Venture AshoreReviews of ventureashore.com

Generally I only write reviews on things I want to recommend. But occasionally, very rarely, I feel people need to be warned. This is what happened with Venture Ashore. We had always been very pleased with them, but that was when things were going well. The first time things went wrong it was like having a parachute full of holes. The tour guide had failed to turn up at the place we were told to meet. We phoned the emergency number (at some expense) and were told they would sort it. After 20 minutes, and fearing our few hours in Tangier would be spent in the cruise terminal, we made other arrangements (less good and more expensive). We tried to claim a refund (over £100) but they just blocked and prevaricated, and after all this time we have given up hope of an honourable outcome. Although we were in the right place and the tour guide wasn’t, Venture Ashore claimed we had canceled the trip and were not entitled to a refund. Despite our previous good experiences we will not use Venture Ashore again until they have returned our money, which was forfeit through no fault of ours.

Superb service from start to finish... the ease of use of the website.. the accuracy of the excursion descriptions.. the on-shore presence.. the friendly & knowledgeable guides.. the quality of transfers.. the communication.. absolutely highly recommend these guys. We booked a cable car ride along with the Toboggan run at Funchal, Madeira as part of our P&O Cruise. Venture Ashore liaise with all cruise operators to ensure a seamless experience. Fantastic all round.

This company takes no responsibility for its actions. My planned trip to Bangkok was ruined by this companies negligence. Although they sent me confirmation the trip was booked, they failed to pass this onto the local rep. We were abandoned, more than 2 miles from Bangkok. Venture Ashores emergency telephone number went unanswered, so more than just disappointment and frustration. They have not provided an adequate response, they state they have compensated me by not charging for the service they failed to deliver. This is not a reliable company with poor customer service.

We booked trips in Vietnam and Thailand, 7 in total.We were in small groups, sometimes just the 2 of us! The guides and drivers in all cases were local and keen to show us around and share information.The transport was either an air conditioned mini bus or car, clean and comfortable, water often provided. The only negative is meeting instructions not always clear. Advice, do take some currency as there are local markets and small restaurants that don't take card

Booked a tour in Napier NZ as a shore excursion from a cruise. We had to cancel going on the cruise due to my father’s ill health. I emailed Venture Ashore in Napier on 8th at 11.23pm Sydney time to cancel for 15th - 7 days out which happened to be their cancellation time. Was told they wouldn’t refund me as I needed to cancel 7 days before tour date based on “Napier” time. Napier is 2 hours ahead of Sydney so it would have been 1.23am on 9th for them when I emailed to advise of our cancellation so I was 1hour 23 mins too late to get a refund. Pointed out our unfortunate circumstance as to reason of cancelling but they still wouldn’t refund me. Geez, I’m still appalled and shaking my head still thinking about this. No act of goodwill from them at all. 1 hour 23 mins too late!! Seriously?? Cold email replies back from them. They didn’t care at all. We’ll be going on another cruise when the time is right but will NOT be booking any tours with this mean company.

Booked two tours with them, tour for Mumbai was great, albeit shorter than we'd paid for. Booked an 8 hour tour but the guide told us it was actually 5 hours which would have been cheaper had we booked that, the tour was informative and interesting though. Next tour was SriLanka, the ship was late getting in so we missed it, there was no internet or phone service and when there was we had an email to say the time had been changed to 10am, the next day, got the email at 5pm though. Emailed a couple of times but when they did eventually respond they did not want to give a refund or voucher. We cruise often but not sure I'd ever use them again due to the awful customer service, I can see why others have made the same complaints in their reviews.

Booked four personal tours when we were in Vietnam, Hanoi, the first three were pretty much hassle free, though describing the guides a "speaking English" for two of them was stretching it a bit! It all went pear shaped on the final trip in Vietnam, supposed to meet up at 08:30, waited till 09:00, unable to make any contact due to no phone signal, and they aren't on whats App ffs!!!!!!! Went or a wander around for a few hours, headed back to the Cruise transfer boat and the guide was there at 11:00, saying he'd been there all morning!!!! Still waiting for not just a refund but any reply from this pathetic company.

Worst tour experience we could have possibly had! Would be a zero star if that were an option. I had bought my Mom a tour for Mother’s day to go and see Florence and Pisa. However, when we got off the ship and went to the meeting place, there was no one from this tour company to be found. We walked around to frantically try to find the bus or shuttle under Venture Ashore, but we had no luck at all. We phoned the company to try and figure out where to meet, but we got no answer. Our day was ruined. We have been trying to get our money back for the past SIX MONTHS, and the company keeps saying that they will call us back but they still haven’t. DO NOT BOOK WITH THIS COMPANY.