We booked a holiday with Virgin holidays in January 2010 to got to Windsor Hills Florida, immediately after the booking there were a few issues as we beleived we booked a complete holiday with them but didn't realise that the car was not for the full duration (which was not at all clear) and didn't make sense to us however came to some agreement on that at our extra cost and carried on with the booking? (Since when is a ‘complete holiday' a fly drive and if they say car hire is essential why is in not included for the whole period of the holiday)"¦ ?
5 weeks prior to departure they wrote to us telling us that we could not go to Windsor Hills due to property repossession and they had relocated to us to another villa resort named Emerald Island. This was disappointing as we really wanted to go the Windsor Hills having spent a long time researching before the booking to go there and when comparing we felt that it was a much improved facility than the relocation now offered having a much better and larger communal pool with slide, better bar and restaurant plus being a newer complex. We did manage to find availability directly with the resort for Windsor Hills (which we sent to them) however as it was only a few weeks away it was more expensive and Virgin were adamant in not being able to provide us with any accommodation there no matter what we found, so we ended up going to the Emerald Island rather than cancelling the whole thing and going without a holiday. I found the terms of booking allowed compensation for any alterations less than 6 weeks from departure and although Virgin rejected it at first the paid us £25/person totalling £175.00 compensation. We also managed to negotiate a bit of extra discount with them on park tickets which we bought through them.
When we arrived at the resort late on an evening, although the accommodation didn't quite meet the expectations having read what was on offer at the Windsor Hills (not on the virgin site as they give no real information so I suppose cant be relied upon), we were not really that disappointed as we were on holiday and it was clean, tidy and forecast was sunny. The following day we went to collect our gate pass at the main reception to be told that the communal pool facilities and tiki bar/restaurant etc were closed for refurbishment and would remain closed for our whole holiday. As you can image this was annoying as they, moved us here based on providing the same facilities as the orignal booking which were now shut. We went straight to the Virgin office and got their 10min before it shut (Sunday) however it was locked up. We did see the rep leaving about quarter of an hour later but he said it was too late for him to do anything and come back the next day which we did and reported the situation again, the Virgin rep sent us to the villa management company who took the report and said they would come back to us, which again they did the following day telling us the information we had received from the resort reception was correct!... eh!.. We asked what they could do about it and they basically said they didn't need to do anything as the villa we stayed in had its own pool. Now to explain, we deliberately booked a gated community with communal facilities so that we could spend time on site and have access to a larger pool and eat/drink on site without taking the car and paid more for the holiday for them, so to be told by them that we didn't need them anyway and could manage without really pee'd us off. It is difficult to know the exact figures at the time we booked but checking now for next year the basic cost on their web site for staying at the same location with the communal facilities as opposed to one of their standard villas without the facilities shows a difference in the standard guide price of the accommodation only as £50-£60 per adult (there were 4 of us) plus 3 kids, so whay pay more for no benefit....
The rep never came back to us so we emailed virgin immediately to log a complaint in writing bearing in mind we first reported the the first full day of our 14 days and they replied letting us know the local rep would be in touch, which they eventually did not day 4 and left a message on my answer phone basically telling us that as we had taken some compensation prior to the holiday they couldnt do anything"¦ I couldn't believe this as the compensation was paid out in accordance with their own terms for late changes and I didn't expect that this would basically mean we had to accept anything that happens or further changes. I again emailed Virgin voicing my opinion and again recevied an emailed apology stating they would get the local rep to get in touch. After all the exchange of emails and a slow lcoal rep we were now 8 days into the holiday and in my opinion too late to really change anything however another message came on my answer machine by way of an apology from the local rep along with the offer of some 'free' meal vouchers which we took but left no doubts that we would be in contact on our return.
The person we dealt with by email sugested we write in on our return explaianing the problems and issues we had, so we sent in a letter of complaint outlining the issues we had and asking for some form of explanation as to why things seemed to have been so bad.... We have just received a letter back from Virgin which states that the closure of the facilities is unfortunate and beyond their control but that they did all they could at the time but as a goodwill gesture offered 15% of the 'accommodation only' cost to be refunded (£165.00) less the value of the meal vouchers taken whilst on holiday giving a total refund value of £80.00"¦. Now I am not an ungrateful person (or don't believe that I am) but feel as though Virgin just don't give a damn that they couldn't deliver the holiday we booked initially or the substitute they gave us 5 week prior to leaving, they did not do anything to try and deliver the holiday we asked for prior to departure and did even less once there and now have the cheek to offer compensation less the value of something they gave us as an apology when we were there (I have the voice message still on my phone apologising and offering the vouchers)"¦ I made the error of booking with a company I expected would provide a good reputable service and paid well over £1000 more for a travel agent to arrange for the peace of mind, but to be honest they have been nothing less than useless, inconsiderate and very uncaring in the customer service and not forgetting if we had booked the holidays on offer without the facilities with virgin we would have saved much more than the compensation offer"¦..
Am I being unreasonable in expecting some form of better explanation and even a refund for the facilities not being available and not to expect something offered as an apology at the time for their service being rubbish to be deducted from that (If I had known it was going to cost me I would have bloody took them?) Is it even worth trying to fight virgin to accept they have been nothing less than poor or are they just to big a opponent. As you can probably tell, I am quite wound up with feeling like they have taken my money and then wiped their feet all over me and my family so any thoughts please, even if the truth of the matter is I am over reacting and too stop whining and get over it"¦"¦"¦"¦.
Oh, Virgin Atlatic were brilliant
, just the holiday side of comapny that were rubbish... 
