Spa Breaks www.spabreaks.com

Awful experience. On 3 occasions the package booked online was not available and we were forced to continue to try and rebook on every occasion due to them only ever issuing a credit note. The customer service is appalling, there is no aftercare or support once they have your money. When I contested the original issue I was point blank told there is nobody more senior to escalate a complaint to this was untrue as subsequent complaints were escalated higher when the spas kept cancelling our booking due to “no availability”. One of these occurred 6 days after booking and meant we only had 72 hours notice that our weekend plans were cancelled. On many occasions throughout this horrific experience I was constantly having to chase to get responses. Any booking giant his company is clearly de-prioritised by the spa so it really is not worth it - just book with the spa direct! Many of the SpaBreak packages don’t save you any money and some even cost more than going direct!

Booked a spa and literally within 5 mins of booking I had to cancel so I used the live chat feature and asked to cancel they advised no it’s non refundable can’t do anything about it.

Awful customer service experience. Made an online booking for an overnight spa break, received an email saying that the booking would be confirmed within 3 working days despite money already being taken in full from my account.

After 3 working days, confirmation had not been received so I called Spabreaks, told that the booking had not been made, the venue had not been contacted, that this would be chased up, resolved the same day and that confirmation of booking would be emailed. This didn’t happen and I was told this for 4 consecutive days each time I phoned them. I didn’t receive any confirmation, calls back with an apology or explanation. This was after being on hold between 30-45 mins each day on the phone.

I was advised on one of the days I called that the head of customer services was unavailable to talk to but that a request for a cancellation and refund could be made in writing or vouchers could be offered. As I wouldn’t want to book through them again, I requested the cancellation and refund in writing, had an automated message saying that I would receive a response in 48 hours but did not hear back.

After 7 days of the initial online booking, I emailed the head of customer services directly about the issue. She later replied saying that cancellation and refunds are not given (you apparently tick a box on the web site agreeing to this in their T&C’s but definitely not clear), despite being told otherwise by her team, and that my booking was to replace a cancellation they already had from another customer! She did offer to change venue but clearly missed the point that I didn't have an issue with the venue, I had an issue with their booking process and customer service. After 8 days, I finally received booking confirmation but at this point did not want to have anything to do with Spabreaks but unfortunately now have no options of cancelling and booking elsewhere.

It seems that as soon as they take your money they do not care about the service their give you, repeat business, positive referrals to others and are quite happy to ignore you. You only have to look at the shocking reviews all over the internet with customers who have faced the same experience.

Avoid at all costs, book directly with the venue if you can or through a more reputable company with positive reviews. Despite them trying to sell you a relaxing break, it causes so much stress and hassle making the booking that it is not worth considering this company.

We originally booked our wedding anniversary spa break via Spabreaks at the Old Thorns for August 2021. The itinerary wasn’t to our specifications and this was due to availability at the spa, so we asked for a gift voucher instead. This query took a bit of time but I was understanding and was patient.

Once the gift voucher was issued, we then chose to book at The Hampshire Court Hotel in Basingstoke and had an absolutely awful experience there – I won’t go into the main details now but have left a review detailing it all on Trip advisor.

However, one of the issues here was that Spabreaks sold us an upgrade option to have a 2 course a la carte dinner at the hotel rather than the £28pp allocation towards dinner, but on the day the hotel told us that they weren’t doing it so we had to have the £28pp dinner instead. Very disappointing considering the food was pretty much just sub-par microwave food.

I raised my complaint issues linked to the hotel directly with the hotel, but I was told the a la carte dinner complaint would need to be raised with Spabreaks as the booking was made via them.

I raised a complaint with Spabreaks on the 8th August, and the main reason why I’m leaving this review is because of the awful customer service experience I’ve had with Spabreaks overall, it’s been diabolical the whole way through. Right from the beginning of trying to get a gift voucher issued for the first stay was a battle, and now trying to get a refund (which isn’t a huge refund I may add!)

The timeline is as follows:

• Initial date of complaint: 8th August 2021 (promised a response from Chris Harrison within 28 days)

• I sent various email chases and calls and was simply told on the phone that they would ‘chase this up with the hotel’ I was told this numerous times so it felt like no action was actually being taken.

• Response received from Barry Thorn on the 17th September (day 40) advising that I would receive a refund for this mis-sold dinner within the next 14 days.

• I then replied complaining that the lack of communication overall with Spabreaks was unacceptable, so can they provide me with some form of compensation?

• Response received from Barry Thorn 24th September advising they will provide £40 gift vouchers for the inconveniences

• Chase email sent on 14th September as 14 days had passed and no sign of the refund.

• Email received from Barry Thorn on 14th September advising me the refund will be issued in 14 WORKING days (what?! This was not said previously!) as they have a much reduced team due to the pandemic.

• Chase email sent on the 11th October as this had now been 16 WORKING DAYS since the initial advice that a refund would be issued.

It is now the 14th October which makes it 19 WORKING DAYS since the initial confirmation of the refund. I have since emailed Spabreaks again to say whilst I am entirely sympathetic towards the current situation with Covid (I myself work for the NHS), I honestly cannot believe that I am still waiting for this refund. It's not even a big refund. I am starting to feel like Spabreaks are now deliberately trying to prolong this frustration out of pure spitefulness.

I have advised them that I will not be using their vouchers as I no longer wish to purchase any future experiences through them again and will be leaving a negative review. I have started spreading the word of how appalling this company is too, especially after reading other people’s poor experiences as well.

If this is left much longer I will be reporting them to Trading Standards as this is a case of mis-selling and theft.

Spabreaks – don’t you dare comment on this saying some generic spiel that ‘you require more information’ or anything like that from me as it’s been me contacting YOU chasing this up this whole time and the problem is:

a) Mis-selling something that never existed and

b) You not giving my money back!

Terrible customer services. We needed to change our booking due to receiving an isolation notice. Phoned and emailed over 20 times - each phone call takes at least 20 minutes listening to music before being put through and then no help whatsoever. They wouldn’t change dates and have refused a refund. Avoid at all costs .

Absolutely disgusted by how I have been treated by Spabreaks.com. I booked a spa day for my elderly parents a couple of months before the pandemic started. We waited patiently for restrictions to be lifted and it was safe to be able so we could book the SPA day. upon trying to book the spa we were told that our voucher had expired, I was staggered. What type of company does this to their customers. They now won't even reply to my emails, I guess hoping we will just go away. They have taken my money and given us nothing in return which is immoral and using a world pandemic to snatch people's hard-earned money is beyond belief. I hope fate treats this company the same way they treat their customers. Trading standards is my next step for this company.

Buyer Beware, Shop elsewhere - AVOID!! AVOID! AVOID! Spabreaks.com

Over the years I have used a number of companies/hotels for spa treatments, Spabreaks.com are the absolute worse by a very long way.

Because of co-vid and a change in the Tier system my spa treatment had to be understandably cancelled. Quite reasonably I requested a refund. This has been refused by the company.

I have had now had to escalate matters with the threat of legal action to get my money back. In these difficult times every company I have dealt with have been flexible and offered full refunds when they can’t deliver because of the effect of co-vid. Spa breaks.com are not one of these companies. Read the reviews below as this seems to be a theme with this company of keeping peoples money and I would even question the validity of the more positive reviews. AVOID, AVOID AVOID this company if you want to keep your money.

I had to amend the date at a charge of £25. I then had to cancel as I did not want to pay another £25 as I sadly had to change the date again. It was a present for my Mum (Birthday); who is also moving to London so I thought it would be a nice treat for her and my daughters’. Sadly, the chain on my Mum’s move got delayed and I did not want to pay another £25 fee to change the date. I found Spa Breaks very unhelpful and inflexible in helping me with this. I advised them that I would therefore need to cancel, they took almost £200 from me for nothing approx 2 weeks before the spa break, I will never be using them again. Also, other discount websites i.e. Wowcher offer very good deals. I found Spa Breaks very unhelpful, inflexible and money grabbing.

I booked a SPA get away for my friend and I to celebrate her birthday. On arrival at the hotel, it transpired our pre booked treatments, which had been confirmed by telephone and in writing were not actually booked in. The hotel had only one therapist booked all day and she was too busy to see us. I was very disappointed and will not be using this company in future. I wish I had seen these other awful reviews before we had used the company! I would have booked direct with the hotel.

I recently booked a one night spa break for myself and a friend, I was very definite to the person making the booking that we had to have a twin room (2 women travelling together) on arrival we found out that the hotel was full and the room we booked was a double with Zip & Link beds, this means the beds are zipped together to make a double and can be unzipped to make a twin, great idea! unless the room is not big enough to separate the beds so even though they are made up as single beds they are still pushed together as a double. The hotel was very good and tried to help by removing ALL other furniture in the room that was removable and pushed the beds apart by 4 inches. Once we came home I emailed Spabreaks.com to complain and they passed the buck to the hotel to respond. At NO point have Spabreaks.com apologised for any of the inconvenience and upset we experienced at the hotel. I asked why we had not been told that the beds would be next to each other in the style of a double and they said they didn't know but even if they did they wouldn't feel it important enough to tell their customers. Our contract was with Spabreaks.com Not the hotel as such they should have responded and they should make their customers aware of what they are booking at the time of enquiry. We paid for a Twin but got a double. The Customer Liaison Manager is not interested in our complaint or the fact we would not book with them again. I would not recommend booking them to anyone, book direct and get much better service.