Buyer beware be very aware! My wife and I booked a flight with Cheapdealsfare.com, to Fort Meyers Fla. in order to attend a funeral. The cost we paid for the tickets was $511.24 for the two of us. However, about 2 hours after booking our flight, we received a call from a Mr. Liam Wandson, an agent from cheapdeals. He informed us that due “to a computer glitz” cheapdeals was experiencing, the flight we booked was now overbooked.
As I mentioned we were going to Fort Meyers for a funeral that I was to conduct. Consequently, we had to get there and it already was the 11th hour! Mr. Wandson said he could arrange new flights, but the cost was now going to be $863 rather than the previously promised fare of $511 which is a $352 increase! Some might call this the classic “bait and switch maneuver.”
However, in exchange for allowing cheapdeals to rebook us on another flight Mr. Wandson promised the following:
• Our seats for our new flight reservation would be selected in advance by cheapdeals and we would also be able to check one bag free of charge.
• We were also told that within one month we would receive a $500 voucher for a future flight, as compensation for the immense inconvenience and additional cost for the tickets, that cheapdeals had caused.
Needless to say, none of these promises were kept. When we arrived at the airport, Spirit Airlines had no record of a flight reservation ever having been made in our names! Therefore, we obviously couldn’t get our boarding passes and of course this also meant that no prior seat selections had ever been made either.
If it weren’t for a very compassionate Spirit Airlines employee we would not have been able to get a flight out to Fort Meyers! Upon booking we had to pay $79 for our bag, which according to cheapdeals should have been free! And of course, our rebooked reservations cost us an additional $352. On top of that we were charged $170 additional dollars for their "services rendered" for changing our flight! Subsequently an agent said this fee would be refunded. But that has yet to appear on our credit card statement.
Efforts to resolve issue has been futile to say the least! To date I have placed a total of 14 calls to cheapdeals and initially I was told Mr. Wandson was unavailable. But after a number of subsequent calls, I was told by “Kevin” that Mr. Wandson no longer worked for the company. However, “Kevin” said that I could expect to receive a call from one of the supervisors, either Mr. Eric Parker or Mr. Walter Major, within 12 hours to resolve the issue. That was on June 25th.
I did not receive the promised call so I placed a number of calls and finally reached Mr. Walter Major on July 2nd. During our conversation he acknowledged that the whole debacle was cheapdeals fault and that Mr. Wandson had been fired as a result of it.
When I pointed out that we had lost a total $680 ($158 in baggage fees, $352 from the change in ticket price, $170 for service fees) Mr. Major said he would talk to “the owner” about the possibility of getting our baggage fees reimbursed to us. But he was unwilling to address the remaining $522. Mr. Major promised to get back to me by July 10th. That date came and went with no return call. So, I called on July 17th and again on the 18th and both times I was told Mr. Major was unavailable. However, the agents promised that Mr. Major would call me back. To date I have yet to hear from Mr. Major!
So again, be cautious when using cheapdealsfare.com They will promise you the world and leave you grounded! The bottom line is that we lost a total of $680! Not to mention the promised $500 flight voucher for our immense inconvenience during a time of bereavement! As well as the aggravation and wasted time which cannot be quantified.
At the very least cheapdealsfares.com is one of the most incompetent companies in the travel industry. At most cheapdealsfares.com is a scam! So, fly away from using cheapdealsfares.com or the money in your wallet will be the only thing that takes flight!
