Thanks for the contact hetismij2. I too understood that they were required to make it clear when a number is a premium number for which they are charging you. Because we are not from the UK and are not in England we didn’t recognise it as such. Will follow up as you suggest.

Christina, I have just revisited the site’s homepage and it has a UK number clearly in the ‘masthead’ and no mention of Greece at all that I can see. In my experience that would clearly be seen as an attempt to misrepresent the company as being English. Burying information on an ‘about the company’ page is hardly being upfront given that most people go straight into the search for tickets which is right upfront on the homepage. Never having dealt with a company as poor as this one we didn’t think to go looking to see if they were reliable. If I had I would have found the numerous complaints on their own facebook page.

I’m not sure what you don’t understand about a flight from Malaga to Madrid to Lisbon – this is a standard route if you search it on Iberia Airlines. The first leg is an internal flight with Nostrum and the second an international with Iberia.

Not familiar with Elliott.org but will follow that possibility – thanks for the suggestions. We’re from Australia but living in Spain now.

Thanks to newtome and clausar for all the contact details. We are meant to be leaving this Sunday 29/5. Now that it is Monday we are on the case again.

Sue – the alleged link to change your flight on their website just goes to a message saying you have to email them. We have done that repeatedly but they don’t respond.

By the way – I’m definitely not meaning to say that all online booking agents are bad. Never had any problems before with Expedia or Webjet nor with accommodation sites like Booking.com. I guess that’s why we got lulled into a false sense of security and failed to do due diligence on this one! Such a shame that the bad eggs tarnish the perception of the good companies.

Sorry – had so many responses my apologies if I failed to respond or thank someone. Really appreciate all your help.

By the way if anyone wants to see just how bad this company is go to their facebook page. They don't seem to allow people to post so customers are using comments on the page's own posts to try to get in contact and resolve their problems. I wish I'd thought to visit this FB page before booking. Will be doing so in future, and checking to find out where any company is based before dealing with them.

<i>I’m not sure what you don’t understand about a flight from Malaga to Madrid to Lisbon – this is a standard route if you search it on Iberia Airlines. The first leg is an internal flight with Nostrum and the second an international with Iberia.</i>

That is not how you explained your itinerary in your OP.
<i><b>We booked flights with them on 9 February 2016 on Iberia Airlines (Madrid to Lisbon) and their subsidiary Air Nostrum (from Malaga to Madrid)</I></b>
All you needed to say was your flights was from Malaga to Lisbon with a connection in Madrid. Have you not noticed that flight bookings are in date/time and geographical order? When you start referring to flights in an out of sync manner, it can be confusing.

bvlenci, I've used Expedia a lot, too, without major issue. I really hate the way some posters throw "Expedia" around in the context of discussions of really shady companies like MyTrip--which Expedia does not at all resemble. Middle men are not by definition fraudulent. (But one should research the middle man one is using.)

Yes the premium numbers are a pain and are being legislated against however there is a website

http://www.saynoto0870.com/ which tells you what is the number behind the number (and so no charges). But on this occasion does not offer solution.

Still anyone in the UK who would trust a Greek travel agent.....

NewbE,
I've had serious problems with Expedia being unresponsive in terms of a flight cancellation. It cost me about $600.
So now I don't use them.

jubilada, fair enough, I;d do the same in your shoes. Perhaps I'm cynical, but I think a bad experience can be had with any company, even a reputable one. However, there's a difference between bad service and an outright scam.

Jubilada, was it a flexible flight that allowed cancellation? Very few flights allow it. I myself usually buy cheaper non-flexible tickets, which allow no cancellations, but usually allow date changes, with a hefty fee. I figure that what I save in air fares allows me to swallow the cost of any cancellations or changes. I had to cancel a whole trip a few years ago due to an illness in the family. I knew from the beginning that I wouldn't get any of the air fare back. I did get most of the hotel costs back, because I had mostly chosen the more expensive "pay later" option on booking.com , another third-party service that I really like.

bilboburgler - had we realised they were a Greek company we certainly wouldn't have used them. That is probably my main concern, that despite as someone pointed out, the fact that the Greek ownership is available if you go searching , it is definitely not 'up front' on the home page. The prominent display of a British area code phone number in the masthead and on all their communication, coupled with no reference to Greece or being Greek anywhere on the home page, lulled us into a false sense of security.

And before people all go screaming about the integrity of many Greek companies this is not a character judgement but more an observation of the inherent difficulties that can arise from cultural and language misunderstandings and the differences between consumer laws in countries like UK/Australia and others with which we are less familiar.

The fact that they haven't even bothered to have a native English speaker translate their website would have acted as a proxy indicator warning me of their marketing service standards had I read it. Live and Learn.

I just hope this thread contributes to the plethora of complaints about them on the web and helps save someone else from them.

Erika, you have my sympathy and yes I too might have fallen for it. Your experience has been a real wake up call to me.

BTW mine was a character judgement, I've worked with Greek companies. I don't believe the institutions destroyed under the colonels have become strong enough. That is not to say that individual Greeks are not honest, upright etc, but party-loyalty/interests and hence the family are still too powerful.

Erika-it is very common to have English language websites with UK phone numbers (or other European phone numbers) with whatever company is running that website being based in another country. Maybe you are not used to the global way of working, but in my experience this is exactly how it is.

But why you & bilboburgler would be put off by a Greek travel agent is beyond my comprehension. But again, like this whole saga, I put that down to lack of experience & knowledge. Where in the world do you think Expedia and Booking.com are based? Do you really think that on the UK sites of these websites that there are people sitting in the UK all because they display a UK telephone number? I don't see you complaining that Expedia and Booking.com have not decided to put their address on the top of the home page. Most companies put their addresses etc on a link called CONTACT or they put it at the bottom of the home page.

Take Autoeurope, they provide an 0800 tel no for those booking on the autoeurope.co.uk website. I book through an online agent called gotogate.co.uk sometimes. They provide a UK telephone number but they are based in Sweden. How are these companies different to Mytrip.com and why would their physical location be a problem?

As for providing a native UK English speaker to translate webpages, you really think companies who create and run websites employ a Brit to sit and translate page by page? What cultural differences are there on a website? Have you found any mistakes in any of the English?

<<really shady companies like MyTrip>> We don't know that they are really shady, they might be guilty of incompetence or not helping out in this situation (we only have erika's version of events, who only registerd to complain) but they are unlikely to be shady IMO.

By the way, I dialled the UK 0844 number and the hold time was 1 minute. Do let us know how you got on with changing your flights.

"But why you & bilboburgler would be put off by a Greek travel agent is beyond my comprehension"

But unfortunatly not beyond my experience.

Have a great day

Erika,
I called Pame Diakopes and talked to someone who was extremely helpful.
They receive all emails of mytrip and their other companies and he said that it must have been lack of communication.

He could had helped me directly if i had your booking number, which i didn't.... but he suggested you send an email to [email protected] . He also said that if i gave him the booking number and your telephone number, he would call you back even in Australia.

The number that i called is : +30 213 0184000 their working hours are Mon-Fri 08:00 - 18:00 Greek Time.

I was also told that in case of flights cancellations, they are being contacted by the air company, and they contact their clients immediately. ( having worked in tourism for many years, i know that this is true)

You may want to call them directly, and have them call you back.

Best of luck
clausar