“MESSED UP VACATION: none of the excisions/activities worked; None of the Pre Paid tickets were every delivered to us; No customer service to help! Last minutes changes to hotels and no guides anywhere to be found; extremely stressful; lesson learned Never trust this company and forget about getting you money back; They cannot even contact their own out sources; You are on your own; WARNING: DO NOT BOOK WITH EXOTICCA - you will be sorry!”
“EXOTICCA - Holiday Horrors: London was messed up none of vouchers worked; Edinburgh was messed up we got no tickets - all Pre Paid and NO SERVICE; they leave you with nothing buy BAD MEMORIES; Exoticca have made no effort to help correct the situation, we are seriously out of pocket to pay for everything twice; Misrepresenting there product and services and the vacation is over and you get nothing but STRESSED OUT VACATION; no refunds, no credits and no nothing / they don’t care and no help! BUYER BEWARE!!! You will be Disappointed… BS customer service and they don’t know what they are doing, as they have NO STAFF; responses are standard BS and without resolution! Please report this company to nearest Travel Government Agency and have their license revoked;”
“A friend and I booked a 13 day Greece island hopping trip that started in Athens. We wanted time to explore the city so came a week before. First issue is they said the airport transfer would be included but then they wouldn’t pay because we came a week early. Said they would just cover a transfer from our Airbnb to the hotel instead which was one block away saving them approximately a $50 airport transfer. Day 1…all our confirmation emails state our transfer from the Airbnb to the hotel would be at noon on April 27th. No one showed up! Leaving us to fend for our self to get to the hotel. When we arrived at the hotel they say we aren’t booked till the following day. Our confirmation clearly states the 27th transfer to hotel with each days excursions clearly listed starting with the Acropolis tour on the 28th. After a call to exoticca they say someone will come meet us. When the exoticca representative shows up he wants us to pay for the hotel for the night and says that our whole tour is a day behind all the confirmed dates we have making us stay in Athens an extra night with nothing to do the next day and loosing a night off in Santorini at the end of our trip. Secondly we were Told our tour group would be 6-10 people and then found out that it will be 29 from this same rep. This is upsetting to us as I have medical conditions and booked a small group so I would have less exposure to others on a bus etc. Lastly when we checked in the hotel (which was changed after booking the trip to a way worse looking one) staff told us to be very carful outside the hotel as it isn’t a safe area 😳 So keep this in mind if you are thinking of booking with exoticca. So far nothing has be done for us for the massive screw ups and crappy hotel.”
“Disgraceful company. Booked a holiday with them. It was cancelled. Booked again at a higher price. Cancelled again. Booked again for May 2022. In March asked for substantial balance or holiday would be cancelled and we would lose our money. Paid and shortly after they cancelled again. No excuse for it as far as I can see though they blame covid but nothing changed after they extorted money from us. Now I’m asking for my money back but needless to say they won’t engage. They ignore e mails and if I phone when they eventually answer they put me on hold while they forward to the right department but the hold turns out to be permanent. This company is criminal, literally.”
“I have had 2 holidays with Exoticca and both have been good value - for the price, I would not expect to have first class hotels and the organisation was acceptable.
HOWEVER !!!!
Exoticca cancelled my booking for another holiday and you would have thought that it would be a simple matter to obtain a full refund of the amount that I paid. I have e mailed them 4 times and telephoned 3 times and have still not been refunded. I also need to be refunded for an excursion that did not happen on my last trip with them, but there is no sign from Exoticca that they are willing to refund any of my money.
Be aware that if you have to have any of your money refunded ...... best of luck !!”
“THEY PAY $50 FOR EACH 5-STAR REVIEW ON TRUST PILOT. My fiance's parents found this trip to Peru and thought it was a great deal. The red flags started almost instantly. After we had paid a sizable down payment to book a trip for four, they said that they would give us $50 off of our trip to post a 5-star review on Trust Pilot. Alarm bells went off but what could we do? They already had our money. I posted a review about how the booking process was easy (the part where they take your money) and left it at that. After I had posted my review, I followed up about the discount and was told that it wouldn't be applied to THIS trip, but to a future trip with them (which they already know you aren't likely to take). When you're booking, you can reach them anytime, day or night. After you put down a deposit, they will only answer your call during business hours when you're working, I assume to make it harder for people. I called the 9-5 number and a woman answered. I let her know that we had booked a trip and I had a couple of questions. She hung up on me. I called back and let it ring and ring and no one ever answered. No one responded to my email to customer service either. I guess they work on commission so no one wants to spend time taking care of existing customers. We were told that we would receive a detailed itinerary at least 30 days before the trip with all the information we needed. Despite us asking for it multiple times, it finally arrived three days before we left. Exoticca also failed to notice or care that my fiance's passport expired less than six months after we returned home from Peru, meaning he wouldn't be allowed to travel. Fortunately, our trusted travel agent was getting everything together for our honeymoon and SHE caught it and let us know. At that point, he had to call and get an emergency appointment eight hours away to get a new passport in time. Thankfully she caught it or we would have had to cancel and Exoticca would've kept nearly $5,000 of our money. The first hotel was fine, the second had no hot water and no heat (not even a space heater) with temps in the 40s. The third hotel had ants in the bathroom which I found on my toothbrush and ants crawling on the food at the breakfast buffet. Hot water was spotty. But the worst part was the smell. Our bathroom had a window that opened onto some sort of utility shaft. The window was broken so that we couldn't shut it all the way and the utility shaft and our entire room reeked of raw sewage. After one night we were both sick. The next night we figured out that we could shut the bathroom door and shove a blanket under the crack to keep most of the smell out of the bedroom and that helped some. But since the space heater was attached to the bedroom wall, that meant that you couldn't get any heat into the bathroom and had to take a cold shower in a cold room. We've traveled to less affluent countries and never encountered situations like these. The trip was poorly organized as well. For instance, instead of booking the 1-hour flight back from Cusco to Lima next to the 5-hour flight from Lima back to Miami to make it easy, they had us land in Lima late Saturday evening, bussed us an hour and a half away to what I can only assume was a hotel much cheaper than the ones close to the airport, and picked us up again at 4 o'clock in the morning to bus us an hour and a half back to the airport. We would've gladly paid more to at least stay near the airport and get a few more hours of sleep. We made the best of the trip and Machu Picchu was phenomenal. Most of our guides from Condor Travel were wonderful as well, especially Rodrigo and Alexis. But the one who picked us up at the Cusco airport told us that she had been about to take off and leave us behind. We had been off of the plane for 10 minutes, just long enough to grab our bags and make a quick stop at the bathroom before going outside to try to find her. She literally said that she was about to leave four Americans, one of whom was disabled and only one of whom spoke broken Spanish, stranded in a foreign country with no way to get to the hotel or home or anywhere because in her opinion 10 minutes was too long to get off of the plane and out of the airport. Exoticca is a get-what-you-pay-for situation. If you're okay with no communication, no customer service, no information, no hot water, no heat, no sleep, ants, raw sewage, and possibly being left stranded at an airport, then go for it. If not I highly recommend paying a bit more for a reputable travel company.”
“This "travel agency" offers 3 things: 1. lousy flight schedules; 2. mediocre hotels; and 3. an hour city tour (+3 hours picking up/dropping off other hordes of travelers at many hotels). THAT'S IT!!! Awful customer service!!! I've traveled extensively for past 20+ years with several tour companies and hand's down this is BY FAR THE WORST agency! Total waste of time; money too but the waste of time will always bother me. Don't say you haven't been warned. Wish I could give them a -10 rating!”
“Just returned from our Exoticca holiday to Jordan and Egypt. I will never use them again.
Firstly, they never produced an itinerary that matched what we did, which made it impossible to plan our free time.
Travelling from Amman to Cairo we arrived around 18.30, only to be told we had to be ready to leave our hotel at 02.45 the next morning to get the 05.30 flight to Luxor. Due to the organisational shambles of the locally contracted tour operator, we didn’t get into our hotel room until 21.15
thirdly, Exoticca routed us via Bahrain to/from London to both Amman and Cairo. Cairo to London direct is about 5 hours. Via Bahrain, from Cairo to Heathrow was scheduled to take 12 hours including 2 hours in Bahrain, which is a pain, but I guess it was significantly cheaper. What actually happened was that Gulf Air cancelled our 20.00 flight from Cairo to Bahrain and rebooked us on the 13.00 flight out of Cairo. So our journey took 19 hours including a 9 hour stopover in Bahrain. We lost most of the last day of our holiday in Cairo. I chased Exoticca for 4 days to find an alternative, but they did nothing until the day before our return. They came up with an option that I had already found online to fly direct with British Airways if we paid an extra £460 each, which was the full price I could get easily online. Any clown could find that flight and say they had offered us an alternative. By doing my own research (no help from Exoticca), I found out that Gulf Air would offer us a transit hotel room and evening dinner free of charge, which did help to mitigate the overly long journey. Would have been nice if Exoticca had used their travel expertise (not!) to advise us of this.
Nightmare company!”
“This was one of the most stressful and disappointing holiday experiences we have ever had but it is only now that we are home that the true awfulness of it comes through.
Fist of all, we paid a significant sum to spend 8 days/ 7 nights in 3 different locations - Athens, Mykanos and Santorini. We didn't realise until it was actually happening that ONE WHOLE DAY of our holiday was spent getting to and from Greece. Because we had transfers both ways in Germany, the journeys took forever, at least 12 hours! Cheaper for Exoticca but totally tiring for us. It was the same when we moved on from Athens to Mykanos - our ferry (dirty, overcrowded and basic) took 6 hours! There was a 2hr ferry, we subsequently found but it was a bit more expensive. Another 1/2 day wasted by the time we got to our hotel.
Then there is the organisation and communication. At both Athens and Mykanos, our hotels were changed without notice. No biggy in itself but should we have had to hear it from a TAXI DRIVER and a rep who we never met before and who we never saw again! Not good enough! On the day before we were due to travel to Mykanos, we had absolutely NO transfer information until late that night after some 20+ calls to the reps, the emergency contacts and Exoticca itself. 20+ phone calls - imagine the stress and the frustration! The lack of emergency contact was really worrying as was the fact that Exoticca agents in Spain and Florida eventually stopped picking up!
Anyone who thinks this is just wingeing, it's not. As well as several minor problems, at least 5 other sets of travellers had exactly the same things happen to then, including single travellers and travellers from the USA.
If you book with Exoticca, just be ready - they'll ruin your holiday and hang you out to dry!”
“I am booked to go to Turkey with Exoticca this Saturday. My hotel in Istanbul has been changed at a few day’s notice. Terms and conditions state it must be of comparable standard. However the replacement hotel is on a motorway nowhere near the city centre. The traveling time to the old city has more than tripled to 1.5hrs. The recent reviews of the replacement hotel are really dire at 1star. Exoticca say there is nothing they can do.
I shall post again following the holiday.”
“We had lots of problemson our trip to costa rica, starting with missing our connection because only 1 hour was allowed for transfer through US Airport. We had one of our trips cancelled either Exoticca suddenly saying it was optional despite us providing their itinerary which showed it was inclusive. However the worst part of our trip was when they cancelled my reservation for my homeward flight. The rest of my party had to fly home without me and I was left stranded in Montreal airport by myself with no flight home.
Exoticca Customer service is non existent and I had to pay for my own flight home.
We are still trying to get them to compensate us for all the stress and extra travel time. As well as phone bills and the cancelled trip.
Don't touch them with a barge pole!”
“I am usually satisfied, grateful and appreciative I have a travel agency working on my trip. However, this time I COULD NOT let this agency fly or get by with what kind of travel plans they have for me. My trip package was to Italy for 14 days from Venice to Florence, to Rome then Napoli (Almalfi coast to Sorrento, and then back to Rome. We gathered up our itinerary and printed out all the train stop tickets from and to our next destinations.
The day we were supposed to leave, as we are grabbing our board passes, an hour later, our flight got canceled to the very next day. I understand airlines can get a crazy bit hectic, and a flight delayed is something that noone has control over. We called Exoticca to see if we can somehow speak to their supervisor or someone to at least provide us with a new flight since we have already paid for our 3 days in Venice (flight +hote stays +tours) and since our flight was delayed past 1 day, which means we have already missed at least 15% of our trip including all of our funds we have paid for, since its really 2 days according to the changed time zones. Exottica would NOT assist us to arrange for a new flight, or help us at all. They guardrail us with speaking us to their higher ups. And instead, they said even though the flight was canceled and delayed us by several days, we WOULD NOT be getting a refund back for those days we have missed. We spoke to several representatives and they all provided us with different answers. Clearly, there were gaps in their customer support standards and protocols because each of their answers were all lies and each tying back to say they will call us back and resolve our concerns and issues. Yet, NOONE called us back , and so we continue to make our calls with them and addressed our concerns and seeing if there were any other options they can give us to resolve the matter. NOTHING. This is UNACCEPTABLE! Why? Because there were many options Exoticca could've provided like: 1)Rearrange our flight since there were many other direct flight options 2) Provide a refund back for the days we missed, hotels and excursions we paid for. 3) Add an extra day or two with the money that we have paid for. Exoticca has so many alternatives that could well mend their customer relationship with us, and instead, kept telling us they CANNOT and WILL not help us and we can either cancel the entire trip or accept the delay, and the fact we are losing the 15% of our trip, since we are missing about 3 days of our stays in Venice, given the time zone changes. My trip alone costs 7k and I paid Exoticca all that money for them to not help us. This is such a dishonest, unethical and unsupported system that they have in place, only to pocket our money and provide us with a lack of integrity and were untrustworthy.We ended up having to pay an extra $$$ to get an uber to and from our place, for another day, lost our Venice tour. We specifically chosed this itinerary to go to Venice, and instead didn't get our 3 days worth of stay. Then, as we get to Almalfi coast, Exoticca didn't manage to provide us some form of transparency that stared we had to pay $$$ over 100 euro from the train station to the hotel that they picked for us in Sorrento. The cost of the taxi was more than the cost of an airplane ticket to another country. Wow. They are insufficient, and mismanaged our customers itinerary and providing us with clear instructions. We could've just created and managed the itinerary ourselves and not get ripped off. This is by far UNACCEPTABLE and NOWHERE BASIC customer support. We want our money reimbursed somehow with the cost of what we missed and expect TRUE accountability for their umabiguious customer service! And this is me providing only a high level overview of the mismanaged trip they have done. The in between hotel bookings are also a problem. I am not going to get into more details about this.”
“Dreadful company. Before booking I asked about baggage allowance and was assured this was included before booking. Flight information has come through and they want us to pay for bags.Why would i Book a 12 day holiday with a carry one case. Apparently they are listening to the tapes- not holding out much hope and have requested a copy as I don't trust the company. I will never recommend or use this company again. Below average and poor customer service. Its taken 3 days before anyone has answer my call and No reply to my email I sent 4 days previously. Agree with one of other the reviews they need reporting.”
“I would give this below zero if I could. This is by far the WORST organisation I have ever had the displeasure of dealing with. They steal your money, promise it back, and then a year later, you are still having to ask for it. It is simply unbelievable. DO NOT USE, PLEASE HEED MY WARNING.”
“SCAM warming! All the hotels were cheap and nasty, transfers were unsafe and the trip was poorly planned. This was sold as a luxury holiday via Secret Escapes and it was anything but. The hotels in Thailand were £30 a night (we checked) they were smelly, noisy, unsafe, outdated, dilapidated and terrible all-round. What's more is that Exoticca ignored our attempt to contact them about it, when the finally replied they just fobbed us off so I will go through an official complaint route when home. The planning on their side also had holes which made transfers between locations really stressful. They booked transfers with unsafe companies whose drivers were dangerous and left you clinging to the seats praying to avoid a high-speed crash while the drivers casually used their phone, ate, counted paper money, all while driving in the hard-shoulder at speed on congested roads!!! Do not risk your family or loved ones lives with Exoticca!!! The lesson I learned is never to buy a package trip again. Just do it yourself, get better places to stay and be more in control.”
“xoticca is basically a travel broker. Having just come back from Costa Rica we would never use them again. There is no one on the ground if things go wrong. When we complained about the safety of one of the hotels we were told that reviews on such platforms as booking.com had given good ratings. Is this how they chose their hotels? One of ours had an open building site with huge glass shards in the ground outside our room. We travelled with friends but they were put in different trips, hotels and transport. We would never use this company again. We are well travelled and have done independent trips, volunteering and used other travel companies. This was shocking!”
“Just finished 11 days in Turkey, the wonders of Anatolia. The long hours of travelling on the coach from one town to another is too much. The night mare started when the tour company told our tour guide that the tour will stop immediately because exoticca did not pay the tour company in Turkey. The tour campany said that we need to sort it out with exoticca to sort the problem. We called exoticca and money was sent to the tour company. We don't need this.”
“DON'T BE FOOLEDDO NOT USE THIS COMPANY!!! - CLASSIC SWITCH AND BAIT.
So I have not even left for my trip, yet, but already I am regretting choosing this company! They have a fantastic sales team, that were really informative and even took some money off due to incorrectly advertising the holiday, for longer than it actually was. With my 3 friends, present, we chose the luxury, level (5 star) and chose the hotel and boat (both with twin rooms) and direct flights.
I had to chase the confirmation, which was sent around 3 weeks before the holiday. Only to find that a different hotel with the same star rating, but according to a hotel booking site, half the price and by a motorway, was given, and instead of a 5 star, we got a 4 star boat. When I questioned it, the only effort this company made was, allegedly, listening to my phone calls, where they have claimed, I did not discuss a hotel, or boat or star rating. I challenge anyone to book a holiday without discussing any of these!!! On top of that they have then refused to let me listen to these calls, until I complete an email requesting this, and then this will take at least a month to come back, by which time, I will have been on the holiday. They have suggested that if I want my money back I will only get 25% due to the time before leaving. They have also stated that in their terms and conditions they can change the accommodation for any reason. It is clear that we were enticed to purchase the holiday from them with the accommodation we wanted, There was no intention of giving us this, and instead, cheaper accommodation.
On top of this, tonight, I have now been told that I booked double rooms, instead of twins, which were requested during our calls in April this year.
The customer service agent , insinuating that this is my fault. Not the agent who we booked our holiday with, over the phone.
What was supposed to be an exciting time for us, has turned into disappointment with the last week being really stressful.....and we have not even got there yet!?!. We are dreading what is in store in Egypt!!! I will of course update how this goes but in the meantime, if you were tempted to take the company up on its buy one get one free offer on their holidays, and you don't mind getting what you did not want, then go ahead. Otherwise, steer clear. DO NOT BOOK WITH THIS COMPANY!!! They are not interested in resolving our concerns, just absolving themselves!!
Update 09/09/23 - so I had an email from Exoticca on the 2nd september, confirming that i do have a request for twin rooms but cant guarantee.....they have assured me that someone is looking into the 'category' issue, and will get back to me. No surprise, then, that there has been nothing since. The email was very polite but did not mention my concerns around the location and price online, of the hotel or going from a 5 star to 4 star boat. Oh well 5 days to go until the holiday. It read as follows:
email from Exoticca
Hi,
I hope this email finds you well.
We strive hard to deliver a smooth and satisfying experience for our customers and feel greatly disappointed when this isn’t the case.
Regarding the call recordings, I can see that there is a process by our agents working on the case, from 50 minutes ago. Once we have the update, we will send you an email.
Also, I can see that the agent informed our team at the destination that you are requesting a twin room, on 30/04/2023. Please keep in mind that this is a high season and that we can not guarantee that the hotel will have available twin beds, however, our team at the destination is doing their best to meet your needs.
As it is mentioned in the trip summary, all the hotels that are listed in the Trip summary are in the same category (or better) and all the hotels can be booked until and unless they are in the agreement list.
We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience caused and appreciate you reaching out to us regarding this issue. If you have any more questions please don't hesitate to contact us. We will be happy to help you.
Once again, we apologize for any inconvenience caused, and we appreciate your understanding and cooperation.
Kind regards,
********* (name of agent)
Customer Service Agent
Exoticca claim to answer questions, but they don'. Just terrible excuses
11/10/23 - Exoticca did not except any responsibility for fraudulent sales tactics and giving us a hotel next to the airport instead of in Cairo itself, and a boat that was 4 star instead of 5. We discovered other holiday makers on our boat they did the same thing to. One couple summed it up :BAIT and SWITCH. Exoticca have made no attempt to send me the recordings of my call before my holiday and no compensation for giving us cheaper accommodation and lying to us. I SAY AGAIN....DO NOT USE THIS COMPANY!!”
“Good trip, negligent support when something goes wrong. Never refunded us for an excursion they agreed to cancel. Stranded us in a foreign country costing us around 1k in lodging and airfare and offered us a $50 voucher as compensation. We booked a trip to costa rica. Cant say enough good things about that part. The excersions were nice transportation was a breeze. The app and website was great. We loved our hotels.
The only problem we had was when Aeromexico caused us to miss our flight in Mex City and tried to charge us full price to rebook the next flight. We reached out to exoticca emergency support and they promised solutions then ghosted us MULTIPLE times. We ended up having to figure it out ourselves in a foreign country where we dont speak the language. Exoticca promised they would rebook us on the next flight and all we would need to do is pay any price difference and any rebooking fee. The promised to call us and message back more the 4 times after i reached out and to this day I have never gotten the promised response from support.
I reached out to exoticca to ask them to cover the price difference between the full priced flight we were forced to purchase and the lower price it would have cost them to rebook us through aeromexico as they promised they would do.
Exoticca admitted that they saw the evidence that we had been abandoned by their staff and offered $50 CREDIT on their website for the "inconvenience"
Additional issues: We cancelled an ATV tour and they agreed to refund 50% of the cost and we never got it.
I would never book exoticca again since, despite the great trip, they abandoned us in a foreign country promising resolutions that never came then offered an insulting resolution.
The only resolution i will accept is them to issue a check payable to me for the difference in our full priced flight and their rebooking cost, 2 nights lodgings plus meals (the amount of time we waited on their promised resolution). US-EX2023148839”
“Unfortunately this system does not allow you to give 0 starts. I booked a trip to Japan with Exoticaa which was due to take place in 2020, due to the pandemic the trip has been repeatedly postponed. However I held faith with the company and allowed them to hold onto my money. The holiday is now due to take place this year . Exoticaa have provided a new “itinerary “ in which they have downgraded hotels, removed meals and also an excursion that had all already been purchased. They advise that the itinerary was changed in 2022 ( I received no notification of this) , and “apologise for any inconvenience.” They have in effect decided to keep my money and in return give me something entirely different to what I purchased. Complete mis-selling. Buyer beware!”
