We were trying to book a trip to Italy. We left them a message since they were closed for a week…read more We never received a return call so I guess they had no interest in our business. We booked the trip with another travel agent.

First let me start by saying I cannot recommend Carol and her team at Farnesi Travel enough. We…read morewere originally planning to go to Italy last year but after postponing our wedding due to the pandemic and Italy shutting down, Carol and her team were so professional and helpful with rescheduling. Fast forward to planning our new honeymoon this spring and we decided on Tahiti with stays in Moorea and Bora Bora. Carol was able to keep our new trip within our original budget which was a huge plus. We opted to spend the little bit of extra money on trip insurance with everything going on and it paid off big time. When we arrived in Tahiti we ran into some issues with this wonderful pandemic going around. Thank god we had not only the trip insurance but Carol and her team as well. They stayed in constant contact with us despite us being 6 hours behind. She was able to transfer our reservation from our Bora Bora stay to extend our stay in Moorea due to some travel restrictions. She constantly reassured us everything was going to be fine through the most stressful week of our lives which was probably the best aspect of having her as our travel agent. Carol and her team at Farnesi Travel worked non stop and were in constant contact with us, the hotel, the airline and other contacts to make sure we had what we needed for not only our stay but to get home as well. We seriously cannot thank Carol enough. She was a god send. If you've ever thought about buying trip insurance I can tell you first hand it is worth every penny. We will be buying it for every future trip we plan. If you've ever thought about using a travel agency, Farnesi Travel is who you need to use hands down. They have made us customers for life.

A grateful shout-out to Cheryl at the emergency dispatch desk early Sunday morning…read morewho tracked down my daughter's left behind suitcase in the chaos of off-loading at JFK with fellow Peace Corps volunteers, and who arranged the safe return of the precious suitcase in time for their flight to Africa. Above and beyond the call of duty...thank you, thank you, thank you!!!

Soulless and cowardly would be the two words that come to mind first. Executives sitting on a…read moreperch not to be disturbed. A staff with horrible PR skills. How do you end a call with "try to have a better day" with someone who just lost a love one? A tour director that is taking the easy way out by calling a guest instead of the family directly to have a conversation. My mother booked a bus tour/Norwegian Cruise tour with a group of old friends that was supposed to leave in September. Sadly, my mother recently passed away, but during the fight of her life she "missed" the cancellation day for Starr tours. Under these extenuating circumstances you would think a company would put people over profits. Not Starr tours. They are doubling down. When I called to plead with them a woman named Sandy kept referring to their policy instead of having compassion. She kept passing the buck saying it's not in her "scope" to make those kinds of decisions. When I asked to speak to someone who can make those decisions she decided to shield her bosses and say they aren't available. All she could end the conversation with was "try to have a better day." It was a cold conversation. Try to have a better day? I don't know how these people sleep at night. I hope their money keeps them warm at night. BTW Norwegian has a 30 day cancellation policy, so they have a chance to get money back out of this, but they clearly aren't working hard enough. I decided to take a trip to their company building to plead with them further. Sandy answered the door and reluctantly let me in after realizing who I was. I gave a copy of the death certificate and once again pleaded my case. I was given the same lip service, but that the person who could help me further wouldn't be in for the rest of the week. I patiently waited for a phone call from a Chris and still haven't received a call. If it's the same person this Chris called my mothers friend on the trip instead of me to let her know she would have to pay extra (over $1,300) for single occupancy on the trip OR we would have to find someone to buy my mothers trip (around $1,800). NO phone call to me as of yet. Also how do you do this to a grieving friend? They were friends for almost 60 years! How can these people be so cowardly? Where is the compassion? In the last few weeks I have had to deal with the unexpected loss of my mother and all of the funeral plans. Spending countless hours of time making the calls to various places to make them aware of her death and this company has the guts to do this. In the bio of the company the owner Sandy sounded so relatable. Her and her husband Pete had to fight, scratch and claw to keep their livelihood and company that her father built from the ground up alive during the pandemic. My mother fought so hard to save her life. I'm so sorry she couldn't call your company on time because she was too busy trying to live. In business you can't always point to policy. Beyond policy, how can you treat people like this and think it's ok? I hope the owner reads and fixes this because the staff is only making a terrible tragedy even worse! Don't force a grieving family to have to peddle my mothers trip. Do the RIGHT thing. Truly heartless and painful experience!

This place was absolutely no help at all. I'm not sure where all these five star reviews are coming…read morefrom. They wouldnt discuss their available tours over the phone and asked that my MIL show up in person instead. I called asking if there were pamphlets available to get and review, to decide which tour would be best. The lady said yes. I arrived, very well aware that the lady helping me was not the same person on the phone. I asked about pamphlet, she said they dont have such a thing. I would have to tell her where Im interested in going in order for her to print something out for me. Unfortunately, she wasnt able to print ANY of their tours because there's just too many. She continued to be very pushy in asking where we wanted to go. I don't know, why else do you think Im here!!! How does one expect someone to answer if you can't provide me what you can offer in the possible states you may be going to? She kept repeating Boston, which leads me to think thats the most popular place to go. One would not need to go to a tour company, if they know where to go and what to do. Obviously, Im coming to you, and asking what your company can provide me. Another thing that was irritating. Im speaking to the lady in english. This older man starts chiming in, in mandarin. Why? One, why are you talking to me and two, why are you talking to me in another language? Very unprofessional.

My mother and I are so happy that we went through Discover Travel to book our tickets to Taiwan…read more Aileen is a wealth of information about the best flights, connections, seats, baggage and change fees, visas, COVID restrictions, and shuttles. She saved us so much time, and was so responsive when we emailed our questions from Taiwan. She is so professional and efficient! Thank you for your service!

My husband and I went to Punta Cana, our trip was arranged by Kelly Pinto at Berwick Travel, first…read moretime I use this travel agency and I have to say Kelly is the best, she is very attentive, answered all my questions by phone and email. From day one until I came back from Punta Cana she took care of us, nowadays you don't find that kind of customer service..... We definetly will contact Kelly at Berwick for our next trips arrangements.... Kelly, keep up the good work!!!

We just got home from the Viking Romantic Danube cruise. It was wonderful. Our travel agent,…read moreChelsea Lebeda, was so helpful in making all of our arrangements. We really appreciated her help in being prepared as to what would be expected of us while passing through Heathrow airport in London. We also really appreciate all her assistance in picking our excursions. Thanks Chelsea for all your assistance. It truly was the trip of a lifetime.

I'm usually the one that plans our family vacations. This one was special because it was to be a…read morebirthday present to me. I didn't want the hassle of researching and looking and watching tons of videos. I had seen this company's tiktok and sent it to my husband. I said ask for their help. They did an amazing job. After contacting them they sent him a form with a few questions. Location, budget, days, preferred airport and what he was looking for in a vacation. Maribeth quickly Came up with an itinerary. He asked them to switch the order of the island. We wanted Anguilla first and then St. Martin. He had them move around the itinerary a bit. Changing the amount of dates, with St Barts, without, more days here and there. Everytime she promptly responded with the changes and the price. Once finalized she sent the form for payment. He forgot and they tried again a few days later. We got email reminder of forms we needed. A detailed itinerary with confirmation numbers. Contact info and emergency contact info for the company. Now the trip was above superb. They set up our ferry transfers with a private company. This was the best decision. Our flight was delayed by a lot and the service they picked for us waited for us and quickly got us on our way to Anguilla. Our experience at Zemi Beach house was perfect. The distance to the best beach was short. We ate at the other bigger resorts and felt although bigger the distance to the actual beach was too far. In St. Martin we stayed on the French side and it was the best choice for us as well. Now our hotel was also a few steps from the beach and a short drive to a calmer beach. We already said that we will contact them again for our next tropical vacation.

Leading up to our travel to the Dominican Republic and Live Aqua the communication was good with…read moreconfirmations of itineraries and booking confirmations for special things that were supposed to occur for my wife's birthday with the travel agency - The Tropical Travelers. Upon arrival at the airport the private driver that was booked for us was hard to locate, but once located went smoothly. The company itself was not great as the driver on both our route to the resort and back drove very fast and our safety did not seem a priority. Upon check-in at the hotel after almost 48 hours of being awake from traveling we were met by the concierge and told they would check us in, great! Until we were offered a free couples massage after asking for our photo ID and credit card type and not being fully aware we agreed. This was a mistake. We just wanted to get to our room and settle into the hotel, but instead were swindled into a breakfast the next morning to meet the concierge again and be handed off to a timeshare presentation that took over 2-3 hours of our time. They were not super pushy, but did keep trying to offer more incentives and have the next supervisor come over with more deals when we just wanted to enjoy our vacation we paid for. Live Aqua itself is small and quiet but almost every room smells amazing. We had the Fuego ocean front which was nice, but the pool area is not private at all and almost a safety concern if you forget to lock your patio door as you can just hop over to the next room. The beach area is small and not private so locals came right up to us multiple times offering goods and services. We said no thank you and most kept their distance after that. There are not many pools on property and no hot tubs at all. The concierge did ask if we had feedback on the resort the next morning and we stated it would be nice if they had a door for the toilet area and he said yes multiple people have given that feedback and they were looking into it. Only to find out after visiting a couple's room we met that there were some of the same rooms with doors for the toilet area. How did the concierge not know this? We felt once again like we were not given the truth. According to our travel agent the hotel was made aware that it was my wife's birthday, except upon arrival they seemed surprised by this and only had some very small balloons in the room upon arrival and a small cake when I had asked for more to be done. Every time we met with some new staff member it seemed like no one communicated between the travel agent, concierge, butler, and supervisors as each person had to ask why are you here? What are you celebrating? On another occasion we had asked our butler if they could change out the bottles/type of alcohol in the room in our mini bar. We were not looking for top shelf, just a different kind and were told he could not do that. Then after speaking with another couple with the same butler they were able to accommodate their request. Once again we were not treated the same as others. We were supposed to have a Bali bed reserved for one day on the beach and a hydrotherapy session at the spa another day. Upon checking into the hotel these items were not mentioned at all and only after we did more research realized these items were already included in our room package, which our travel agent apparently did not know, although books this resort frequently? The Bali bed had no reservation sign or anyone even checking to make sure we weren't just using it un-reserved and there was supposed to be a bottle of wine and there was not. We had to even setup our own towels for shade and setup the tables as it was just all stacked up. Not a huge deal, just was hoping for something more romantic. Upon emailing these issues to the travel agent, she said she was speaking to the hotel to ensure our next few days went better, even stating she escalated it to management. There was the same small cake one other day (unsure who put it there or why) and only upon asking our butler to have some better decorations in the room was there something done by him that should have been done in the first place. We had high hopes for the food with our past experiences in the Caribbean, but found the food very bland. The options were ok, but lacking in flavor and some restaurants did not have many options. We did enjoy the Asian hibachi. The positives were time together away from the hustle and bustle of life, but we would not recommend using this travel agency again nor staying at Live Aqua. The travel agent did reply two times while we were still on property, but did not check back in to make sure our experience was improving and still has yet to follow up post trip to see how it went.

I travel fairly extensively for both work and personal reasons, I only used this travel agent to…read morebenefit my cousin regarding her destination wedding. I have never had such an unprofessional and poorly managed travel experience. What compelled me to post was the agent's crude and incompetent managing of the arrangements and lack of customer service in communication with me. Despite her voicemail stating she returns calls in 24hrs, I had to call her repeatedly to book. I compared my story with several in the group of 50 that traveled and they reported the same experience. When I arrived at my destination, the transfer company didn't have my reservation and what's more, when they called the hotel, they reported to me I didn't have a room. I called the agent, Tina Fleck, and while it was 2/12/15, her voicemail announced her schedule for 2/4/15. My suspicions were confirmed, she would not be of help to me. It took me two hours in a foreign country to correct the mistakes when I began to receive angry texts by Tina. I've attached the photos of her texts which included her telling me what arrived in my travel pouch instead of her hearing from me what I actually received. She informed me that she was an 'amazing agent and mother'....which still confuses me as to why we were discussing her personal life, certainly not a topic I introduced to the conversation. And her referencing....'maybe next time, you'll...' I'm sorry I thought I was the customer? For her to tell me I was incorrect about what I received in the mail and inform me in several ways, the mistakes I made, I found to be very unprofessional. In fact, I requested her supervisor's information on three ignored occasions before she finally said she would 'be happy to fill him in.' To date, I haven't heard from the supervisor, perhaps he approves of this style of communication? There was definitely no after-travel satisfaction survey. I asked several persons in our travel party regarding their experience and heard 'I don't like her.' As well as descriptive words such as 'flake, flighty, not all there' from multiple guests, as well as the party organizers. A bridesmaid told an extensive story about Tina'a inabilities to manage the billing process and how, despite multiple clear emails, Tina had to ask the bride to clarify travel arrangements for this one particular guest. Run! Don't use this agency, especially Tina Fleck! I gave it one star only because you aren't able to post without any stars, but clearly it doesn't deserve any!

Another awesome Ultra Tech Destination Wedding. I am a wedding photographer and do a fair amount of…read moredestination weddings. Ultra Tech is my number one Destination Wedding Travel Agent. Their knowledge, preparation and professionalism is unmatched in the industry. Every trip is just flawless. Thanks again!

We have used Gate1 based on a recommendation from a friend who is a well-seasoned traveler with a…read moredozen trips. Our friend did not disappoint! We have taken 3 trips to Europe so far with Gate1 and every trip was fantastic. Everything associated with the trip was a complete joy from the booking to the trip itself. We will always use Gate1 to book all future trips. The tour guides were absolutely wonderful and accommodating even when one of our friends became sick. They arranged for a doctor and was well-cared for. I can't say enough nice things about Gate1.

Gate 1 kicked three people off the 9 day classic Iceland bus tour, after 3 days, for showing signs…read moreof Covid. We were at the eastern-most point in Iceland, farthest we were getting from Reykjavik. We were told we could not return to the bus tour and were responsible for getting ourselves back to Reykjavik. Since there is no train, bus, Uber or rental car service where we were, we were pretty upset. Our tour guide thankfully arranged a taxi to drive all the way from Reykjavik to pick us up and return to the city, a 4 hour drive at a cost to us of $362 US. Back at the city, we needed to purchase 2 additional nights at a hotel, costing another $920 US. We missed 3 full days of touring, the other hotel rooms(already paid for), and the meals that were included. We were treated in a very ignorant manner, with absolutely no consideration of the consequences this decision had for us. Thankfully, our Covid resolved after 2 days of rest. The majority of people on the bus were coughing and I understand 2 more people were asked to leave. The rest on the bus were stifling their coughs, not wanting to get kicked off. How does Gate 1 justify taking all our money for the trip while we were left to spend more ? Why were we not compensated, at least in part, for our loss? I entered into a contract with Gate1 assuming they have a responsibility toward us as their customers. Sadly, they failed.

I can't believe this company doesn't have a hundred reviews... Banchi Outdoor Adventures is a great…read morecompany! I stumbled upon them about 15 years ago when I saw a flyer at Ski Barn in Lawrenceville. I've been on roughly 10 of their trips to upstate NY, Maine, Vermont, and New Hampshire. Half of which were weekend charter bus trips and the other half being trips that I drove myself. They even have ski trips to Canada and various places on the west coast. And if that's no enough, they offer white water rafting trips, camping trips, and zip-lining to areas along the Hudson and Lehigh rivers. Weekend charter bus trips include round trip on a charter bus with a restroom, a two day lift ticket, and lodging. Trips usually start towards the end of December and run until the end of March. The buses have 3 pickup/ drop off locations in Jersey and x amount in PA. I believe the lowest priced trip starts at $250 and the price goes up depending on the mountain, how many people you room with, and what resort you stay at. The bus ride is not bad at all. They usually make 1 or 2 stops at rest areas and best of all, everyone on the bus is usually pretty cool. So the ride up there is a great way to make new friends. The crowd is usually in their 20's and 30's, with an occasional small group of people a little bit older. As for the mountains, Banchi only goes to the biggest and best mountains. Lodging is average to great, depending on how much money you wanna spend. And as far as I know, all of the rooms have a kitchen of some sort. The 5 day trips are pretty much the same, minus the charter bus. As for you'll have to organize transportation yourself. The majority of the resorts have awesome nightlife and if it's not directly on the mountain, it's usually just a few minutes drive downtown. Another cool thing is Banchi also has college week trips. Those particular trips tend to have a little bit younger of a crowd and sometimes, they have special events during that time as well. But no matter what Banchi trip you go on, the prices are great and you're sure to have a an awesome and very memorable time.

Bachi Outdoor Adventures is awesome! They buy trips for wholesale and sell it much cheaper than the…read moreoriginal retailers. I went rafting with whitewater challengers through Banchi last minute ...at $53 per person. I was able to personally speak with one of the reps who booked the trip for me while on a boat! Thanks man! We had so much fun! TIP: If you're unable to contact their office message their Facebook page!