Perillo Tours - Bad Experience
 

Sicily - S. Italy - Rome/Sepotember, 2005

My dream trip was unsatisfactory due to uncomfortable hotel rooms (no hot water/no air-conditioning/flat,lumpy mattresses and pillows/noisy locations) and repetitive, mediocre meals --- all chosen by Perillo Tours. To that, add an overcrowded bus and no tour guides provided for us at some major Greek/Roman sites.

The hotel at Taormina (3 nights) had a train rumbling past every 25 minutes from approximately 6AM until after midnight --- just between the property and the sea. I had to change rooms 6 times and what added insult to injury was that I paid Perillo a single-supplement fee of over $600, in addition to the very high cost of the tour.

I wrote a letter to Steve Perillo expressing my legitimate complaints and received, in my opinion, a response from Customer Service that was dismissive and that offered no remedy for my inconvenience and disappointment.

If you wish to have details, please write and I will be happy to provide them to you.

Topping for lynnre. There is no need to post this more than once. It merely slipped onto the "nest page" of the Forum. If you look at the bottom of the left column where titles of threads are you'll see "next 50", and if you click on that, it will take you to the set of the next 50 posts. If you want to top one of your own posts, no law against it, just search by your own name on this forum, click on one of the posts that comes up, and then click on the post you wish to top so you can top it.

BC

That's too bad, I thoguht Perillo Tours were sort of on the upper end, but I don't really know for sure. Maybe they are more mid-level. I think there should always be tour guides for major sites, but if it's more a budget trip, hotel rooms are often not deluxe.

Your single supplement makes me wonder how long this trip was, though--looks like that might be right for about two weeks extra. That really is irrelevant to your complaints, though; if you are staying in a room by yourself, there will be extra costs over the price for one person sharing a double. That's just a fact and there's no getting around it.

Christina, on their website they advertise this tour as 12 nights, air from NY, Chicago and other cities included, starting from $3199 off-season. Not cheap!!

Looks like all breakfasts and dinners with wine included, nothing said about lunches.

I went with Perillo and had a different experience. But I also did my homework ahead of time. I was given a list of all the hotels and addresses, I looked them up online first so I knew what to expect. We never waited in line for anything, Rooms/hotels were great, We had breakfast, and dinner nightly. Soft drinks, water and wine were available everyday on the bus, We were responsible for lunches but that was no problem. we Always had tour guides for all major cities, Our buses were very nice, 2 seats per person (for at least 1/2 of the bus) -- I dont mean to be rude but if you had to change your room SIX times maybe it wasn't the rooms?

It sounds awful but maybe next time you'll be more inspired to travel by yourself or with a companion. I've personally never understood the appeal of a tour and am often irritated by giant group tours at major sights when i travel. take charge! you'll get way more out of it...but that's just MHO.

We were booked on a January tour of Italy with Perillo but the trip was cancelled due to low response. We have been rebooked on a March tour which disappoints us but we are still excited to go. Perillo has waived the extra cost of the trip and is also making some concessions on airfare changes. I have never travelled with them but they are trying to make things right. It worries me about all of the bad comments I have read here but then again there are lots of good stuff too. Is it that some people would b**** if you hung them with a new rope? Some people you can't please or are these real problems? I have a lot of money riding on this and I hope I am not disappointed.

GrannyPaige - I think it's reasonable to expect any hotel room to have hot water for showers and to be quiet enough to sleep.

lynnre - This is the second Perillo complaint I've seen about their Sicily tour recently. I think with tours, it depends on the time of year you travel (and luck) as to which hotels the company uses. Another person can take the exact same tour at a different time and have a good experience (different hotels and restaurants available). Sorry your trip didn't turn out well, but there is plenty of help on this board if you decided to plan your own trips in the future.

GrannyPaige-don't let bad experiences bother you. True, they do happen, we had a much less than satisfactory trip last year with a different company going to Greece/Turkey but you just chalk it up and get past it. Sometimes I think we bring on some of our own disappointments also, at least I did, maybe expecting too much. However, I do think unsatisfactory rooms are not acceptable.

I've just booked a "spur of the moment" trip leaving in 11 days for Christmas markets along the Danube which I will be doing solo as my husband is busy with work. I too had to pay a single supplement but that's to be expected as I did not want to use their room mate matching service and would prefer to be alone. I'm also using a company that has had some bad reviews on this board and some very good, positive reviews so...! Anyhow, I hope to have a wonderful time and can't wait.

Enjoy your trip and have a wonderful time. Try not to "think it to death".

My coworker and her family have used Perillo for Italy tours several times in the past 5 years, and have been very satisfied. If there are 'tier' options for the level of hotels used, that might be something to consider. Her hotels always seemed to be 4-5* properties.

Well, I think the key words of the OP is dream trip. If we expect too much or perfection from a tour we will most likely be disappointed. After all, you are not personally chosing the restaurants, hotels, tours, etc. but letting the company do it for you.

It is a shame but it should also be a learning experience.

Friends of mine have stayed down by the tracks in Taormina and raved about how wonderful it is, being so close to the sea, etc. They booked their own hotels and probably booked a seaview room and not one near the tracks.

Sorry the trip wasn't good, lynnre.

oh I also see now that this was a year ago!

Good catch SeaUrchin - I didn't even notice the date.

SusPaul - If it's Grand Circle, they've had good and bad reviews on this board. It got to the point that they had so many people filing complaints with BBB and not being addressed that they were de-listed from the BBB. They say they are trying to earn back their listing which should be a good sign for your trip.

>>>>>
an overcrowded bus
>>>>>

what does this mean? were people standing? or did the tour operator lead you to believe that the bus would have a lot of empty seats. or were the seats too small?

Lynn, PLEASE provide details. I, too, got screwed by PERILLO.

Joseph1950,

This is a 7 y/o thread. Let it go. Quit trying to stir the pot and get people on your side. It's pretty clear, having read your thread, that those that have taken their time to look at your blog (I not being one of them) believe your complaints to be rather prima donna-ish. Tell your story and move on, but stop trying to solicit others to jump on your bandwagon. If you can't find anything positive out of your trip, maybe you should just stay home next time.

This is a 7 year old thread.

I think there is a new poster who is on quite the campaign to "destroy" Perillo tours - at this point I think we should all just ignore this post and the others.

Most of us here are not tour takers anyways - pretty all this guy is getting is "we could have told you so"!

Isnt life short enough? Let it go, chalk it up to experience and start remembering the good times you had.

Clearly, these ARE the good times!

Act 2 of the opera Nitroglycerin and Fettucini Bolognese...

I think this posters counterpart is currently posting about his "bad trip" with the same company - in order to get people to go to his blog with the intent to sell his real estate. if i were perillo tours, i'd seriously take a lawsuit out against joseph for his shady shanagians. what a bunch of baloney these two posters are.

Looking back at trips I've taken, I can barely think of one that hasn't included a major mishap of some sort. In hindsight we laugh about them now, as they've added color to the spectrum of our travel memories. I've traveled with several tour operators, including Perillo, to many foreign countries, always with an open mind and realistic expectations. I still love to travel after all these years.

I will say this: I am SO glad Joseph1950 was never on my bus.I read as much of his blog as I could tolerate and really don't think he should be leaving home. Dude sounds like an unstable individual.

Perillo tour October, 2012
This was the worse trip that we ever took. The meals were terrible -the breakfast each morning in every hotel was not good. You only had a choice of (chicken,fish,calamari) every night for dinner in each City. There is a 10hr bus run that you are not told about & the next day there is a train ride that is over 6 hrs. The hotel in Sorrento was nice, but not clean. You are charged for optional tours that should be included in the price that you paid (which you paid a good amount to travel on this tour). The trip to Capri -they take you to a shopping area, then lunch for $100.00 pp. Everyone was disappointed. They have cut back in their transportation, meals and tours and it showed. Ask about all transportation in your tour (hrs, etc.) meals, accommodations, because everything was not listed and we found out the hard and expensive way. We went with another couple and thought this trip was going to be incredible. SO disappointed. We will never use Perillo again. Hire your own tour and see what you want and when. Go out to dinner of your choice. We couldn't wait to taste the food when we went and we have had better at home. I contacted them and their letter lacked concern for what we experienced and they basically told us that we should have used the open time when dinner was not included to try other restaurants. Well, we would have if we had time. There was no extra time to explore other restaurants. We basically ate at pizzerias after we had their meal, because we did not eat it. There were 41 people on this tour and they felt the same. I thought this trip to Italy would have been such a great time and we all found it to be be terrible. I sent a letter and received a response from customer service and asked that Steve Perillo respond. He responded basically with the same reply as Customer Service as was not going to remedy my concerns and/or request regarding the trip. I am so DISAPPOINTED WITH THIS TRIP.

We gathered that you were not satisfied with your trip.

I cannot understand why anyone takes tours - 50 years ago, yes, but not now with the enormous amount of travel information available. Decide where you want to go, buy a guidebook, ask questions here, it's not too difficult, in fact it's part of the enjoyment of travel.

First, Perillo is definitely a moderate tour. If you want better you need to go for Tauck or similar - and pay a lot more.

Second - buying a tour requires you to read and understand the itinerary and all the details. There should be no surprises. If there are either 1) you didn;t read thoroughly enough or 2) they are pulling bait and switch. If the former, no one an help you - if the latter - suggest you take them to small claims court.

Hated our Perillo tour!!!!!! Still too upset to talk about it yet.

sherri - if you are going to resurrect this thread you probably should give some information rather than just a uninformative blast of negativity.

Perillo is definitely not upscale - middle of the road. But in high season - when all tour groups are competing for resources - people often find themselves in less desirable places than they would in shoulder seasons.

BUT - the key is knowing how to read the brochure to see what you are really getting - and checking the hotels in advance.

If i felt the tour was not

I suppose my comment is just hearsay and doesn't count, but fwiw my neighbors have done two Perillo tours and loved them. My neighbors are "tour" people. (She doesn't believe in computers and he doesn't want to bother with research.)