After seeing all the bogus reviews on…
After seeing all the bogus reviews on this page, I decided to offer a honest review of the entire tour from my experience couple years back. And I got to say, baiting people with fabricated reviews is not cool. Compass Holidays is a subsidiary of Tianbao Travel; their products are practically the same. What I realized when I was at the office was that the same package in English is far more expensive than in Chinese. Even for trips such as cruise whereas guides are not included, the price gap is still HUGE. Go check it out yourself. Ultimately, people wants to know if this tour is genuine. The answer is NO! And I’ll break down the scheme.
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It’s really just a click bait. You see a super value tour and would definitely check it out. But in reality, most of these prices are not offered and availability are fake. My cousin made a call 15mins in after the sales started, and the sale price was sold out!? And I realized we’ve been tricked to make this call. We did get a call back telling us this sale price is available at a different date and then we took it. Other tourist told us that they were also rescheduled to be on that day. So I guess to prevent themselves from breaking the law, they do have a small number of tour for the sale price. If you are to book your days off ahead of time then you are screwed! They don’t reschedule until a few months before departure.
Administration
They are a mess in this area. And if the availability on their website is half true, then they are serving thousands of guest with only 3 staff!? No wonder calls can never get through. And to make the matter worst, they flat out admitted that they are not TICO licensed staff. In other words, their administrative staff is not even qualified for their job.
Refunds
Payment is easy, but getting money back is hell. After being overcharged by mistake, which I think occurs frequently, they asked to use the overpayment for excursions. Upon refusal they would try again, very consistent people. Finally, they agreed to make a refund. Just when I thought it was resolved, the refund didn’t make it back for months. Then again the offer for excursion is brought up. I surrendered.
Insurance
Traveling with Compass Holidays you MUST have travel insurance. The insurance provided by the agency is one of the most expensive insurance I’ve ever seen. I highly recommend calling your credit card company or bank to get a travel insurance quote. Not only are they cheap, but sometimes travel insurance are already included for free.
Flight
This is the biggest joke ever. Flight information wasn’t delivered until a couple weeks before departure. Apparently, it is the travelers duty to reserve their own seats. After a long struggle with the wrong reservation number, we got the right number and got to the reservation page. And its fully booked. So the reservation was opened for months… As a result, my partner and I ended up in different section. The flight was delayed and we arrived late around midnight. Barely anyone is at the airport, so same goes for our tour guide. We attempted to get assistance but no one speaks English. Fortunately, someone from the same tour can speak Chinese. Tour bus is gone; hotel doesn’t recognize our names so we won’t be getting a shuttle bus. The next best option are the airport benches. In the morning, someone contacted the guide and we were rescued!
Gratuities
Demanding for the reason for the mix up, the guide gave us insights to their job and got 100% empathy from me. The so called mandatory tip collected doesn’t go to the tour guide, the agency pocket the money. As for the guide, they have to bid to get a group to guide. Their only source of income is commission from retailers. When I asked the office staff about this, they said the tip is for administration staff. Really…!?
Tour
Have you ever been to a sales pitch where they promise you a prize after you go into a room where they sell you stuff for hours? This is it, just in a foreign country. How bad could it be!? The tour is 15 hours a day, and if you don’t participate there is a penalty (forgot the amount). There was this teapot factory that we visit, and it was a REAL visit. We were there for 4hours. For every single day, most of the time was be spent either on the bus or in sales pitch. Places like the Great Wall, we spent a little over an hour stop. All these amazing sites can easily burn a day or two to explore, but instead, we are confined to these shopping locations. To make matter worst, the prices of these products are 10 times more expensive then the retailers. Aren’t they factories!? Obviously, tourist gets the special treatment. And if you bought something big and expect it to be mailed home, then good luck with that. The excursion is the only good thing about the tour. These excursions are the real deal with no additional selling. We just go enjoy the ride or show and then head back.
Dinner
Bring lots of granola bars because you need enough for 8 nights. Dinner is not included in the tour not because it cost them more, but there are no time with all the sales pitch. You get back by 9 and you would be starving. Then you’ll realize the hotel restaurant is about to close. Going to restaurant outside, you would not be able to order because there are no English menu nor English speaking staff. People legit speaks no English. You’ll end up going back to your room eating granola bars or you can do room service. I can’t believe no one rant about this on the forum.
Conclusion
You really do get a lot of awesome views from the bus. The entire trip is about going to these locations and taking snap shots. Do you really get to explore or know these places!? Not really. At the least you can tell your friends you’ve been there. For people who signed up, remember to take all excursions to make it worthwhile; refrain from buying too much overprice stuff and just pay the poor tour guide a tip. As for people who are still considering, I would advise you to explore other options. Even though there might be a slight difference in price, but it would be legit.
6. maj 2019
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