Wednesday, August 6  

Funtastic Holidays - Holiday Scams Or Not? You Decide

Want a funtastic holiday? Yep, funtastic! Not only fantastic but fun too!

Add them together and you get a funtastic holiday.

Funtastic Holidays - Don't Mess With My Mum!

This is a lesson me and my 4 brothers learnt many years ago. Don't mess with our mum. You'll end up with very sore back of the legs!

Sure, she might not still have that wooden spoon but she gets mighty grumpy when things go bad.

My mum told me the story of your dealings with her and my advice to you is run for your bedroom and hide under the bed! Don't come out until things cool down.

Anyway, here's the story.

My old mum Betty got a call from Funtastic Holidays up here in Queensland offering low, low prices on flights.

Just $99 for a flight to Queensland from Hobart and return. My old mum thought that sounded good so, after much stressing (she's a pensioner and can't afford to lose $99), bought tickets from Funtastic Holidays!

Excellent! Or so you'd think.

You see, later on it emerges that they contact my old mum to ask where she'd like to book the 7 nights accommodation.

"But I Don't Need To Book A Resort"

"Wait," says my old mum!

"I don't want to book anywhere. I'll be staying with my son - I don't need accommodation."

Mmmmmmm. "Well," say Funtastic Holidays, "Part of the deal for the cheap tickets is you have to book at one of our 'partner' resorts for 7 nights."

"You didn't tell me that," cries Betty and the fun begins!

A Miscommunication?

I thought maybe it was just a miscommunication between them and my mum. But I dug a little deeper and this is what I found:

Fair Trading Queensland has prosecuted them before:

"The company failed to properly explain the terms and conditions of the vouchers to consumers."

They got fined $10,000 for telling customers fibs about a couple of things.

Read the full Office of Fair Trading info here.

Just 9 months ago they featured in a special report by consumer champion Helen Wellings who started talking about Funtastic Holidays by saying:

"Another clever scam has conned customers looking for cheap airfares."

Graeme Samuels, Chairman of the ACCC is quoted in the report saying:

"We have received a number of complaints about this particular operation and they are now going to proceed to a process of investigation."

You can read the full report featuring the practices of Funtastic Holidays here.

Back To My Mum

My mum asked for a refund.

"Sure!" said Funtastic Holidays.

"Just put it writing to our management."

My mum thinks they must have some sort of process so that's what she does. She's trusting my old mum!

"The refund is coming. " But it never does.

• My mum rings and rings and rings. But the phone always seems to be engaged.
• Finally she gets through.
• The sympathetic ear on the other end explains that whoever was responsible for her refund was away.
• It will be processed. Nothing arrives.
• More calls.
• Lots of promises of a refund.
  
• Apparently now it's off to an insurance company

Not quite sure what it's got to do with an insurance company??

But then again, the letter to management, the calls, the fobbing off, etc might all be seen by some as a way to simply exhaust the complainer so they go away.

That wouldn't be their tactic would it?

Funtastic Calling Today

Anyway, Funtastic Holidays were, of course, definitely going to call today or have the refund money in the account today.

That call/money never came. Wow!

So thought I'd just write this blog post to say hi to my mum and mention a customer service story.

Gee, I wonder if this post about Funtastic Holidays will get ranked in Google and maybe even be read by people checking them out?

Cheers

Brendon

Labels: funtastic holidays