Bait and Switch / Misrepresentation of Tours vs. what is received / affiliate company is…read morenon-accountable
Fat Tire Tours DOES NOT OPERATE the DC bike tours. Their affiliate "Unlimited Biking" does and as a result, the Integrity, Professionalism, and Experience you are used to from a Fat Tire- run tour is absent from the unaccountable, dishonest, and unfriendly staff that Unlimited Biking provides.
After showing up to check in ahead of our 10:30 AM tour time today, we were told what we booked is not what we would be receiving. When asked if we could receive what was represented on the websites, we were told no. No refund was offered - a classic bait-and-switch.
On July 11, we booked the "Best of DC Electric Bike Tour" on the FatTireTours website for $79 each X 4. What was supposed to be a 3.5 hour tour, ended up being 2.5 hours. For this tour, the description says " Our electric bike tours operate in groups of a maximum of 8 people", however there were 14 people on our tour. The description indicates that we would be seeing the Library of Congress, Supreme Court, Union Station, The Jefferson Memorial, and the Tidal Basin. None of attractions were on our tour. The description also represents that we will be making a "Brief stop for lunch", however this did not happen either.
Most importantly, the representation of this particular tour was that it would be an "Electric Bike Tour". In fact, the description of the tour boasts " No other tour on our menu covers as many sites as this one!". But instead, we were on a regular tour, with regular bike riders. We were given Electric Bikes, but since all the other riders on the tour had regular bikes, we could not take advantage of the benefits of the electric bikes. We spent the majority of the time, coasting, or braking while we waited for children on the rest of the tour on their non-electric bikes to keep up the pace. The tour was slow and we saw less.
When I asked for the tour that we paid for, Emily M said "you are getting an "Electric Bike Tour....you are on a bike Tour and you have Electric Bikes", ignoring the fact that all other representations on both Fat Tire and Unlimited Biking websites clearly differentiate the Electric Bike Tours from all other tours. Subjectively adjusting the English language to defensively tell me, the customer, that I was incorrect, is a disgrace to customer service.
At the end of the tour, Emily said "I understand there was a miscommunication on the Fat Tire Website that hasn't been updated" and offered us TO PAY MORE to take the 6:30 PM tour for half-price. When I asked for a refund, she refused, saying that it's a third-party mistake. When I told her the description on the Unlimited Biking website says all the same things in the description of the Electric Bike Tour, she said "oh, we'll have to look into that" and ended the conversation.
For your reference, here are the representations of each tour made on your respective websites; neither of which is what we received today.
https://www.unlimitedbiking.com/tours/monumental-electric-bike-tour/
https://www.fattiretours.com/washington-dc/tours/best-of-dc-electric-bike-tour