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Bad Customer Service Is Their Mantra
By -

I recently needed to book a flight to Washington, DC from Buffalo, NY. Considering there are a plethora of options of where to go online to book flights, I weighed my options and took a chance with cheaptickets.com. I booked my flight and was content with the simple and easy process for picking flights and booking via credit card.

In checking through my records, I realized that I failed to receive a confirmation email with my account and flight information on it. Given that Cheaptickets.com had put a $2 hold on my credit card for the flight, I had assumed as anyone would in my position that everything was a-OK and that I had nothing to worry about. After all, cheaptickets prides itself on being the cheap, easy way to book a flight. I called customer service on 9.04 to verify my flight, thinking that my confirmation must have been sent to my spam folder in my gmail account.

My cheap and easy ticket buying experience was quickly compounded into one of the most unprofessional and horrible experiences I have ever had from this point forward. Upon calling customer service, the customer service representative who was merely doing her job in assisting me went on to tell me that not only did I not have a ticket booked, but I must have done something wrong to cause the error. Now, being an Internet savvy person as you have to be in this day and age I need you to realize the level of frustration on my behalf as a customer.

I followed all prompts on your website, entered all appropriate information, and was led to believe I had purchased the ticket that I needed. Further emphasizing this point, a hold was put on my credit card for $2 from CheapTickets.Com for the purchase. At no time did I receive an error or an email from customer service on your behalf saying something was wrong. Instead, a week goes by with me believing that I have a ticket booked for my trip, and I come to realize that I do not have one and am told by your customer service agent that I did something wrong to cause this.

Follow this path of "logic" and you will see that indeed, I did nothing wrong but there must have been a glitch in your web interface causing the issue, considering one would never be so bold as to accuse their customer of not being intelligent enough to hit a submit button. This being insinuated from your company is utterly ludicrous, unprofessional, and downright inappropriate.

Furthermore, I am told by your well trained customer service agent that "she is sorry that I feel the way that I do" about the service I received, but there was nothing she could do to help me, besides book another ticket for the same trip that was $70 more expensive. Not only was this not an appropriate response in the way of customer service, but training your customer service agents to be condescending in any way to a customer is not only unacceptable but it is going to cost your company in the long run. I ended the call frustrated and belittled.

Your training program at cheaptickets.com must be a short one, after all your customer service department does not actually provide any customer service.. rather they blame the customer for any mistakes and then take advantage of them by charging even more for the ticket they are trying to book. That is a very dishonest and counter intuitive approach to customer service.

Today competition is everything in the marketplace. The one thing that makes a business stand out from another is the level of customer service one receives from that company. Great customer service makes customers happy, makes them repeat customers, and makes them recommend that business to others. Word of mouth makes companies in times of a rough economy.

In the reverse, poor customer service is a detriment to a company. A company who puts customer service as second seat to everything else is a company that receives poor reviews of their services all over the internet, like the ones I read about your company (just do a search for cheaptickets.com reviews and read about all of your unsatisfied customers give their two cents).

A company who belittles and makes their customers uncomfortable will lose existing customers and future customers based on word of mouth. Customer service is everything, and customer service is something that your company is lacking as a whole. I'm sure that my definitions of customer service aren't a surprise to your company, being a corporate entity. My question remains, however why is it that you do exactly opposite of what will build a customer base by treating your customers in such a manner?

I come from a family who works in the service industry, and I understand what it means to build a clientele and how you need to give to customer wants and needs at times, as well as how much the old saying "the customer is always right" really builds a reputation with a company. In general I am appalled that in the way that I was treated by your company and how little was done to rectify my situation.

I had the opportunity to be a great and loyal customer to your company, one who travels often, with many acquaintances who do the same. Now I stand as a customer who was ill treated and unsatisfied. I was unable to re-book my ticket to DC throughout this whole process, and now I have a business trip that is ruined and no one to blame for it but your awful customer service standards and poor web interface. What is one to do in this case?

I can go about my business and let it lie that I had a bad experience with your company and leave it at that. I could also go forth and warn those who I know against using your company's services based on the experience that I have had. I can also put my two cents in to all of those searching the internet for a place to book their next vacation through. Regardless of what I do, my situation was not made right.

I stand unsatisfied, and your company is to blame. The weight of that, times a thousand bad experiences is enough to sink a ship, in this case the ship being your business. I would appreciate a formal apology for the way this situation was handled, and some insight on how it could be rectified on Cheaptickets.com's behalf. After all, the customer is always right, and I was severely wronged.

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Thank You For Destroying The Bachelorette Party!
By -

SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA -- I bought a package from the Bay Area (San Francisco area) to Las Vegas for my wife's best friend's bachelorette party (including roundtrip airfare and hotel for my wife and her friend during the Memorial Day Weekend). The departure flight involved Aloha Airlines and the return was with United. When Aloha Airlines went bankrupt, we instantly contacted Cheapticket to ask if it would affect the vacation, if we needed replacement flight etc. The staff at Cheapticket could not answer and recommended us to do nothing. Approximately 1-2 weeks before departure Cheaptickets contacted us to inform us that the Aloha ticket was canceled.

I called Cheapticket and asked for options, hoping that the bachelorette party would still be able to proceed as planned. The sales person suggested I got a single ticket from the Bay Area to Las Vegas to replace the canceled flight. I asked him 3-4 times during the conversation whether he could ensure that the return flight with United would still work out. I said that my wife would be very upset if they got stranded in Las Vegas. He ensured me the trip would now work out as planned.

At the last night in Las Vegas, my wife and her friend tried to print out their boarding passes for United but found out that their tickets for their flight at 6 am were canceled. Panic ensued and they called Cheapticket around midnight to inform them about their predicament. The staff just confirmed that the return flight was canceled without providing any further assistance. After a lot of hurdles, it was possible to find an alternative ticket for them home (without assistance from Cheapticket).

I contacted Cheaptickets and demanded an explanation and spoke to **, a supervisor. He claimed they had a recorded phone conversation with my wife's friend, where they informed her ahead of time that the trip was canceled. He offered me a $100 voucher as compensation because they HAD noticed us ahead of time that the return flight was canceled. I accepted the offer, thinking that my wife's friend had missed to inform me about this phone conversation. However, when I spoke to her, and we looked at the date for the phone call, it turned out that ** referred to the "panic call" at midnight, 6 hours before the canceled flight should had departed.

I contacted Cheapticket again, spoke to supervisor **, arguing that "the 6 hours notice" (done during a phone call initiated by us) hardly can be seen as a timely "warning." He promised to look into the matter. When three weeks had passed I called Cheapticket again (today 07/08/08). I spoke to supervisor **. He again referred to that "they had warned us that the return flight was canceled" (the panic phone call at midnight) and that because I accepted the $100 voucher (sent to me by e-mail and never used) the issue was settled.

He was even rude enough to say "Well, you did use the hotel room, didn't you?". Through my bank I have disputed the dollar amount of the trip related to the Aloha Airline ticket. The case is still pending. ** tried to make it sound like THEY had refunded my money related to Aloha, while it was ME who took action.

I ended up spending an extra $800 on flight tickets because Cheapticket NEVER warned us that the return flight was canceled with enough notice for us to act properly. Their substandard customer service has created unduly hardship on a very special event (a bachelorette party) that only happens once and cannot be redone. As a customer, I did all in my might to make sure the trip would work out as planned - still Cheapticket did not fulfill their part of the contract.

I found it shameful that ** tried to "trick" us by claiming that the "panic call" was a timely notice of the canceled flight (he had access to the dates and I had no calendar in front of me during the call) and that ** was trying to take credit for the pending refund of the canceled Aloha flight. In addition, as a customer, I should be able to expect that Cheaptickets is actually trying to help me. Not trick me (as ** tried to do), not ignore my issue (as ** did), and not behave rude or trying to take credit for pending settlements that was initiated by me (as ** did).

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Reservation hold on bank account
By -

CALIFORNIA -- My husband and I had to fly to Chicago, from California for a funeral. Since it was short notice, I went through cheaptickets.com to get a lower priced ticket. I got us both tickets and noticed that same day they "reserved" the money in my checking's account. The day we had to fly I didn't check my bank account. We had to be at the airport early. We got to our destination, with no problems. Until I tried to get the rental car, my card was declined.

Since this was a unexpected trip, money was a little tight, but I got the rental car through cheaptickets.com and the hotel was very inexpensive, so it was do able, we were only staying 3 days. My husband had to put the car on his card and we knew that was it. He was taking care of all the bills at home (either of us have a credit card, we only use our ATM/debit cards). So we get to the hotel, I tried to put the room on my card (its was cheaper than the rental car) but again my card declined. The lady behind the desk was so nice to allow me to use their computer so I could check my checking account.

I noticed that a new charge of $320, then another for $320 was made to my account that day, along with two separate over draft fees of $24 (since I didn't have the money in my account). I also noticed cheaptickets was still holding the $640 reservation fee for the flights, even though I was charged that day. (Each ticket cost $320 each). I didn't know what to do. All I needed was $210 for the rental car and hotel room, but I didn't have it, they were holding onto it. I called back home, to my in-laws house and asked them to get us cheaptickets.com customer service number. In the meanwhile, my mother in law called the hotel and put the room on her card. She didn't want me, who is pregnant sleeping in a car for two nights.

I called the number and after being put on hold forever. I finally got through to some guys, who barely spoke English. I explained to him the situation and he said there is nothing they could do about it. He said they never "hold" money, even though the amount help was the exact amount the plane tickets cost and it was the exact day I initially "bought" the tickets. He said he was looking in my account and only charged me once, which wasn't true, they actually charged me twice, each ticket separately. He said I need to call the bank because they are holding the money.

I told him my bank was closed, its a Credit Union and they are only open Mon - Fri and I was calling Sat night.. banks aren't open at night either. My bank doesn't have an 800 number, where people work late. But in the past my bank has never done this, weekday or weekend. I had this happen to me once before by a different company and when I called it was a simple minute and the money was released and I told them that and he said he wouldn't do anything. The guy kept putting me on hold and each time he came back on line, he was very mad and "bothered" by me.

I told him I was done speaking to him and asked for a manager and he said the company doesn't let people like me talk to managers. He continued to put me down and be mad at me and told me the money problem was my problem and if it doesn't get better by Mon call him back and he will see what he can do. I told him if he could fix it Mon then he needs to fix it NOW, that we are on the phone. He said No; it's not his problem. He put me on hold, this time it was close to an hour. I waited, I needed my money. Finally he asked me for my phone number so I gave it to him and he said the manager would call me back.

I was upset, crying and gave up. I didn't know what else to do, but at least my mother in law got us the room and we had gift cards for different restaurants. Right after the funeral I get a phone call from a manager, I told him what happen with the money being held and about the conversation I had with his employee and he asked me to hold on and when he came back he said the money should be there and asked if there was anything else I needed.

I told him about the 2 over draft fees and he said he couldn't help that. I was still upset about the guy I spoke to the night before but he never apologized or anything for his employee's behavior. We hung up, I went to an ATM and the money was released, this was on a Sun (when my bank was definitely closed). I used cheaptickets so help us out, but in the end, they caused more heartache, as if we weren't suffering enough. I will NEVER use them again.

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Lodging reservations
StarEmpty StarEmpty StarEmpty StarEmpty StarBy -
Rating: 1/51

On May 30, I made a prepaid motel reservation with Cheaptickets. I received an email from Cheaptickets confirming the reservation (itinerary #726966316).

When I arrived at the motel, there was no reservation; they'd heard nothing from Cheaptickets.

This was, at least, the third time Cheaptickets had pulled this trick on me over several months.

Needless to say, I've never used these fraudulent clowns again.

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Terrible company
StarEmpty StarEmpty StarEmpty StarEmpty StarBy -
Rating: 1/51

Purchased advanced tickets to a play. Paid $202.00 per ticket, plus $42.42 ticket fee per ticket. I was sent $75.00 tickets. They will not refund any or all money paid. And even hung up on me 2 times when I called. I was not abusive or rude in any way, but the support people sure were!

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They Bullied Me
StarEmpty StarEmpty StarEmpty StarEmpty StarBy -
Rating: 1/51

FORT WORTH, TEXAS -- I am not one to complain, and this is my 1st time ever to write a review on a company but this must be said. I WILL NEVER USE CHEAPTICKETS EVER AGAIN! I went to cheaptickets.com and tried to get a plane ticket from Pittsburgh to Houston Texas, Feb 28 to March 4.

A few days later I realized that the confirmation email they sent me had the wrong dates. I believe this may have happened when I filled out the billing information and left something out; when I pushed "send" or "next" it went back to that same page and said I left something out that needed to be filled in, I guess what I did not realize is that CheapTickets also cleared the dates when it reloaded back to that page.

I called them to explain what happened, but the customer service representative got very defensive and would not work with me at all. He wanted me to pay them for the plane ticket, a cancellation fee of $250.00, and then buy a whole new ticket with the right date on top of that! I offered to pay the difference between the cost of the ticket I bought and the ticket I was trying to buy. And I actually would considered paying a cancellation fee that was not so ridiculously way too expensive! It was more than my ticket was!

All other companies have like a $50 cancellation fee if any at all! I used this company quite a lot this year because I travel for work and this is how they treated me? I felt bullied so I disputed the charges. Now they sent me an email threatening that they were going to go to a Collection Agency. They are just a bunch of bullies who do not care about the customers at all. I would suggest for you to never use them! I would use Expedia or ANY OTHER company instead who are known for having good customer service. Thanks for listening.

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Do Not Use Cheaptickets.com
StarEmpty StarEmpty StarEmpty StarEmpty StarBy -
Rating: 1/51

MILWAUKEE, WISCONSIN -- DO NOT USE CHEAPTICKETS.COM. By far THE worst customer service I've ever had. I had purchased two tickets to the Pink Concert in Oregon January 9th. We get to the concert to find out that the tickets they sold me were FRAUDULENT. I then had to buy two crappy tickets in order to go to the concert.

The next morning I call Cheapticket's "Customer Service" and some guy answers the phone. I tell him the problem and his response was "ah OK well we are upgrading our systems so call back in a few hours".. EXCUSE ME!?!?! So then I email the company to let them know the situation and I get an email saying I will be contact within 5 business days.

Now, I don't know about you, but I have just been screwed out of over 200 dollars and I'm not happy. 5 business days is a crazy amount of time to expect someone to wait (plus still never got that call). So naturally, I dispute the charge on my credit card. This finally got cheap ticket's attention because they notified me that I could only receive the 150% refund they promise on their site if I can't the dispute. Well gee, maybe if your customer service didn't suck, I could've talk to someone there and felt more comfortable not disputing it in the first place.

After emailing back and forth with a girl, I finally cancel the dispute last week. I again emailed them today to ask for an update on my refund. They have done nothing because they have not received notification that the dispute was canceled. BS. I don't believe that for a second. A customer tells you that you are selling bad tickets and you don't even look into it?

Meantime, they tell me it takes up to 30 days to get the refund, so I'm sure they expect me to pay the interest charge on the 200 plus dollars sitting on my credit card waiting for the refund? Why doesn't the company do as they promise??? It is not hard to contact the venue and talk to the VERY NICE people there who helped me out to see if my tickets were in fact fraud. But nope, they are dragging their feet in hopes that I give up so that they don't have to pay me the 150%. HORRIBLE CUSTOMER SERVICE!!!

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Beware of Cheaptickets.com!
StarEmpty StarEmpty StarEmpty StarEmpty StarBy -
Rating: 1/51

HAVERFORD -- I booked 4 people on a flight from Munich to Detroit in April. In July I start getting emails for 1 of the persons saying that they have changed his flight time. The airline and flight number stayed the same, but the departure time went from 12:20 to 1pm. No big deal. I talked to 2 others and they got the same email. The last person in the group never got an email confirmation of the time change so I just let it go. Big mistake.

Yesterday (21 Aug 2013), I get an email saying that she was on a 10am flight arriving in Detroit 4 hours prior to the rest of the party. I don't understand! Why was she moved to an entirely different flight and time. I got the email around 6pm and called by 1pm the next day to try to get her back on the 1pm flight. The flight including her husband who has the same last name (which is not that common!). I was told that because Lufthansa already issued the tickets (how? they are e-tickets!) that I would have to pay a change fee to get the person on the same flight as her husband. Why do I have to pay $450 to fix cheapticket.com's mistake?

I asked to speak to a supervisor and was told that she could pay for half (mind you this was after about 1 hour on hold and then me telling the supervisor to call me when she had answers as I was at work) but I would still need to pay $150. I was happy that half of $450 was $150 but soon found out that reason was that the supervisor had inverted the return date from 01 Oct to 10 Oct!

After another 15 minutes on hold she could not yet confirm that it would be $450 and I told her to call me back again when she had it. I finally paid $225 to change a ticket so that the person could be on the flight that I originally booked her on. Why am I responsible when cheaptickets.com screwed up? I will make sure to avoid this site in the future!

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On-Line Seat Selection Is A Waste
By -

LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA -- NEVER USE CheapTickets' ON-LINE SEAT SELECTION! I'VE been a customer of CheapTickets (CT) for years. May continue, but will never use their on-line seat assignment feature. Here's why: Based on experiences on 11/4 when I ordered Christmas trip tickets, and today, when I tried to recover from the damage, here's how their on-line service actually works.

CT reads the current data from whichever airline for the flight in question, and populates CT's display. You pick the seats as displayed. CT STORES your request, and moves onto your next flight leg. After you have ALL your selections for ALL your flights, and finish, THEN CT sends your seat requests to the airline(s). If ANY of the seat requests are rejected by the airline(s), CT throws away ALL YOUR SEAT REQUESTS without telling you. You may even have a screen shot print-out with the seats you asked for. Too bad.

After purchasing tix and picking seats on 11/4, for flights on 12/19 and 12/24, I forgot to check the SECOND e-mail confirmation they sent that evening, since the first one had my flights, the airline's record locator number, my freq flier numbers, and the price. BUT it's the second e-mail, the one with the airline's actual ticket number, that said I still needed to select seats.

Today, two months later, the day before the flight, I went through EXACTLY the same process at CT, with GREATLY REDUCED selections (no kidding!) and found two legs out of four that still had a pair of seats side-by-side, for me and my wife. Went through the whole selection process, then went back to my CT itinerary, and it STILL said I needed to select tickets. So I went over to the airline's site, used the locator to find my flights, and one of the two pairs of seats had become a single seat. All the other seats I had asked for, on all other flights, were still there. So I did all my seat reservations through the airline's site, and I have those confirmed now.

Spoke with the folk (singular) at CheapTickets, after a 40-minute wait, and she confirmed that a) they bundle and send the requests to the airlines at the end of your transaction, that it's not really interactive, and b) CT does not guarantee their seat selection process. Well, I learned the hard way. Save yourself the trouble. Just pick your seats at the airline's website. Better yet, have Cheaptickets find the best seats for you, then order them on-line at the airline's web-site. Why give CT money when their service isn't reliable? Airlines themselves are bad enough.

Especially when this 'ordering airline tickets' example is the standard example problem used in all computer schools to demonstrate database data locking. When two reservation clerks are looking at the same seats on the same flight, who gets told their request was rejected? Apparently, NOT CheapTickets Customers!!!

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Cancellation of Membership
By -

TEXAS -- After I signed up for Cheap Trips, I received their "kit" (a few pieces of paper including the Welcome Letter, Airline Savings Certificate, Reward Miles, 4 Free Trips (HA!) and Member Benefits) and, due to the nearly false advertising (the 4 "free" trips had so many qualifications and you have to book them 60 days in advance, with choices that must have at least 30 days between each choice) I decided to cancel immediately.

I tore up the papers and called the company to cancel. They said that they needed their "kit" back (even though it would be useless for anyone, including myself to use ANYTHING they sent me, because you must use your Member Id Number) and that they must receive it within 30 days of initial sign up. When I asked why and said how do I know that they would even receive it, they said I could send it certified return receipt - in other words, I could send more money. I asked if I could just fax in my letter requesting cancellation. Sure, I could, and they would cancel me immediately - but I would not be refunded.

This company is despicable and I am so sorry that I even though to sign up with you. I consider your behavior to be criminal. CANCEL me IMMEDIATELY and REFUND my MONEY IMMEDIATELY - NOT in 30-60 days, but IMMEDIATELY. (The same way you took it!)

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1.2 out of 5, based on 19 ratings and
41 reviews & complaints.
Contact Information:
CheapTickets.com
1440 Kapiolani Boulevard, #800
Honolulu, HI 96814
808-945-7439 (ph)
www.cheaptickets.com
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