Bait and Switch: Overseas Adventure Travel
 

BUYER BEWARE!

We have traveled as a family (parents, 13 and 14 yo) with many other private and group tours with no complaints. These trips ranged from $8k to $18k, without airfare. These companies were able to find air fare to our request. The entire process was hassle/glitch free and the tours were well organized.

Our experience with Overseas Adventure Travel (Grand Circle Travel) was the exact opposite. Firstly, they require minors to have an email address to e-sign OAT’s terms and conditions. Our minor children do not have emails so those had to be sent by USPS. Why would any company expect 13 and 14 year old kids to accept terms and conditions? Strange indeed!

For airfare we requested two 1st class and two economy seats. The agent said that the first 6 hour flight had no 1st or business class seats. We were skeptical but expected professional experience was being considered. We found later that the agent was wrong. We should have backed out then but wanted to give OAT a chance.

So after we paid our down payment to lock in our quoted price (trip + airfare) the agent called the next week and said that we owe more money because our airfare went up. We voiced our concern about the competence of their agents and convoluted registration process and asked for a $1000 credit for such a confusing process and for all the time we waited on the phone for answers to questions we’ve never had to ask from any other tour company.

OAT agreed to credit us $1000 and we intended to pay the balance of the trip once the credit posted. The credit never appeared and were told to call back next week. This happened for 3 weeks in a row before they said we were not going to receive the credit they agreed to.

The most heinous and criminal part of OAT is their travel insurance through Trip Mate. We paid over $7,000 for useless travel insurance because were told by OAT agents that we could cancel for ANY reason. Today we received notice that our claim for reimbursement was DENIED!

OAT maybe running a “bait and switch” operation. We were lured in by a small “discount”, ran through a convoluted registration process, increased our airfare price after we paid a deposit, then denied us a refund that is guaranteed by their affiliated insurance.

OAT and its sister company (Grand Circle Travel) must be investigated for running a bait and switch operation and taking advantage of others. Trust pilot (80% negative reviews) shows many other peoples’ stories that have been duped, in manners similar to ours, by these companies! OAT responses to the multitude of complaints are canned and nothing more than lip service vomit.

I'm confused..did you decide not to take the trip, and that's why you needed to use trip insurance?
Which OAT trip was this?

One takeaway here is not to use tour companies to book flights....but I wish you would offer more information..

yes. We cancelled because were fed up with the inaccuracies of the agents and calling them week after week when they had no intention of rectify their mess.

Thank you for the booking advise. We’ve booked many trips+airfair with Odyssey and Audley and were spoiled by them. Lesson learned is sticking with trusted companies and reading ALL reviews. OAT has 80% negative reviews on Trust Pilot, which I neglected to take into consideration.

You gave them $7000 for 'travel insurance'?!?!?

I wondered about that, Suze.

Audley is an entirely different provider....much more high end, I think.

But you just canceled the trip? did you go anywhere else, instead?