Holiday Hypermarket Review

Overall Rating

NONE !!

Unhelpful, imcompitent staff. Do not return calls when they say they will.

We went to Fort Kinaird First Choice Holiday Hypermarket in January 2005 to book our family summer holiday. We stated we would like an all inclusive. The travel agent we sat with then proceeded to advise us that they had some amazing deals for all inclusives to the Dominican Republic. So we asked to see and hear more info on this holiday, the girl then showed us the holiday in the brochure which was a brand new hotel, and all the extras such as a junior suite for the family which has a Jacuzzi in the bathroom and 24hr all inclusive as well as the fantastic beaches of white sands and turquoise sea. This obviously sold the holiday to us and we decided to go for it. The travel agent then went on to book this holiday for us and we signed all the paper work that was given to us, obviously in hind sight we now wish we had taken all this away with us and fully checked the details out! Anyway we paid our holiday in full and waited for our tickets to arrive then excitedly went on holiday!
Then the fun began! We arrived in Puerto Plata Airport and made our way to the bus which we were told our transfer time would be 1hr 30 mins this first of all rang alarm bells with me as in the brochure it had said 45 mins to 1hr. Then we arrived at the hotel and when booked in went to our room (excited about our jnr suite) on opening the door I immediately said oh dear there seems to have been a problem, they have given us the wrong room, so we went back to the reception and advised them that we were supposed to be in the jnr suite to which he claimed they have no jnr suites and all the rooms are the same size! There were 4 single beds crammed into a double room! Not what we would travel all that way to be cooped up like that!! We asked if we should have an adjoining room only to be told we would need to pay the extra!!?? So we went to the bar to have a drink and began talking to some other people that was on our coach, we started saying if we didn't know any better we would say we were in the wrong hotel, to which they replied they had just been thinking the same thing and proceeded to describe their brochure etc which was the same as us, they were on their honeymoon and it was all the little extras that had made us book this hotel that had decided them. We were sitting discussing this and the fact the beach looked nothing like it did in the brochure nor did the rooms or the descriptions when other people joined in and we said something about being in the south to which they laughed and told us we were in the North!!!! The next morning my partner went to see our "rep" who in fact wasn't a real First Choice rep - he covered 3 other tour company's! When my partner started to tell him our problem he said wait a minute that sounds like you are describing our sister hotel in Bavaro Punta Cana - to which my partner said well that's where we are isn't it? No you are in Rio San Juan up the north! He then got a brochure out and showed it to my partner which was the hotel where we had in faith booked back in January and told him this hotel was the other side of the island which was a 6hr drive away!! To cut a very long story short in our case and the honeymoon couples case we had in faith went into Holiday Hypermarket sat and discussed a holiday and agreed to book it only to be booked into the wrong hotel! The honeymoon couple by the way had booked their honeymoon in Hull Holiday Hypermarket - coincidence I think not, this was all starting to make sense to us it seems to be an error in the confirming a booking with this company. Meanwhile back home we had left the hotel phone number with our parents saying where we were etc and because we hadn't yet phoned to let them know we had arrived safely my mother in law had phoned the hotel in Punta Cana to be told the had no reservations for us! When we phoned home she was distraught imagining all sorts had happened - not in fact what had happened! We made numerous calls back home to holiday hypermarket in both Hull and Edinburgh only to be fobbed off and spoken to very rudely - they kept making out we were trying to upgrade!! They were supposed to phone me back only for me to have to keep calling them back as they never retuned any of my calls. The kept saying we had signed a legal document for the hotel we were in and there was nothing on record to say we should be in Punta Cana - they only real proof we had was obviously our memory of the booking, and being shown the hotel in the brochure etc and the verbal conversation we had with the girl when booking as the jnr suite and Jacuzzi was one of the things the kids kept going on about, now why would they be doing this if the hotel we were booking didn't have any of these things? Also on arriving home we have looked at the brochure we were given that day in January when we booked the holiday and the Bahia Principe in Rio San Juan where we were sent is not even in that brochure, how can they explain that? Anyway we will not be leaving it at that we want answers and we want to speak to the girl that booked our holiday back in January and see if she will admit she remembers booking our holiday that day. The phone bill for our holiday was $600 us dollars, the majority of this went on phoning First Choice back home! Basically we have learnt our lesson about tour operators and in future will be booking our holidays via the internet, as we have been lucky in a way that when we came home we were going to go back to First Choice to book not only our family holiday for next year but also either our wedding abroad or honeymoon, so I'm glad they will have missed out on all this money and commission!!
We have also advised all family and friends never to book with this company and will also tell anyone else that will listen.