“Beware - Terrible customer service. Sell you a holiday and you don't get what you pay for. We booked a particular room and have ended up with one we didn't book! Disgusted. Spent hours trying to get through the automated chat to a real person, when I did I was 95th in the queue and which took another 2 hours, after which I gave up having no resolved my problem. Use TUI or Jet2, they might be a bit more expensive but definitely worth it!”
“You book a holiday to Hersonissos… and they fly you to Barcelona.
That’s basically what OntheBeach did.
Hotel in Hersonissos (Crete)
Flight to Chania Airport, 175 km away, at 1:00 AM. With two babies under 3 years old.
Result? €440 in taxis. One child vomiting in the car from exhaustion. And we reached the hotel at 4AM.
But here’s the thing — the problem isn’t the distance or the money.
The real issue is that I trusted a holiday company to make my life easier. I’m not from Greece. I didn’t know Crete had two airports. That’s why I used OntheBeach — so they would do the thinking for me.
Instead, they offered me a flight to an airport literally on the opposite side of the island from the hotel they sold me. No warning. No alert.
I called Customer Service and after 1 hour 20 minutes of being bounced around, I was told: “Well, that was probably the cheapest option available that day.”
So… cheaper for who, exactly?
If I book a hotel in Madrid, you don’t fly me to Barcelona and say, “well, technically it was cheaper.”
This is either gross negligence or a complete lack of care for the customer experience. Either way, it’s unacceptable.
Never again.”
“On the Beach advertise cost saving efficiency over its competitors, BUT it is not competing with conventional tour operators.
From the moment you book, YOU have to arrange a 'seats only' flight with EasyJet, using their convoluted payment method where you must use the On the Beach Resolute Card, that you MUST personally register for !!
Then adding luggage through the company app. is over 2x as much as doing it directly through the airline. The same with reserving a seat. Making any subsequent significant changes from then on is virtually impossible with the On the Beach App.
Airport transfers at the chosen resort ..? ..
Good Luck. With no remote personnel to assist you are left enviously watching the TUI reps guiding their tired customers to their destinations.
Call their 24hr help line .. it rings for 10 mins only then to tell you they are really busy and to call back, and then terminates the call !!
Alternatively, use their 'chat bot assistance' which loops you around and around if you ever ask a question out of the norm !!
In precis, On the Beach is very poor 'value for money' .. If you do have a budget, can I alternately recommend you book directly with the hotel [ after checking TripAdvisor ], the airline, and a local taxi transfer firm if required, [ all of which is so easy online now ] and you will receive far better, more efficient, and a much better
Will have a more personalised, less stress, more cost effective, experience. You will then be in direct control of more professional and easily accessible service/s.
And as a final foot note : during our return flight we had a critical emergency landing en-route and an unscheduled 26hr stopover in Turkey awaiting a new aircraft. On the Beach !!, we never heard from them and/or any concern for our safety.
We tried 'On the Beach' once ... never again ... they should be more practically called 'Got Your Money and Goodbye'.”
“They told us our hotel was unavailable and the alternative had terrible reviews so we said no. They wanted to look for other alternatives, I replied to the message saying that under the terms and conditions I wanted a fully package refund. Now they have gone radio silent on me. I tried to use their live chat but every time I do including after 9am, after 11am and after 3pm on a Tuesday and a Wednesday, it keeps giving me a message from a bot saying I have contacted them out of hours. But the bot also tells me to contact them between 08:00 and 18:45 when their live chat is open. I can't contact them via phone as the number is an automated line only unless you are abroad. You try to raise a complaint and it says it needs to be done via live chat. I'm tearing me hair out instead of relaxing prior to going on holiday. So my advice, spend your money elsewhere and don't book with these cowboys they don't have a clue.”
“Initially booked a holiday and all seemed well, except they didn't add the free airport lounge as they're so fond of advertising. However after chasing this up using the online chat this was resolved.
A few months in we heard rumors online that our hotel wouldn't be open in time. I messaged On the Beach as there is no phone number, they said they would contact the hotel and find out. 2 weeks later I was still chasing OTB for an answer. So I messaged the hotel directly and they replied within 1 day.
Now, with only 2 months to go I've received an email saying the hotel won't be open from OTB. They've offered an alternative which is nowhere near as nice and in a completely different part of the island.
I've messaged back asking them to contact me regarding my options, they auto responded saying they would reply within 48 hours.
48 hours came and went with no response. So I've tried the online chat and they're not open at weekends, plus it's bank holiday now. So no response for over 72 hours.
This is the most stressful of situations for our family, yet OTB can't even be bothered to ring us and explain nor even reply to my messages when they say they will.
They're a complete disgrace and I will never use them ever again.”
“Extremely disappointing and unprofessional experience. I first spoke to Jay on March 15th to book flights for my parents. He assured me that the tickets would be issued within 24 hours. That never happened. Instead, I had to chase him for weeks just to get any updates. When tickets were finally issued, they were repeatedly rescheduled to later dates with no proper explanation or notice.
Eventually, I requested a refund on April 6th—something I was told would be processed if I wasn’t satisfied with the service. Since then, it’s been excuse after excuse, with false promises that the refund would be sent "in a couple of days." Over a month later, we’re still waiting.
Now, to make matters worse, my messages to Jay are no longer even being delivered. I've been trying to contact him since May 1st with no response at all. This isn’t just poor service—it feels like deliberate avoidance and deception. I feel completely scammed.”
“I will never book with ONTHEBEACH holidays again. In my opinion They over inflate the prices. Say that they have a price drop protection. Meaning you find the same holiday cheaper they don't refund the difference it's a con. Word of warning do not book with ONTHEBEACH Holidays. I would give them no stars if I could.”
“This is an awful system. I wished I had just booked the flights with easyjet myself. It would have taken 10 minutes whereas I've been trying to download all the apps involved for best part of 2 hours. Not good if yr an android user and live chat is closed. Awful system. Never ever again!”
“Booked and paid for a holiday for a friend's 50th birthday. Received an email to say 'hotel is unavailable', please choose another? Why would you want to go to a completely different hotel when it's a group holiday for a 50th birthday party? Emailed twice to ask to cancel the holiday & ignored. However, surprisingly enough when I went onto online chat, same advisor 'Sarah' answers immediately?? The only response I recieved was that they have, 'no control over availability'. Wow, so what is the point of booking a holiday if you aren't guaranteed said holiday?? Talk about taking no responsibility or account as a company. This is the first time I have booked with this company and what a poor, shambolic disappointing experience it's been! Thanks for ruining my holiday!!!”
“Hotel was charged at 1300 more than the website, wouldn’t honour price promise as a group booking. Spent over 2 hours trying to sort through chat, can’t speak on phone as digital company. Customer service is non existent, do not book maybe cheaper but they do not rectify problems and you cannot speak to a human ,”
“Booked to go to Skiathos package, called me the hotel was unavailable gave me 3 alternative hotels all within the same vicinity, booked a suitable one only to discover it was in Crete on a different Island. The customer Service was dreadful, they admitted to their mistakes but blamed me for not checking. I have had to pay a cancelation fee, I would not recommend this company..”
“Shocking bad customer service. They canceled my holiday a few weeks before departure. Still waiting for a refund. I would hate to experience what it would be like if i needed their assistance while on holiday. Best avoid.”
“Very poor customer service, no responsibility for bookings made through them. No clarity for exactly what you have booked online. No willingness to put any problems right.”
“I booked a holiday online and used the smart booking system to book the flights. I no thought this would be easy , it wasn’t. I found this really challenging as I had only booked three 23kg bags for four passengers and it wouldn’t let me progress to next step unless I booked four bags . I used the live chat which wasn’t a great experience but eventually flights and bags were booked
Seats weren’t included which I thought they were so booked these direct through the airline .
I was then contacted by on the beach through text message to say the wrong bags were booked and I had booked seats through smart book they wanted another £299. I explained I had confirmation of booking , screen shots of booking and seats were booked direct with the airline definitely not through smart book . I was then told the wrong bags were booked and no further reference made to the seats .
I requested four times someone call me as in their website I could only book the one size bag which I had done so couldn’t understand where things had gone wrong . My requests for someone to call me were not even acknowledged completely ignored . This issue still isn’t sorted out , currently I am on hold to the airline I hope they are more helpful.
Extremely poor customer service and experience. On the beach if you are reading this please call me !! Reference MYB13704243B”
“Stay away from On The Beach, they are a scam company and ignore your consumer rights.
The customer service is s non existent, the apps don't work, the holiday booking is very difficult to navigate. Complaint made and they take forever to respond.
Recommend to all customers to stay away from this dangerous, scam company”
“I recently booked a family holiday through this company, and while waiting for confirmation, I received an email thanking me for my booking. However, it also stated that the hotel had sold out for the dates I had selected. Upon further inspection, I discovered the same hotel and dates were still available on the website, but at three times the price I was initially quoted.
The live chat team was helpful, but unfortunately, they were unable to resolve the issue, attributing it to a third-party issue. If that’s the case, I understand, but I found the website to be misleading and unreasonable, particularly for those on a tight budget or with limited flexibility due to childcare.
I hope the company can review and address this issue to prevent similar situations for future customers. Overall, this experience has been extremely disappointing.”
“Scammers that hit you with booking flight fee after 1 hr , although it is stated 24 hrs (in the tine where you can book for flights yourself).
0 trading standards”
