Gold Medal Travel Group PLC

Negative experience: Scam of a company. Convinced us to cancel existing flights already booked as they could get us a better deal. Promised full refund from other flights booked. Committed and bought new ticked to be promised a refund within 48 hrs weeks later still waiting. Do not answer calls from our numbers but answered when using someone else’s phone. To be told they would sort it, still not sorted and gone back to ignoring calls. Avoid do not use they just want your money. They do not deliver the promises made.

Negative experience: I warn everyone never book with this company I did Tanzania n zanzibar safari they booked on wrong plane out to Ethiopia then left us at a cafe for 10 hrs waiting transfer to airport then lost more hrs at kilimanjao airport as there never was a plane booked I've travelled with a good few company's worldwide but this was the worse won't accept accountability for nothing once they have your money that's it for them

Negative experience: AWFUL COMPANY, COMPLETELY RUINED OUR HOLIDAY AND ARE NOW NEARLY £1000 OUT OF POCKET ON TOP OF WHAT WE PAID FOR THE HOLIDAY ORIGINALLY.

Negative experience: Terrible experience. TUI packaged our holiday through these airheads and so far, they’ve not booked any of our transfers despite paying for in the package (£22k Disney and Caribbean trip). So $120 later in Uber costs and unnecessary stress we’re finally on our way back to the airport 40 minutes late for the next leg. I called gold medal for assistance and all the guy on the line said “can I stop you there, you’ve called the supplier line”. No apology or “can I get you through to the right person”. Average 2.9 starts says it all. Avoid!!! Update. We’ve just had to pay another $120 as they haven’t added our baggage on to the flight to the Caribbean. Great! Another update. Our seats on the flight were not booked together. My 7 year old daughter’s seat was 11 rows at the back, despite the trip being booked for 12 months. Great attention to detail.

Fantastic experience: Well what a fabulous bucket list trip we had. From being met at Dubai airport and transferred to our hotel to the sea plane taking us to the island in the Maldives. Everything went so smoothly and we would highly recommend using Gold Medal Travel

Fantastic experience: Fantastic location and offices for a great Trade tour operator with fantastic facilities

Negative experience: Avoid, never informed about a flight schedule change resulting in missing our departing flight. Have been waiting 28 days for them to investigate and respond to my complaint and still nothing. Terrible communication and clearly don’t give a toss about there customers. Flight was Originally booked through Netflights which is a trading name of Gold medal travel.

Negative experience: They will hide behind 'ABTA guidelines' to avoid paying out a refund. They claim they 'weren't aware at the time' yet I emailed them the night we arrived at the resort in question. The photos below show the issues, and yet these only qualify for a 'standard cancellation refund' because we chose not to stay, which we would have got if we had simply changed our mind. Imagine thinking this is acceptable at a '5 star' resort. Disgraceful.

Negative experience: AVOID Netflights (Gold Medal Travel) Now Awful (used to be ok). Booked a package holiday, but their system sold us a package with no return luggage allowance. What sort of package holiday doesn't allow you to bring your luggage home!! The online booking process started with hotel selection then the next screen asks you pick from their pre selected flights (outbound and inbound are paired already, no way to separate). I selected the second flight option from their list (additional £22). Next screen called 'Extras' offers car hire transfers insurance etc (extras), NO BAGGAGE ALLOWNACE mentioned. Third screen gives you the total to pay for the package holiday. On receipt of the booking confirmation email it was obvious that they had not included return hold luggage. Contacted then to correct what I can only describe to be an error in their system. Netflights email response was: 'It is understandable you may have missed or misunderstood this information but you have been charged correctly for the fares selected. In our GDS system it shows to add hold bags is approximately 28.00 EUR per bag per person, this will need to be added at the airport. There was no warning or detailed information suggesting that we would not be able to bring our luggage home or even given the option to pay for it during the booking process. (which I'd have done). I WOULD AVOID BUYING PACKAGED HOLIDAYS FROM NETFLIGHTS!!! Unless you want to leave you luggage at the destination and not bring it home.

Fantastic experience: Recently booked Thailand via one.of gold medals national customers. Flawless travelling from start to finish. No issues whatsoever. Used them on two occasions now and both were extremely organized. I can see others had issues when changes were needed we were fortunately not in that boat.

Negative experience: Do not use them you have no support if your flight is cancelled. Not only was our flight delayed by five days but we also lost our hotel booking in Singapore. We’ve had no response or recompense. Avoid at all costs

Negative experience: Rude if they treat customers like prospective staff !

Negative experience: Worse company big scammars ever had in my life took money from my account unauthrised with coordination of Polani travels. Don't go to them.

Negative experience: Worse company I have ever dealt with. Tried to book a flight, booking didn't go through, but they still took my money and when i called they said sorry mistake you'll get it in 5 days. That was on the 31st of August and I'm still waiting. Thief's and scammers and I don't understand how they are still operational.

Negative experience: Shambles and poorly operated. Let down from start to end. Avoid.

Negative experience: Absolute disgrace of a company avoid at all costs, and avoid Co-Optravel independent travel agents, mis selling and no transfers turn up when you pay for them, we were stuck in Paris airport for over 9 hours, as they changed our flight and nothing not even the lounge that they issued had anything - they were closed. I am taking them to court.

Negative experience: Went to Mystique in St Lucia, supposed to be 4*, maintenance shocking, told it was adult only and it wasn't and Gold Medal doing nothing because we didn't ring helpline!

Negative experience: These people stole my money from my account. Iam in a bid to recover it. They is no means to contact them.

Negative experience: Impossible to contact when things don't go to plan. Out of pocket when transfers did not materialise . The 24 hour emergency contact number provided goes to answer phone message and then they dont get back to you. So you basically have to solve the problem on your own. I have to now wait for travel agent to claim money back on my behalf as there is no way to contact them directly. Avoid this company if you can.

Fantastic experience: Excellent overall ❤️

Negative experience: Disgusting company lost my £500 deposit due to change in circumstances wanted to change to next year but they are charging me £600 in admin fees in which no way would book with this company ever again

Negative experience: absolutely shocking never book with these or tui we go away in 4 days and there’s no sign of our booking reference no hotel nothing absolutely disgraceful do not even waste your time booking through gold medal or tui

Negative experience: One hotel they booked us into didn’t have any booking details after a 6 hour drive had to pay for room then got to another hotel after another 5 hour drive and they had booked us into a smoking room . None of us smoke absolutely disgusting smell and we had to stay there because they had no other rooms available. Will never use them again absolutely useless .

Negative experience: Absolutely and axiomatically xxxx

Negative experience: Very disappointed. My transport did not arrive in Orlando and Gold Medal refused to help or deal with problem through me. They said I had to go through my agent (who I also couldn't get hold of) They did refund the money to me afterwards but still not impressed.

Negative experience: DON’T USE GOLD MEDAL We booked our honeymoon with TUI using Gold Medal to Bali. We booked a package holiday and this was our dream honeymoon. It is now 3 weeks until we are due to go away and Gold Medal have cancelled our flights without explanation. Their customer service is disgusting and they have offered alternative flights to another airport over 200 miles away from where we live and asked us to pay over £2000 to swap them, even though they cancelled the flights. We are heartbroken and simply don’t have the money for the alternate flights. Gold Medal have also told us we can have a full refund but it will take 46 weeks to come through so we cant even use the money to book a honeymoon anywhere else. We have already sorted all our holiday clothes, travel money, travel insurance for while we are there and our vaccinations. We have not been offered any form of compensation and we got a pathetic apology in the form of an email. They took over £3,000 from us but they can’t even provide adequate customer service. My advice would be don’t bother booking with them especially special, once in a lifetime trips. I’m appalled by their service and this has ruined our wedding. I would give them no stars, but this wasn’t possible.

Negative experience: Me and mt husband booked a flight to canada with gold medal it was to see my 87 year old sister who is rwally ill and her 91 year old husband who needed help. But unfortunately we both got covid so was unable to travel the travel agent said there was no airline that changed your flight to a later date or gave a refund all we are getting back out of 1,600 is 68 pound each but yet i looked on line at a flight with air canada and it stated they would change your flight but no refund thats all i wanted to get to my sister these want closing down

Negative experience: To be clear - Zero stars. Utterly shocking customer relations. My friends and I travelled out to Las Vegas in early April 22 and flew out from Manchester without incident (even with the PCR tests required). On returning home 4 days later we found that our E-Ticket was no longer valid and was not allowed on the flight (same one we got out there with). We were offered the same flight the next day but this was not practical for us (or indeed anything like reasonable). We ended up on a flight to Gatwick some 12 hours later. The stress and anxiety this caused was immeasurable - childcare and work matters had to be amended and much goodwill was needed to fix this problem. As our UK airport landing was now nowhere our original departure we had to book and pay for a hire car from Gatwick to Manchester to collect personal vehicle. Had the flight been cancelled or delayed it may have been understandable, but it wasn't, our flight took off as scheduled! To date (mid Jun) there has been no mention of compensation or recompense for the additional costs of our trip. This experience has spoilt a memorable trip. I would actively avoid using this company for any travel arrangements in the future!

Negative experience: It's a dump

Positive experience: Good response

Negative experience: Its horrible this place should get shutdown just 1 day ago my mum was supposed to take a flight to Accra Ghana, her flight was at 12:00 she checked in just fine and then at the gate for the plane they provided her with a fake ticket we called the agency they hanged up 500£ waste on this disgusting agency this agency’s should get shut down disgrace

Negative experience: So arrived in Canada only for gold medal to have cancelled our transfers l. Spent a lot of time trying to sort it out however gold medal won’t talk to the customer only the agent. Spent all the time worrying and trying to sort our our transfers we had paid for. Gold medal solution pay for it and claim when your home. Worst travel operator ever

Negative experience: Still waiting for refund 2 years after taking my money agreed need to refund after airline stepped in 5th Oct still no refund appataking longer cause so old isn't that my point you've had my money 2 years

Negative experience: Not had my trip yet

Negative experience: If I could give zero stars I would

Negative experience: I paid for a flight to Australia to go in July 2020 but it got cancelled due to covid 19 I am still waiting of my refund from them it is going into 8months now and still no nearer to getting it back

Negative experience: Very slow and not heloful

Negative experience: I booked a flight which had resulted in a substantial flight change. I requested a refund. The company Gold Medal Travel and Netflights have constantly lied, deceived and refused to refund the money due. This is clear theft as no one is willing to talk, assist or apply for or process any form of refund. They write not known on mail and inform Royal Mail that the addressee is 'not at address' on Special Delivery mail. They delete comments from Twitter, Facebook and Messenger and block when you ask for help. They even create false reviews with similar wording to support their review status which is so sad and pityful. Your only option is to commence legal proceedings to recover refunds. DO NOT USE THIS COMPANY AT ALL. YOU ARE WARNED.

Negative experience: I booked my holiday through teletext holidays for myself and my son to egypt in feb 2021, due to circumstances i have unfortuantley had to cancel, now, reading the terms and conditions that gold medal travel have on their page, it states that, although you will loose your deposit (£200) that id you cancel 70+ days before your holiday date then there will be no cancellation fee, so, why I ask, are they trying to charge me £500+ to cancel, now benn a single mum and unemployed you can only imagine how hard I have had to save to have this holiday, and its taken a long long time to do so, but a dream us a dream , I want to rebook, I want to go, as does my son, but if they take this fee when they said they don't, then I will end up paying over £700 to sit in my front room, hurt, upst, angry, can't describe how I am feeling right now, but needless to say, I am not happy, so NO I would never NEVER recommend this company, not even to my worst enemy arghhhhhhh

Negative experience: Very poor communication

Negative experience: Worst company to deal with. They never send updates or cancellation about your flight and never pick up the phone or reply to your email.

Negative experience: Total scammers. Been arguing with them and teletext and no one ever comes back to you

Negative experience: Unfortunately first time using and due to COVID-19 our holiday had to be cancelled. We had been offered vouchers or rebook for next year. There was no mention of full refund, which is illegal not to give a customer. Finally communication with Hayes Travel our money was paid back. Gold Medal never sent an email to us apologising and never sent an email informing us that the flight had been cancelled, we had to contact the travel agency.

Negative experience: Booked through Hayes Travel. Holiday was cancelled in mid March. Still waiting for my refund. Not at all happy with this. I appreciate we are living in difficult times but surely authorising a quick refund can't be that difficult!

Negative experience: Gold Medal DREADFULL company Just got back from Cuba. No thanks to Gold Medal. Hotel closed down due to Lack of guests. No flights coming from anywhere due to virus. Been told the hotel may close. Emergency Numbers on Gold medal travel docs did not work. Emailed our agent Co op travel in Market Harborough, they finally got hold of Gold Medal. Told us to find another hotel our selves. Pay for it ourselves. Cant contact transfer company to get us back to the airport for return journey.Monitor airline for flight changes they said. Gold Medal have dumped us and not fulfilling there duty of care. Co op have said sorry we can’t help more. DO NOT BOOK WITH THIS DREADFUL COMPANY

Negative experience: Very disappointed, my parents (in their 80s) are stuck here in Australia, original departure date 5/4/20, when asked to, they called Gold Medal they said their flight was to be changed, this involved a 2 DAY stop in Qatar, which is in total lock down!! needless to say Gold Medal have not offered a solution to this ridiculous part of the itinerary. They then pointed out that this was the only alternative Qatar Airways had offered and that if they wanted a comparable flight (2 hour stop) that they would have to pay 1400 pounds extra. In a further call to try and resolve the issue, they were then told that all Qatar Airways were "grounded" and to contact the British Consulate if they wanted to get home!! Upon checking, Qatar was and is still flying, even adding more flights due to demand, so this was a complete fabrication, upon contacting Qatar direct they informed us due to the type of booking that Gold Medal would have to do any changes to the itinerary, furthermore on checking the booking online Gold Medal went ahead and changed the flight even though my parents strictly said it was unacceptable but still have not emailed an up to date itinerary (fishy...) Now they are not answering emails or calls, in short Gold Medal have wiped their hands, extremely unprofessional & non humanitarian in the current climate.

Negative experience: Very poor and rude customer service. Important lesson learned - ALWAYS book the flights direct with the airline to ensure your customer rights are protected. This company is a law unto themselves and have profiteered greatly from a cancelled holiday due to a change in circumstances. Gold Medal would only offer alternative business class flights at huge premiums and claimed they were the only flights available despite the airlines website clearly showing a range of alternatives directly.

Fantastic experience: Great service and contact even when abroad

Negative experience: I wouldnt know. Our account was hacked when the thief used it.

Negative experience: Have been waiting 57 days up to now for a reply to a complaint but just keep getting fobbed off terrible terrible company always check who your holiday company are using

Negative experience: They are terrible! They refused to speak to me as I wasn't the agency who I had booked the holiday with. The sales rep for GOLD MEDAL said "if you are just the traveller I am not talking with you and hung up"!!! The reason I was calling they hadn't even entered my address with British airways so I couldn't pre check in. I told them the problem and they refused to even listen. As a result my wife and I ended up apart on the flight. Surely that's the least they should do. They didn't even advise of any resort fees for our destination, and stated they changed our hotel to a better one, and they would give us £100 good will. In reality it was a cheaper hotel and that was the difference. Two absolute failures by G M. I had problems with the hotel and spoke to the manager myself. When speaking to the local agent I booked the holiday with G M had stated they were the ones who dealt with the problem and got the hotel to sort them out! Again complete lies. Totally unprofessional incompetent and lazy. Will do anything to make money and not accept any responsibility for the problems they cause. They lie and use underhand moves to make you think they are helping. PLEASE PLEASE DO NOT USE THIS COMPANY!!!!

Positive experience: I have used their services through Thomas Cook on a couple of occasions. Purely for flights. They often are very competitive given the flying times and helpful in finding the right flight verses price. They were particularly helpful when Thomas Cook failed, and efficient and reassuring in the way they delt with the problem.

Fantastic experience: Sorted me out after collapse of TC

Positive experience: Polite, helpful and professional.

Negative experience: Apauling service. Vague emails. 1 phone call over 1 hour long. Abrupt letter demanding I call. After 45 minutes on hold. Understandably I hang up and reply to one of your emails asking you call me. I then receive an automated reply stating mail box not monitored. I have no idea how you have any customers.

Positive experience: Not very helpful when I had some serious concerns about my travel plans.

Positive experience: Really good service. Shame it takes so long to talk to agents on phone. But very helpful.

Fantastic experience: Very reasonable priced and helpful when it was possible our flight home may be disrupted and changed flights not once but twice.

Fantastic experience: Cannot fault Gold Medal they have taken over out Thomas Cook booking.

Negative experience: Not able to change our flights less than 4 weeks after booking. Very poor customer service. Supposed to HELP AND MANAGE!!!take the hassle out of travel. Left us with big problems.

Fantastic experience: I have used Gold Medal Travel/Airlinenetworks/Netflights since they had a business in Church Street, Blackpool. Over the years I have booked flights and holidays all over the world, I have always received first class service and attention. I have used other companies on occasion but always return, I always feel confident knowing that they are able to help with all my travel needs 24/7.

Negative experience: If there was a zero I would have clicked that. Would not Book with Gold Medal Travel via TUI Ever again. They book you in to hotels that are in hindsight inadequate and do not come up to standard. When you complain they seem to go silent, and don't really care. That is not what people expect.

Negative experience: The first rule of booking flights - NEVER USE THIRD PARTY INTERMEDIARY SUCH NETFLIGHTS. They sell you $5 cheaper ticket, but you will lose all consumer rights from the airline you purchased your ticket. In my case, I booked four return tickets for my family trip with a wrong date (a month later). It could be just my mistake, but I think it probably was a technical problem with a cookie/local storage - I was using Momondo, checking different options. Finally I was redirected to Netflights website, and I did not see the wrong date. I booked my flight around 8PM. Then, in the morning (around 10am) they sent me a confirmation email. Then I realized the date was wrong. I called them and they said they can do nothing now, I need to wait. I did not want to wait to not lose the British Airways 24-hour Right to Cancel Policy. I called BA twice. They said, they can do nothing, because Netflights sold the tickets. They advice that Netlights can make a conference call with me and them, and maybe BA can help. But Netflights never wanted to do that. After couple of days and many calls Netflights offered me to waive their fees (50 pounds per ticket), but requested to pay: - 4 x 150 Pounds (they said it's for BA) - difference in ticket price and taxes. So, it was triple as much as the original ticket price!! They said again, it was not their fault, they have this kind of agreement with the airlines. Maybe. I don't care anymore. I purchased another four return tickets, which was two times less than what their offer for the date change. I think this kind of businesses should not have ever existed. It's so bad for consumers. You gain nothing, you don't have immediate booking confirmation, so you never know if you purchased tickets or no, and you don't have a standard passenger rights.

Negative experience: This company are connected to Netflights and Thomas Cook. I would not touch them with a barge pole as they totally ripped off my daughter. Basically the original mistake was her's, her friend booked her name as it is known and not as it shows on her passport, which is a longer version. As soon as she realised what had happened she tried to change it through Netflights, aware that it would incur a cost. Basically no one would help a young girl who's friend had made a genuine mistake. Between Netflights, Condor and Thomas Cook they all had her dangling on a string, making her ring each company in turn to be told they couldn't help, she'd have to ring Netflights/Condor etc, eventually Nettflights told her it had been changed but the capital letter was wrong! This was their fault, she obviously spelt her name out correctly to them ( it's not a difficult name to spell!) they made a mistake this second time and the upshot of this was that after weeks and lots of distress trying to get this sorted she ended up paying for a new flight ticket! What should have been £350 plus a charge for amending an original mistake ( which should have cost no more than £50-£75) became £830 for the same seat! Where do Gold Medal fit in? When I wrote to complain about the chain of events that put my daughter so much out of pocket, Gold Medal wrote back to say my daughter had spelt her name wrong! I can tell you she is not a fool! Yes, originally she should have ensured her friend had it right but the time lapses in all this were appalling. I.e the ticket took 10 days to arrive on the email, then so many excuses from Netflights, they'd have to ring Head office and get back to her and so another day or two went by etc, etc. Why couldn't Netflights aka Gold Medal accept liability for the second mis spelling? Because they weren't prepared to accept a mistake and recompense a 19 year old girl who was in her first job, booking a holiday that she couldn't look forward to, they know their mistake plus the whole incompetence of the team who weren't prepared help her . They couldn't do the decent thing!!!!

Positive experience: Some good offers on sometimes though cheaper options could be found elsewhere. As with everything shop around.

Negative experience: Booked a holiday to Vietnam travelling round different areas. We were notified a couple of months after booking the holiday that our hotel in Hanoi is closed so we’re being swapped to a new one. This was checked a few times throughout and confirmed. However when our tickets arrived it had the original hotel so again this was checked with gold medal who advised the hotel had reopened. You can imagine our surprise when we arrived in Hanoi for the last couple of days of our holiday to find no accommodation had been arranged and the hotel had in deed closed 7-8 months previously. This should not have happened was all gold medal could say no apology was offered. I incurred £60 charges for using my phone abroad to sort the error out. We lost a day driving round Hanoi to different hotels checking reservations and sitting around waiting for gold medal to sort our accommodation. It ruined our holiday and I will never book another break through these muppets.

Fantastic experience: Great staff.

Positive experience: Great staff and service

Positive experience: I just pick up

Positive experience: Friendly

Fantastic experience: Lovely group of people

Fantastic experience: The carpet is really average but the chairs are less so.