BEWARE! Overbooked, overpriced, and rude customer service.
We had elderly people in our group, so figuring it might not be best to drive ourselves up Going to the Sun Road, we booked the tour with the Red Bus. Everything went through online, we paid, and had a confirmation and time. Got an email that said to come early at the designated pick up location- and being excited as the tour was to be the main focus of our vacation, we got there an hour early.
After pick up time arrived, four different red buses from the company came to pick up people. None of them had our names on the list. We watched as people left one after the other. After an HOUR PAST the pick up time, we asked one of the drivers just arriving why no one is picking us up. He said he was on a different tour with the same company, and that he saw our name on one of the vehicles that hasn't arrived yet. When we asked him what's causing the delay, he rudely blamed that customers always come late and make the bus delayed. Without any apologies, he left.
Dude, we'd been standing there all morning and everyone we've seen had been there early. Most of their buses arrived late. And you know what, even if someone had arrived late, there should be a limit on how much time you're willing to wait- the tour we booked runs for 6 hours. Any hour late means we loose an hour.
We decided to give them the benefit of the doubt and waited another hour. By hour two, everyone else had gone, and our bus is nowhere in sight. We called their main number, ended up being transferred 4 times with everyone blaming everyone else, until the final lady answered with: I don't know where the bus is. By this time it's nearing three hours past pick up time. She kept blaming other customers and that the bus had to pick up people from different locations- so you mean to tell me that you sent an email for us to come early, but basically everyone from different points in the park had the EXACT SAME PICKUP TIME? meaning that whoever gets picked up last need to wait the entire day for the bus to finally reach them? Wow, this company's planning is certainly impressive.
She denies it, tells us to wait more.
We ask her if there's a problem then just refund us the money, we'd be understanding if it was some sort of car trouble. She denies any car trouble, REFUSES to pay us back the tickets even though THEY NEVER BOTHERED TO PICK US UP, and tells us to continue waiting without a proper explanation. After three hours past, she continued saying she has no idea where her bus is, hung up on us, never bothered with any apologies, and continued to ask us to wait. Mind you, by that time even if the bus had arrived, we would have lost half of the time we were supposed to be enjoying the what should have been 6 hr tour.
Eventually realizing they probably overbooked us and basically took the money with probably no room on a bus to pick us up, we just left and got on one of free park shuttles. And you know what? That driver was extremely nice. Gave us a lot of info on the park and the shuttle stops. On our way back, even though one of the free shuttles were full- they immediately radioed in another one to pick us up. For free! With another extremely nice driver! Meanwhile the bus that charged us $300 had "no idea where their buses are", kept us waiting indefinitely, and not once did anyone give a proper explanation or apologize.
Anyone thinking of booking with them- please reconsider. You'd be better off with the free option. read more