Words cannot begin to describe the level of anger and disappointment I experienced in my business dealing with Lanier Houseboats. The owner, Terry Johnson, is the most unprofessional, rude person whom I have ever had the extreme displeasure of working with. Let me begin at the beginning. I booked the beautiful Fantasy boat through Lanier Houseboats with the owner, Terry Johnson. When we first came to tour the boat, Terry was polite and professional. My company intended to have a large, private party for 150 guests. Terry assured us that this would be no problem at all and we proceeded to put down a deposit of 1/2 of the rental fee AND sign a contract. Fast forward to the week proceeding the event, I attempted to reach Terry several times to check on the status of our event and some improvements that he promised were to take place. At this time, he told us that the stove and oven in the kitchen were broken, but that he was having them fixed "as we speak". This never happened. The day before the event, I called Terry in order to re-confirm our meeting place/time. Our event was scheduled from 7:00 pm to 12:00 midnight. Terry PROMISED the boat would be at the marina promptly at 5:30 in order to give our staff ample time to set up and prepare for our guests. When we arrived at the marina at 5:30, not only was Terry NOT there, but he refused to answer his cell phone! By 6:00, I was in full panic mode as my guests were starting to arrive. By 6:30, I was seething when he finally answered his phone to tell me that he would be there in "15-20" minutes. HE DID NOT ARRIVE UNTIL 7:15! It took my staff 45 minutes to load and prepare and my guests were not able to board until 8:00, more than an hour and a half after they were supposed to! This created a HUGE problem and inconvenience for my guests and caused significant damage to my company's reputation! To make matters worse, Terry was unapologetic and made absolutely NO ATTEMPT to right his wrongs. We fully expected a discounted rate on the remainder of the balance due. Terry informed us that this was not going to happen and threatened to "call the whole thing off" unless we paid him in full right then and there! He was not open to negotiating, and refused to let my guests (who at that time had been waiting in the hot sun for almost two hours) board the boat until we were "settled". I had no choice but to pay him in full and allow my guests to board. At that time, unbeknownst to me, Terry disappeared. As I was welcoming my guests onto the boat, Terry left and another man I had never met began driving the boat. I was HORRIFIED, but I had to hold it together in front of my guests! Just when you think things could not get any worse, they did! The air conditioning on the boat was not working and we suffered constant power outages all night. It was only after my business partner demanded answers from this mystery captain that we were told the true reason for the power issues. Apparently, Terry was greedy and booked two cruises in the same day (which was why he was so late getting to the dock for our event). Because of this, the boat didn't have proper time to "recharge" and refuel before my event began. In the end, my guests were forced to suffer and my company did as well. The irreparable damage caused by Terry's negligence is something that we will have to strive to make amends for to each and every one of our guests. PLEASE, DO NOT GIVE THIS CON ARTIST YOUR MONEY! Terry Johnson of Lanier Houseboats is unethical, unprofessional, immoral, and downright RUDE! read more

This boat called Fantasy was a total nightmare! The absolute WORST costumer service I have ever experienced.... run run run from this boat and it's rude crew. The deckhand screamed in my face and the captain was a total dick. He never even said congrats or hello as we boarded the boat. The boat was late but when it came time to leave the captain and deckhand were yelling get off to all the guest as the strike of 10. The boat was not clean! I used to work in the service industry and I always tip! However in this case I could not even bring myself to tip one dollar. They SUCK save your money and go elsewhere. read more

RUN, RUN, RUN. Lanier Houseboats (aka S. Johnson's Boathouse) doesn't even deserve one star. Terry Johnson and the people that work with him to schedule the dates, and accept payments are frauds. Terry is very polite when he is trying to get you to put down money for the boat rental. He'll ensure you that the carpets will be cleaned and the bathroom will be back functional. Once that's done, you'd be lucky if you can even get him on the phone again. He has other people try to handle his problems. I was supposed to use his houseboat for a party that was originally going to take place on July 20, 2013. It was sunny all day, but rain was in the forecast. I asked Terry if he could keep me posted about the weater at the lake. Around 3pm the party was still ago. He mentioned it rained on the party before us, but it was clear. Around 5pm, Terry called back to say that the weather was taking a turn and we should reschedule. Fine, I can't blame him for the weather. But because of the short notice, I took a loss on the catering. In August, I inquired about a refund because our entire summer was very rainy. Of course, my inquiries went unanswered. At this time, the boat was already paid in full, so there was really nothing I could do but reschedule. It was too late to go to the credit card companies. We rescheduled for September 28, since that was date that also worked for the band. On the evening of September 26, I sent an email to Terry's niece (who is the one I had been dealing with the most since the rain out) to confirm the time that the band and the DJ would be able to load their equipment. On September 27, I get a response back saying the boat is inoperable. Inoperable?? And you just found this out? And if you did, you weren't going to call or email me to let me know? Had I not contacted them, me and my guests would have shown up and been very disappointed. I asked if he could guarantee that the boat would be fixed before the party--he couldn't guarantee. He said he had to call engineers out to fix that problem. So, I had to send out a message that I knew was not going to sit well with my guests. Unfortunately, I'm being blamed, and not Terry. I tried to find a replacement venue (which we found through a non-profit so it was very cheap) because we had once again paid for food and couldn't let it go to waste, however, they were not too happy with that plan. Even though I explained that Terry had only offered another reschedule date. But by this time, I was VERY disappointed in Terry, his customer service (or lack thereof) and his unwillingness to refund our money since this was not a fault of ours. It is way too late in the year to be out at the lake on a open boat. I later found out that a friend of mine attended a party on 9/7 (again the boat rented through Terry) and when her and her guests arrived, the boat was not operable and they had to be put on a smaller boat and she had to come out of pocket to discount their tickets. This leads me to believe that the boat was just not inoperable on 9/27, but it had been out of commission for some time. Terry rents his boat out every year to Budweiser and to fraternities on an annual basis. With all of the money he makes, his boat should be checked regularly for maintenance issues. Even when I explained to Terry's niece (since Terry doesn't answer) that people were demanding refunds and that they were very upset, he has been very unapolegetic. Because they dealt with me and not him, he doesn't care what happens because his reputation is not being ruined. Please believe that I will be pursuing action against Terry if i'm unsuccessful through the credit card companies. These people deserve their money back, and so do I. I will inform everyone that rents from him--including Budweiser (which he advertises on his website), Lake Lanier, and the fraternities I know of that deal with him and make sure they know that he is a con-artist and should not be allowed to do business on the lake. Budweiser should not affeliate their name with Terry Johson's houseboat. Hopefully, the money that Terry makes off of these parties that he has year-round are also reported and his business is a legit one. He was recently fined for letting people sell alcohol on the boat by the authorities. So their excuse to me is that he's had to pay a lot of his money out of his pocket for the fine and for the repairs. This has absolutely nothing to do with me. I don't take kindly to being taken advantage of. He has not attempted to right his wrongs, so I have no choice but to follow through until this is resolved (pending as we speak).... read more

Lanier Houseboats - This is the owner, Terry - Boat Charters Near Me - Buford, Georgia

To work with Terry Johnson will guarantee frustration and loss of money. I regrettable used his boat to host an event on his boat. First warning I should have paid attention to was he did not have any kind of contact. So we created a basic contract, which was pointless because he did not honor it, and in the contract we were supposed to get two boats for two Saturdays. He calls us the week of and tells us he double booked and we would only get one boat, but still had to pay the same price. When we expressed our dissatisfaction he told us he will just give our money back. At that point we already had over 90 people booked for our event. We could not find any other boats available so we were stuck with trying to host our event on one boat. Of course we had many complaints from our customers. We were not able to fix the situation no matter how hard we tried. On top of only having one boat the boat was disgustingly dirty with fruit flies flying around. He told us it was normal for boats to have BUGS. It was so many things so I will just list them: Lights up top did not work. Had trouble getting the stove to work after him trying to figure out why there was no power. One of the engines stop working while out in the water. Nothing was cleaned before we arrived. Fridge had rotten substance inside. Some of the plugs did not work. Terry sat around and made comments to customers that he could not understand why someone would pay for our event. I am getting angry recalling the whole horrible experience. Just know if you deal with this man you will suffer. I wished I would have read the review on him before dealing with him because I would not have had to go through what I went through. Please let this be a warning to stay away from dealing with Lanier Houseboats. read more