“Have tried to book car experience on line experienced problems each time I tried to redeem voucher. Have tried to get through on the phone numerous time never get an answer just music . Such a waste of time and money”
“Booking this red letter day back to back driving experience was so difficult, I had to pay to extend the voucher for another year , then tried to book but nothing was available.
Then I read all the other reviews about having to wait hours and the poor organisation of car chase heroes , paying extra for cdw and paying to park plus you will be sharing the track with 12 year olds who really can't drive !!!!. I at that point I thought forget it , its a shame as my kids bought me the voucher.
But it's such a relief to forget it !!!”
“I attended a castle Combe event
I was very disappointed with the experience and would expect a significant refund or another session free of charge.
There were several issues on the day, despite arriving on time:
- I did not get to drive any of the three cars I had selected!! (This appeared to be because of a time constraint). I paid extra to drive the 458 this was not there on the day. The GT40 had too many other drivers lined up to drive it. And the Atom which I was really excited to drive as it's very different was also too busy for to drive.
- I did not get the high speed passenger ride which I was really looking forward to.
- I waiting for 2hrs 30 for my first drive and was then rushed in any available car to finish up as fast as I could.
This was a 30th birthday present from my family and I was very annoyed with the overall experience.
The extra costs on top of the experience day I was gifted we also really frustrating +£50 for a 'premium track'+£25 for a 458 drive +£25 insurance”
“Do not book this experience, it is a total rip off!
After paying for the gift, you will also get stung with a £25 charge to book on a weekend then when you arrive on the day, an extra £2 for parking AND £29 waiver fee.
After the total £100+ cost you will then need to stand (unsheletered) for hours on end until they call out your name as there are hundreds of other people there in front of you even though you booked! No organisation at all. Can't comment on the cars as we gave up waiting!!”
“Where to start, 1st time car was broken which I can happen at any point(a mini)
2nd time arrive at the site to be told that one car was not there and no reason why, golf GTI, and also the other car was not working and handnt been for a while.
3rdtime they cancelled two weeks before and this took us months to get organised with the cars we wanted to drive. We had booked a hotel as this was my birthday weekend and other things were planned.
4th time we get an email to say it’s cancelled after booking early last year and now to be told the cars that are wanted to be driven are either off site for other things or can’t get at the same time. Also told that if we want a weekend when some are we have to pay extra for this, but this was there choice not ours.
Try to call the it takes over 20 mins to get through for them to say there is nothing they can do. Again we have a hotel booked and another experience at somewhere else the next day. Now looks like it will be next year maybe when they have the cars and will have to pay to extend which is a JOKE!
We did have a good time there and the people at the site were really nice, but this does not mean that excuse things”
“Last year I booked the Mini Cooper s experience but due to mechanical issues it got cancelled. I have had my experience gift end date extended as to date am still awaiting dates for this experience option. It’s disappointing when the mini option is not available on many of the locations offered. I have searched with the thought a 2hr drive would be acceptable to get to a location but to date have not been able to secure a booking for my chosen experience.”
“I recently had an unfortunate experience with Car Chase Heroes . The communication from their team was exceedingly poor. Despite reaching out multiple times, I often found myself waiting for days, if not weeks, to receive any form of reply regarding our booking. This lack of prompt communication significantly impacted our plans.
Adding to the frustration, they only notified us days before our scheduled date that the slot we had originally requested was already full. Without considering our availability, they automatically rescheduled us for a later time slot. This was particularly inconvenient as we had personal commitments, which we had previously communicated to them.
The biggest letdown was their inflexibility in handling the situation. Despite the oversight being on their end, they offered no option to reschedule free of charge. This lack of customer-centric solutions was disappointing, to say the least.
Given these circumstances, I regret to say that I cannot recommend Car Chase Heroes . The overall experience was marred by poor communication and a lack of accommodating customer service. This was not the experience we had hoped for, and it's unfortunate that it did not meet our expectations.”
“Terribly organised - would never put anyone through this torturous wait. Also hidden costs too. would not thank anyone fir this ‘gift’. Had a time slot of 1:30 and still weren’t in the car by 4:30.”
“I was looking forward for my favourite car experience as I paid extra £40 for it but it turned out to be a total nightmare! As you arrive on site they charge you for parking, then a very long queue meanwhile some of staff trying to sell you insurance, until I get to their desk and told that the car has mechanical issue and cannot be driven. They offered no alternative and was told to re-book it but my voucher would pass it’s expiry date so my loss was cost of the expensive voucher plus £40 extra for the car I wanted to drive. It’s absolutely shocking that there is no compensation and they take no responsibility! I have never seen such a lack of care and customer satisfaction anywhere and staff couldn’t even careless! How could they operate as a business in such a fashion is beyond me and I guess with huge number of people who are willing to put up with this only to get their hands on their favourite car, could be the only reason to continue their business. But for me never again!”
“Awful experience from start to finish. Staff are only interested in getting more money out of you, then rush you through, making no effort to provide a good experience.
The number of cars on the track made it impossible to drive at speed and was just like being in a huge line of traffic.
Never again.”
“This would be zero stars if it was possible.
(Summary / tl;dr version: failed to provide experience, cancelling on several people after keeping them waiting for 3 hours, offered no recompense for lost travel money, ruined my blind fathers 80th birthday gift and were poor communicators who only refunded the payment when the company overseeing the experience got involved)
Full version:
Drive cancelled 3 hours after start of event in a manner that showed a total lack of true empathy for ruining my blind dad’s 80th birthday present from us. It is devastating to be turned away from such an event. We had travelled 200 miles to the experience (a 400 mile round trip in total). About 10 or 15 families suffered the same treatment at this event.
Poor communication followed at every front after that. CCH required attendees to make contact for recompense - rather than just refunding people as a matter of course (they had all our details to be able to do this). However, they hadn’t bothered to put maternity cover on for the Ablenet Account and so had no one available to speak to when we rang the number we’d been told to. They took a week to call and then swiftly stopped responding to emails / never called back despite having promised to do so on more than one occasion… showing how much Ablenet customers are valued by them – i.e. not at all.
There was continued failure to refund payment for the event / offer recompense for travel. Ablenet simply passed us onto CCH who never once offered to refund the money for an event they hadn’t provided.
Finally we managed to get a refund but ONLY by going through Track Days – who were absolutely great. With Track Days involved, CCH refunded the money within 2 working days.
So, CCH treated a pensioner terribly and didn’t care enough about it to communicate properly and, whilst the experience days are wonderful (if still chaotic) when they work properly, I would never book with them again, as it just causes too much heartache and unnecessary work. I would strongly recommend you avoid them.
If you want a blind driving experience, with more time spent behind the wheel, where you are not treated as a mere commodity, use ‘Driving Ambition, Brackley’ instead. No supercars, but an amazing day.”
“My son was booked to be passenger in a police car and was really looking forward to it. However when we returned from our holiday we out in the SD card we had paid £40 for but it came up that the card had an error and needed formatting so basically we have paid for a blank card , really not happy . no photos or video of what should have been a great day. We are all very disappointed”
“The worst experience I have ever encountered. I do not recommend anyone to book this. You will be waiting hours to drive the actual cars, poorly organised, all of the staff was extremely rude, there is no seating or shelter when you arrive. Charge you £2 for parking which is absurd. They also try and scam you out of £80 for not returning a lanyard & SD card. They didn’t tell us or anyone about this rule just left a small card with it written on it. A terrible experience.”
“What an absolute scam! Paid for Son to have an activity supercar experience for £59. When got there the pressure sales was so bad, an extra £29 insurance, £10 to show how car works, £50 to drive a half decent car and thr cheek of charging £2 to park. 1 hour waiting after timed slot for a 5 min 2 lap experience. BUT! You can pay more for extra laps!!! There must be better, cheaper alternatives than this. So £59 turn into £150.”
“I purchased a driving experience for my 15 year old son. On arrival we were charged a parking fee to park in a field. Entered a very busy air craft hanger, with no seating. Had to queue for a long time to sign in, they then tried to con us into buying extra insurance. Waited for ages. Had a 5 minute ride in a car, supervised by a very unenthusiastic employee. Would not recommend.”
“Brought as a birthday gift. Cars booked were not available!! Then had to pay £30 insurance ( which was optional) if you never had the insurance and anything happened to the car it could cost up to £5000 scare tactics!! To everyone that goes DONT buy insurance total con !!!
There is no way you could crash one of their cars. It was all very disorganised.
Would never do it again. !!!
Also cars are very dated. With the money they charge they could afford new ones.”
“Avoid avoid avoid! Abingdon
The experience, a birthday treat for an excited 16 year old which turned into a day of mammoth disappointment.
In researching the event we anticipated waiting around, as stated on the website "Please allow up to 3 hours at the venue fram your session start time" what we did not anticipate is waiting 5 hours without any indication, communication, or apologies for delays.
On 3 occasions I voiced my concerns with the teams onsite asking for updates only to be met with shrugs and vague answers.
I appreciate you have no control over the stormy weather. However, if it was a task too huge for the organisers to control in such weather conditions, the event should have been postponed or better communication voiced.
The lack of expertise of the inexperienced junior assigned to organising the timings , and lack of social skills need to be addressed.
A drive which lasted less than 10 minutes is not worth the hype (I have video timings of departure and return) The alleged "high speed passenger drive" which was included in our booking wasn't even mentioned and by then my son was so deflated all he wanted to do was leave.
We then queued hoping the day would be a little salvaged to purchase the videos, only to be informed there wasn't any.
After much fiddling, they couldn’t locate any pictures either. By 6pm we left dispirited.
The day was a major let down. I appreciate some individuals have a marvellous time. But ours was a day full of negativity and judging by observation, we were not the only ones.
I shall not be promoting Car Chase Heros in a positive light amongst, family, friends or social media.”
“If I could it would be a zero rating. So angry with the whole experience. After a 2 hour journey to Abingdon, had to pay £2 for parking apparently to help with the up keep. Had to queue for 20 minutes in horrible weather to book in. Then was told to pay £29 for insurance or leave bank details to cover £5k even if an accident wasn't your fault. Was told to scan the QR code on the card provided, don't have a mobile phone so had to have a staff member to sort this out which meant another 15 minute wait after which was told there would be a at least an hour and a half wait. The weather was horrendous and there was only one area that had a cover for people to stand under. Waited under cover for just under the hour and a half before going back to the car waiting area. The staff were calling out the names on equipment which wasn't fit for purpose and I almost missed my name being called as you couldn't work out what was being said. You are given a memory card for a video to be taken whilst you drive around. Drove first car but the camera wasn't working. Found that I had been called for my 2nd car as I was finishing the last lap. Did get to drive the second car and then waited for the 3rd car. By this time we were cold, drenched and totally fed up. Was then told we could rebook the 3rd car and my wife's car drive experience by going back to where we first booked in. By this time we had been there for 3 and a half hours to be told that my name was about to be called but my wife had at least another 90 minutes to wait. Went back over to the car area and waited again. Not called so asked what was going on to which I was informed that the car had been pulled because of the weather conditions. Apparently an announcement had been made which turns out was when I was driving the 2nd car so how was I supposed to have known this. Back we go to rebook where the member of staff checked with a manager and said the car had been pulled just then. What a lie. Was offord another car to drive which I declined as wanted to drive the car I had booked. The 3rd car was the one I really wanted to drive out of the 3 I had selected. Now have to go through the Customer Services team to sort this out who don't work Saturdays. There are too many people booked in on the day for all to be accommodated. You are offered more laps for a price which puts everything back for others who are waiting. No communication between the booking in team and the car area team. Not enough places to try to keep out of the weather. Need to sort out the sound equipment and to make sure electric cabling is not in water! DO NOT BOOK THIS EXPERIENCE WITH CAR CHASE HERO'S.”
“My son really enjoyed the driving although they could have driven for longer. Always catch you out with extra costs. If you can't prove that you have £5k in the bank to apparently cover the insurance excess, then you MUST pay the insurance waiver. Of course hard sell on the photos and videos after but if its sunny dont bother as you cant see your childs face due to the glare. Also extra cost at the beginning for the warm up laps which is basically just being driven round the track by someone else so thats just extra money for them but they make you feel guilty by saying its best for your child so they dont waste the experience. Why can't these things just be one price and thats it! AND they charged us to park at the venue which is actually public land anyway! Money grabbers. Wouldnt do one of these again due to all the extra expenses.”
