…. Avoid as we have been treated awfully and I would never use again, due to staff shortages in April we missed our flight and our 4 year old child was devastated.. I complained straight away that day and called help desk only told that I can only complain online…. 4 months later and nothing back not even a reply? Nothing ????
This is the worst holiday complaint that just steals your hard earned money
AVOID AVOID AVOID”
“🚨 🚨 This is a plea to find other customers that have been scammed by on the beach and or sunshine.co.uk 🚨 🚨
My email is vikj1002@icloud.com . Please reach out if you are interested in either appearing on TV to talk about your issues and/or want to pursue this legally as a team to get justice and the compensation we all deserve.
We are a party of 10 who have had our long awaited family holiday cancelled with no good reason (in fact they blame us?) with only weeks to go before we fly. We have been pushed pillar to post, lied to, deceived and have had over £3000 of our hard earned cash stolen from us.
Customer services promise call backs from
Managers that never happen. Agent admitted on phone that they cancelled maybe in error?
No they’ve cancelled our stay at the be live palmierias in Algarve, Portugal because they’ve hiked the price up from 2020 when we originally booked from 1750 to nearly £6 grand!
Why not be honest and offer us an alternative? Why not offer a full refund?
Because they’ve pocketed our cash and refusing to do anything about it , that’s why!
These con artists get rich off of people like us!
Let’s take a stand together and we will be heard!”
“I would personally avoid On the Beach for any future bookings. I personally feel their business model it's very close to a small Scam in a way. I have booked with them on Sunday 21/08/2022 for a holiday in the future that only happening in December 2023. When I have made my booking I have received the email saying pending (as always with them). On Monday 22/08/2022 I have received a call from them saying my holiday went up in price by £600!! In less then 24h they wanted to change the price of the holiday by £600... their justification was that the hotel probably became quite popular for that date. Well, I understand Caribbean is popular in Xmas but an increase in 12h of £600 for a holiday happening over a year away?! They not advertising accurate costs, my views are that they advertising really low prices to attract bookings and then trying to get you to confirm the booking by charging you extra. Very untrustworthy company and really bad experience with them. Stay away from their "low prices" as they don't exist. On The Beach should review their prices and advertise accurate and real prices!! I have now booked cheaper then they wanted to charge me on other company and my booking was confirmed straight away. Don't waste your time.”
“Utter rubbish - don't even think about trying t get hold of them once they have your money! Take no responsibility for errors or issues - blaming airlines or anyone else they can. If everything is fine, it will be great. If you have ANY issues and need to contact them - forget it. Isn't that the whole point of booking through such companies?”
“Everything about our "On the beach" holiday was perfect in every way.
The Hotel, the flight and transfers were as any holiday maker would expect even the upgrade to extra leg room seats on the flight home.
The hotel and especially the room with a full sea view with all of the additional features was a bonus.
Very well done "On the beach"”
“i have used these again and in general before they have been ok , this time a query about my hotel i have totally been ignored no reply to a serious question regarding a hotel booking no free number to call and not replying to my emails disgusting.”
“From the initial booking to the return from our holiday, we cannot fault On The Beach. Choice of flights and hotels was excellent.
It was easy to manage the booking and communicate with the company. Also having the facility to pay in instalments made budgeting easy as well.
Will definitely use them again.”
“Amazing customer service, after our flights got cancelled On the Beach team went above and beyond to make our holiday happen.
Thank you Fhakib for your great help and professional support. I strongly recommend to book your holiday with On the Beach”
