TakeToursReviews of taketours.com

Pathetic customer experience!! The company cancelled the tour a week before the departure date. My parents had planned their whole Euro trip around this booking including their flights/visa dates etc. An email was sent a week before the date mentioning that the tour had been cancelled due to insufficient passengers!!! The company should take into account that most travellers have a level of confidence that the tours will stay confirmed. It not only affects the passengers but also others accommodating/organising their travels. We had to improvise on hotels and other trips which then cost us a lot more! NEVER AGAIN TakeTours, you guys are not trust worthy!!!

I had gifted my parents with a 7 day west coast tour from take tours. Here are some things I would like to share about their experience: 1. Three times it so happens that they had to sleep empty stomach because they couldn't get anything to eat as the tour bus stops at Chinese restaurants only. And there was not a single other restaurant option nearby. 2. We were already charged for the entry fee for Grand Canyon when I booked their tour, but the tour guide was not ready to accept it and she made them pay $270 if they wished to see the Canyon. My parents did not have that much cash so they had to borrow it from someone. When I tried calling the customer service of take tours nobody picked up for three hours and I had to chat with a representative. It was a nightmare because that lady was not ready to co-operate and very very rude. Next day I called another representative who luckily understood what the problem after I threatened them that I will sue the company and we finally got a refund after one month. 3. The tour guides are very rude and they charge you more than the actual entry fee. Beware of it. They are looking to take money from you all the time apart from the mandatory tip you have to give them. Overall I think this is the worst tour company. My Advise: pay a little more and have a wonderful experience, instead of being sorry and helpless.

DO NOT BOOK WITH THIS COMPANY! The reviews ON THEIR SITE are bogus. I should have Googled the company, instead, then I would have clearly seen not to bother with this! Yesterday, July 11 2017, I booked a 3 day 2 night tour from LA to San Francisco, Santa Barbara and Yosemite. I called the number on my itinerary to ask so preliminary questions about pickup location, the length of travel daily and if there would be outlets on the bus to charge electronics (WHICH THERE ARE NONE). In addition, after booking, I found out about a $8 per person per day gratuity they would be charging at the time of the trip. Turns out that it IS NOT Take Tours, but another outsourced company called US West Coast Tours. Not only could I not understand the operator clearly so I had to keep asking her to repeat herself, but she seemed very annoyed that I had the audacity to call in the first place. She was very rude and when I asked what her name was, she straight hung up on me! I then called TakeTours and voiced my concerns about going on a trip with a company that was already quite rude and incompetent. There was no way that I was going to continue my reservation with a company that was already quite inept and lacking the fundamentals of customer service. They did not seem surprised. I am so annoyed that they continue to do business with a company that offers nothing by way of the basics of service at the least. TO ADD INSULT TO INJURY, TakeTours charged me a 6% cancellation fee for a trip that I booked only a day prior and decided to cancel only because they are doing shady business with outside companies (UNBEKNOWNST TO ME). I felt I owed nothing! But was willing to get out of it for the $18 bucks RATHER than follow through with sub par accommodations, customer service and as I read on here, just a horrible experience all around!!! BEWARE!!

Its been a week since I tried posted my review on their website and as guessed they haven’t posted it on their website. From this I assume that they are selective on the reviews that they post it on their website. I generally don’t take the trouble of writing reviews but with utmost despair I write this detailed input, especially to guide the future participants and what to expect from trip. The current reviews bemuse me and hope that we didn’t share the same tour guides and travel itineary. This has been eye opening experience, especially as it’s my first bus voyage in USA. I have been in USA for more than a decade and I choose this trip for mainly one reason – to have a better understanding on the history with the help of tour guide. However this trip ended up as a nightmare with an accumulation of unhygienic bus, altercations, and arguments. At the end it left us with bad taste and a sense of betrayal that we literally waited for it to end. From my discussion with the guide, I understood that taketours are mere booking agents and the bus, guide are from a third party, which I vaguely remember to be ezworld or something (other reviewers might help me with this). Guide: Our tour guide, Alfred (American name) is informative and accommodative. However that quickly overturned within a day into the tour. He was able to provide the historical significance of the places on day one and as the tour advances everything changed, he left us with only the tour details. For Ex: he charged us with a lump sum of 25$/individual for an in-depth Niagara tour. On the day of the tour, he took us to an “Old fort” and unlike other tour guides; he left us inside the castle without providing any details. When questioned, he was quick to jump that he is busy looking after other aspects. Driver: To start with he is a rudest person that I have ever encountered in US. He literally bellowed a couple of times at the passengers when they were late. When questioned on his manners, he threatened of not taking them into the bus. The whole altercation happened when the schedule was changed due to bus breakdown for three hours on Day 2. Because of this, the schedule of visiting the illumination @ Niagara was moved to next day which ironically happened to be Canada day, July 1st. Inspite of many passengers request to watch the fireworks, the bus driver was adamant to start at 9:30 PM against 10:15 PM (10 PM is the scheduled fireworks). They never took into consideration that passengers waited for three hours patiently when they had a bus breakdown but couldn’t afford to stay for another 30 minutes. Infact, the pick up time was delayed by an hour and no passenger have ever complained on it. Restaurants: Unmistakably, the only place the bus makes a stop for lunch or dinners would be a Chinese buffet (bcoz of prearrangement between the travels and restaurant). If you are vegetarian or can’t take Chinese food then you are in big trouble. The guide gives you an hour to complete your lunch or dinner and it’s up to you to look for places around and get back on time. They won’t yield to requests of dropping at a different place which accommodates different cuisines and picking you up on their way. Admission fee: This is a big rip off. The guide literally forced the passengers to buy most of the tickets (supposedly optional) listing that they are part of other participating places and cannot be avoided. A couple of passengers were reimbursed on the i-max movie tickets as they came to know that not all passengers bought them and it’s not mandatory as proclaimed by the guide. Don’t succumb to the pressure of buying all the tickets. Ex: Ticket fee for Hershey’s factory ride is 15$ which includes a trump ride (supposedly free) and a gift bag (recyclable bag, a keychain, a chocolate inside it, catalogue of the year events) Bed bugs: We encountered and dealt with bed bugs throughout the trip. Some of the passengers had a horrendous 1st night stay when they had bed bug bites all over the body. In addition, the bed bugs were prevalent in the bus and a passenger developed bites when they travelled in the bus in the night travel. When complained, the guide wasn’t helpful and had no first aid kit to deal with the situation. Conclusion (my perspective): This package with the same travelling company would be a sheer selfie tour. You might be able to cover many places but you will just rush all the time. Don’t expect much with food and hotel. Only one night we stayed in decent hotel that was good and the rest were well below average.

If there was a zero, I would definitely put that. It is our first day and There is no help at all. All guides barely speak English. Nothing is clear and no one answers your questions, email or phone calls. The New York hotels are in New Jersey and no one tells you anything about it. They give you a guide number and no one even answers it. We have no clue what the program will be for the next day or which hotels we will be staying in. Complete disappointment.

rude tour guide who tried to con us into giving up more money. apparently "optional" activities are mandatory and if you don't want to do them you have to pay a $40 service fee, plus it was mandatory to tip our rude tour guide $10 per day. poor time management, hotels were in the outskirts of the cities....... Waste

Take tours Tour code 072-2356 Tried posting this review on Take tour website and as expected they did not publish it. Complete rip off. Never again. Totally disappointed with our tour. Many charges in the itinerary were not clear and completely misleading. Our tour guide Mr Jerry Zhang was extremely non co-operative. He didn't guide us correctly and was very rude when asked questions. Also he took the tips for him and driver right at the beginning of the tour which is not right.He failed to communicate and give proper instructions as to what to see at every destination. Most of the times we were left on our own to figure out what to do. There was complete lack of time management at most of the locations. 1. At Niagara Falls, he tried to sell maid of the mist and movie as a combo and not individually. Many of us wanted to take just the maid of mist ride and not the movie, which he said it cannot be done as it was part of the combo. However in the itinerary they are clearly mentioned as individual optional items. When we questioned him about this ,he told us that he doesn't know what we were told about the itinerary and his company works differently from the online booking company. He also told us to buy maid of the mist tickets on our own if we don't want combo which we refused to do. Finally he pocketed $2 per ticket from all of us just to get us tickets for the Maid of the mist. This is completely unethical and unprofessional attitude. 2. Our visit to Hersheys chocolate factory was disappointing too. For the factory ride, he charged us $15 per person and before the ride we were given some kind of gift hamper. The factory ride is free in reality. When we asked Jerry why did he charge us for the ride which is free, he said it was for the gift hamper , which was completely useless and nobody had asked for. When we demanded for refund, he refused it completely and told us to visit their local office to claim the same.Very few of us were able to visit the office to take the money back. Most of us are unable to do that since we reside at far off places.If company can take online payment from us, then why cant company refund us the same way? 3. Watkins Glen Park was free but company charged us $10 per person as parking charges. 4. Even though breakfast was included at some hotels we stayed in, we were not informed. 5. We were given just one and half hour at Corning glass museum to see the museum and for lunch which was not sufficient at all. As a result of this, we couldn't see the museum completely and could see just the show. 6. At the liberty bell, he didn't inform us as to where the bell was located, because of which majority of the group didn't get the chance to see the bell. Company should stop ripping off innocent tourists who are left at the mercy of tour guide. My advice - Don't go with this company and if you don't have any other choice, be prepared to spend more than what you did at the time of booking, also pack lots of food for breakfasts and dinner coz they take you to such hotels which are inaccessible to food places.

My family (tourists) were supposed to be joining the1 day Amazing New York City tour today, the order number is MT09-486-1047, they were picked up from flushing in front of sherato. They were taken to this "pier" that doesn't look like a regular pier like south street seaport , (there were no people but them.)to catch the ferry to take them close to Liberty. There was another man with the guide and were asking my family to pay $95 each for the cruise alone. And when they refused to pay, because it was too much,they were told to " get out " very rudely and disrespectfully, They were denied of the whole tour, the only place they went to was the Wall street, that's it. An investigation must be conducted by the company regarding this. I must be refunded of my payment. This experiece wad really unacceptable especially the attitude and obnoxious conduct of the guide. ...... flora