This is my first post, I apologise now for the length of it. Please dont get bored and read the whole thing!! putr the kettle on, make a brew and relax whilst reading

I have copied and pasted the complaint letter I have just forwarded to first choice and abta, its easier then trying to explain everything again. Your advice is really appreciated. (I have edited certain names)

Our complaint initially starts off about the legal paperwork but as you will read, they make no effort to communicate and screw up on several things


First Choice Holidays
Customer Services
Diamond House
Peel Cross Road
Salford
Manchester
M5 4RT

Booking Reference XXXXXX
7th February 2009


[i]"The great thing about having your wedding abroad is that once the big day is over, you're already on your honeymoon. Now, what could be more romantic than that?
Whether a civil ceremony on a stunning beach or a religious ceremony in a chapel, reached by a sleigh through snow-white Lapland, if you can imagine it, we can take you there.
There's no need to worry about legal paperwork, organising the venue and reception, or booking rooms for your guests. In fact, your very own Wedding Coordinator will be at the destination to make sure everything goes exactly to plan. All you need to do is relax and enjoy your special day"[/i]

Do you recognize the above quote it is taken from your website. I particularly like paragraph 3 where it states do not worry about legal paperwork. Now that is false advertising if I ever seen it.
Here is another quote I found interesting;

Legal Requirements
Marrying abroad doesn't have to be confusing. Our easy to read guide of legal requirements is for your reference and, on confirming your wedding booking, these requirements are explained fully by the Weddings Team.
I also find the last sentence interesting and I hope all your customers have all legal requirements explained fully as we certainly did not.

Right this letter of complaint is an extension of many other letters, phone calls and emails to your "customer service" so forgive me if I am duplicating things but I want to summarise everything in this letter.
A copy of this has also been sent to ABTA
So I will be talking about what has gone on previously and I will be referring to past communications, I also have a very special surprise for you at the end. You thought you can only mess up a few times but an incident over the past view days have put you at the top of my worst company for common sense and service ever. Congratulations on achieving that award, it is not easy to win.
So let's start from the beginning; below is the first letter I sent, I will put the typing in red for clarity reasons


First Choice Holidays
Customer Services
Diamond House
Peel Cross Road
Salford
Manchester
M5 4RT

Booking Reference XXXXX

I am writing with regards to the above booking, our wedding in the Dominican Republic departing 15th September 2008.

I feel I have to write this letter with regards to the legal documentation needed for our wedding in this area. We have just paid out over £900 to ensure everything has processed correctly and all legal documentation is in order.

The fees were so high due to the fact we had to deal with solicitors, obtain certain papers and then pay to have them translated and legalised, payment to the Embassy etc, etc

When we booked the wedding we had no idea the amount of money or the stress involved in sorting the legal part out.

At point of booking there was no mention of the fact we would have to go through this process and the amount of money it would cost.

We actually paid nearly £1000 to have our wedding on top of our already booked holiday, what exactly do we get for £1000?

We have rang the helpline a few times and been given wrong information, for example when we needed the single status declaration we were told it can be obtained from a local registry office. We were set to go there after arranging an appointment and a friend pointed out to me they thought it had to be from a solicitor, We then rang you back and another advisor told us a solicitor is needed and we should not go to a registry office.

At the time of booking our holiday the agent informed us that we would be upgrading on the plane due to the fact we are getting married, when we rang to confirm this a while later we were told there is no such upgrade.

We have had holidays from first choice in the past and never had a problem, I rate your service generally very high but I do feel the wedding package is misleading and we should have been told more about the legal aspect right from the start.

We have also had to find a company who will translate items and deal with the embassy, surely this should all be part of the package.

I look forward to your comments

Kind Regards

xxxxxxxxxxx

Ok, clear with that one? Notice the date sent (8th August 2008)
I heard nothing so I sent another, here it is


17th November 2008
First Choice Holidays
Customer Services
Diamond House
Peel Cross Road
Salford
Manchester
M5 4RT

Booking Reference xxxxxxxxx

I am writing with regards to a complaint I first made on the 8th August 2008, I have had no satisfactory response and as you can see at today's date that is 3.5 months ago.

I have enclosed the original letter within this pack, please read it again to familiarize yourself with the issue. There were 3 complaints made within that first letter;

"¢ The fact that when we booked our wedding we were not told we would have to go through the stressful process of arranging our legal documentation ready for our wedding. We had paid £900 to sort our legal status prior to travelling and prior to getting married. This is a big piece of your budget that you don't expect to pay. We were not advised by your agent when we booked how difficult, stressful and costly the legal process was.
"¢ The fact that we rang your "helpline" on several occasions and been given wrong information, (example is in the original letter).
"¢ We were told at the time of booking that as part of the wedding package we would be automatically upgraded on the plane to premier class, when we rang at a later date to confirm this we were told there was no such upgrade. We took many guests with us and because we thought we were upgraded, they upgraded at a cost to be near us on a 10 hour flight. Obviously during the flight we were nowhere near our guests.
The obvious answer to the above to stop this from happening again is very simple,
1. When people book a wedding inform them of what legal documentation is needed and roughly how much it would cost, also make them aware of the fact you have to get several documents translated into Spanish and there are companies who do that for you (We found this out ourselves)
2. Train your helpline staff
3. Train your booking staff so they understand exactly what you get for your money as part of the wedding package
Simple yes?, I should get a job in heading up your customer services department.
So I sent the letter on the 8th August 2008, I received nothing so I submitted an online query, again heard nothing.
So on Thursday 4th September (Nearly 1 month later) at 12:08 I submitting another enquiry form on your website, which read "Submitted an email a week ago regarding a complaint, nobody has contacted me in the past week, the original complaint was sent over a month ago. This is unsatisfactory"
Again I heard nothing before I was due to fly on Monday 15th September. Tell a lie I did get a letter from you offering me the chance to purchase champagne on the plane to celebrate our forthcoming wedding, the champagne was offered at a special price. What's the point when my guests were at the other end of the plane. I thought your offer of champagne letter was a little bit of a cheek considering I had been waiting for so long for a response to a complaint
So I returned from my holiday and when I get home and start reading through the many letters I come across a standard letter from you stating my letter as been received and is being dealt with, When I return to work I open an email from a xxxxxxx replying to my on line enquiry, she wrote " I can advise your letter has been received and a response will be sent shortly, I do apologise for the delay" now this email was sent on the 15th September (The day of my departure) at 14.35, if I remember rightly we were just approaching the Isle of Man on the way to the Dominican.
Surely first choice of all people would have known I was actual away on the holiday I actual complained about the time you sent a email and letter.
So been back in the country for a week so I send another email on 13th October at 13:11 to xxxxxx, she did respond the same day at 18:41 with the following message" Thank you for your email, I have passed this onto customer services who will be in contact shortly, I do apologise you have yet to receive a response"
Still no reply so 21st October at 11:06 I send another email to xxxxxxx, with the following message "Still no reply, getting ridiculous now" Now if I had been sent an email like that in my work I would sense the customer is not happy so better get it sorted.
But still no reply to the actual complaint or from my last email so on the 31st October at 14:21 I send another email to xxxxxxxx, this time I wrote "Still no reply, getting a little bit silly now" Once again If I received that I would be do everything in my power to get this sorted for the customer.
So week later on November 7th I try a new route and phone the customer service department, I get through to a pleasant girl who states she has my letter on the system and she apologises for the no response. She actually put me on hold to speak with xxxxxxx(Well that's what she told me) and when she returned she said spoken to xxxxxx and the case is with customer services (Thought I had just rang Customer Services?) The girl, who I did not get her name promised me that this will be resolved and I will be getting a response within the next 3 days.
So that was on the 7th November, today is the 17th November and yes that's correct still no response.
So the original letter sent 8th August, today being 17th November. Not very good service really is it.
I must say the actual holiday and wedding was perfect, could not have been any better, however just a couple of comments from being away;
"¢ There were many weddings whilst we were there and we got speaking with a few couples who all had the same complaint about not being told the full picture for legal documentation and the price it would cost. All couples paid around the same as us, £900
"¢ After we got married we were told by Wedding Co-ordinator Sophie who I must say was brilliant that we would either receive the wedding certificate before we fly home or if not certainly within 2 weeks of us arriving home. Guess what? We have received no certificate and we got married on the 23rd September. I cannot blame Sophie for this, I accept she does not send out the certificates.
So all in all I have been mis-sold, lied to, been ignored and been given wrong information.
I demand I receive a refund of £900 that we paid for our legal documentation and my wedding certificate within 7 days of you receiving this letter.
We have been travelling with first choice for many years and have never had any problems; however the comedy of errors shown by you is extremely poor.
Regards,
Mr xxxxxxxxxxx

So a quick re-cap so far, my first letter of complaint was not answered so after 3 ½ months I had to send another.
Then a day after sending the above letter I received a reply letter from first choice, here it is.

FOR HOLIDAY TRUTHS INFO, THEY SENT ME A GENERAL RESPONSE NOT EXPLAINING ANYTHING

I sent you another letter, here it is;

19th November 2008

XXXXXXXXXXX
Specialist Business Team Leader

Dear XXXXXX,

I am writing with regards to your recent letter dated 17th November.

Now I am a little confused, are you replying to the first letter I sent on August 8th 2008 or replying to the second letter I sent on the 17th November 2008 which cannot be correct as the date is the same as yours.

Firstly if you are responding to the first letter then I see no apology as to why it has taken you 3 and a half months to reply. You start your letter by thanking me for my recent letter, 3 and a half months is not recent.

If you are responding to my second letter then all I can say at this point is have you actually read the letter and understood the content?

Please confirm which dated letter you are responding to before I take further action, please do this the moment you receive this letter by emailing me at jon.bowler@fyldecoastymca.org

Regards

Mr XXXXXX

As you can see my 3rd letter shown that I was confused.
Your reply to the above is as follows:
22 November 2008

Our Ref XXXXXXX

Without Prejudice

Email weddings@firstchoice.co.uk
Booking Ref XXXXXXXX

Dear Mr XXXXX

Thank you for your letter dated 17th November 2008 and I am sorry you are unhappy with my previous reply.

I have investigated the comments you have made and I would like to apologise for the delay in responding to you. Your letter was sent to our customer services department and was allocated to a diary for them to respond to you.

When your letter was due for a response, it was noticed that the complaint was regarding your wedding plans before your departure. Your letter was then allocated to the Weddings department, and I responded as soon as I received it.

In response to your second letter dated 17th November 2008 and your further letter dated 19th November 2008 I would like to offer the following comments:

As outlined in my first response it is not possible to give customers individual quotes for documentation. Preparing this documentation and receiving subsequent quotes is the customers' responsibility, and I must make clear that First Choice will not be able to refund you the 900 as requested. Our booking Forms outline this and give contact details for both the Foreign Office and the Dominican Consulate.

In response to your comments regarding wrong information being given, I can find no notes to confirm this and can only offer my apologies if there has been some confusion over your statutory declaration. As you are aware all statutory declarations are drawn up by solicitors and we have a record of this conversation taking place when we received incorrect documentation in January 2008.

Regarding seat upgrades on your flight to the Dominican Republic, I can confirm that at no time has this ever been offered by First Choice Holidays. I can only presume that this information may have been given to you by your travel agent and I can only ask that you speak to them regarding this.

Whilst I appreciate this is not the response you were looking for, I do not feel that First Choice Weddings have misled you and I can only apologise for any misunderstandings that may have occurred.

Yours sincerely

XXXXXXXX
Specialist Businesses Team Leader

Does not really explain anything does it, please find my response sent on the 24th November 2008

Dear XXXXXXX,

Thank you for your response.

I am not happy with your response as I feel my 2nd letter has not been answered properly.

The key points of my letter were as follows;

1. The fact I have waited so long for a response - I'm sorry but your reply is unsatisfactory, when you make a complaint to first choice the obvious place to send the complaint is the "complaints" department. Its not the customers fault that your internal process of sending it on to the relevant person takes too long.

2. You say it's not possible to give individual customers quotes for legal documentation, the whole point of our complaint was we were never given any information whatsoever as to the documentation needed. We were not told the process and we went ahead and booked our wedding without any other info. Surely it's not hard for a agent to say, "The costs of legal documentation do vary but we want to make you aware it could be anything between let's say £800-£1000. But for not to warn the customer is poor service, as stated in my letter other couples were also mislead with this detail. I understand you can't give each individual a price as it depends on their status but it's not hard to at least warn people as to what they need to do.

3. We was given wrong information regarding single status, it does not concern me that you can't find any notes. This definitely happened and we don't like to feel that we are making things up in our complaint letter. You say as you are aware all statutory notices are drawn up by a solicitor, I do now as I went through the process but I did not know when I booked.

4. Yes an upgrade on the plane was offered to us by our travel agent; you are right on that one. However we booked direct with your travel agent, First choice hypermarket in Bolton. So would you like me to take a separate issue out with them now who are you not part of the same company?

First choice weddings have mislead me and several couples who I met over there, your response is inadequate and you have not given any explanation to the following comments:-

1. The fact that even after emails, letters and phone calls nobody got back to me until 3 months after the original complaint.

2. The bottle of champagne letter, now this was a bit of an insult after waiting for a response to a complaint.

3. Receiving standard letters and emails the day we actually flew, why could it have not been prior to travel?

4. The fact we was told the certificate would be either with us before we depart or certainly 2 weeks within us being at home.

I have been mi-sold, lied to, been ignored and been given wrong information and you leave me no choice but to take this further to obtain the sum of £900 back from you.

I have already sourced information professionally regarding trading standards and mis-selling of products and I have been told I stand an excellent chance in the small claims court of claiming the money back.

All future corresponds will now be going to ABTA and trading standards, If I am not satisfied with your response I will commence proceedings against first choice in the local county small claims court for the fee of £900.

Regards,

J XXXXXX

Now please find your response to the above
Thank you for your e-mail.

This is an automated response to let you know we have received your e-mail and will answer it as soon as possible.

You do not need to respond to this e-mail.

Kind Regards

First Choice Customer Services

That's right an automated message on the same day, that's understandable as it is an effective system to let people know that your email as been received. So currently we are at the 24th November 2008
On the 28th November I receive this email
28 November 2008

Our Ref XXXXXX

Without Prejudice

Email weddings@firstchoice.co.uk

Booking Ref XXXXXXX

Dear Mr XXXXX

Thank you for your further email and I am sorry to see that you remain unhappy with our responses.

We have been open and honest with you and I believe we have responded to the points you have raised and I must reiterate that we will not be able to refund the 900.00 you have requested.

If you do wish to seek advice from ABTA, they can be contacted at the following
address:

ABTA Ltd
68-71 Newman Street
London
W1T 3AH

ABTA will be able to offer you advice on how to proceed if you decide to ask them to arbitrate on your behalf.

While I appreciate that you may be looking for financial recompense, our position on this matter will not be changed.

Thank you once again for taking the time to write to us.

Yours sincerely

XXXXXXXXX
Specialist Businesses Team Leader

Still no real explanation or apology and I reply with the following on the 28th November 2008

Sorry but you have not explained

1. why it took you so long to reply to my original letter?

2. Being given wrong information

3. And where is my wedding certificate?

Please also explain in more detail your comment " we have been honest and open with you"

J XXXXXXXXX

I get an automated email saying you have received the above email on the same day, so we are now up to the 28th November 2008
I get not official reply to the above.
Another issue now, I send this on the 19th December
My complaints against first choice have not been forgotten and small claims procedures have been issued.

Just wanted to let you know of another incident of poor service from you.

As stated in my previous complaints, we were originally told the wedding certificate would take no longer than 2 weeks after returning to the country. Your website states it could take up to 3 months.

My Wife rang your "customer Services" yesterday and asked about the certificate, she was told it will be within 6 months.

So which is it

A) Within 2 weeks of return

B) Within 3 months

C) Within 6 months

The service by you is just simply a joke

I want to know the exact date I will be getting the certificate

Mr XXXXXX

Yes I get another automated message the same day saying you have received my email.

So I am still waiting for replies to the two emails above, on the 5th January I send this
I am getting used to being ignored by you, but please answer my email below

-----Original Message-----
From: XXXXXXXX
Sent: 19 December 2008 09:25
To: 'Customer.Services@firstchoice.co.uk'
Subject: RE: Reference: XXXXXXXXXXX

My complaints against first choice have not been forgotten and small claims procedures have been issued.

Just wanted to let you know of another incident of poor service from you.

As stated in my previous complaints, we were originally told the wedding certificate would take no longer than 2 weeks after returning to the country. Your website states it could take up to 3 months.

My Wife rang your "customer Services" yesterday and asked about the certificate, she was told it will be within 6 months.

So which is it

A) Within 2 weeks of return

B) Within 3 months

C) Within 6 months

The service by you is just simply a joke

I want to know the exact date I will be getting the certificate

Mr XXXXXXXXXXX

That's right another automated message on the 5th to say you have received my email.

To this day I have not had a response to any of my last 3 emails, you have received them because I have received automated messages.

So that brings us to the present day but before I talk about your latest incompetence can I just say that reading all these emails and letters back I notice I do not really get an explanation or serious apology, come on you have got top hold your hands up and say you have made errors
So no word from you for a while, I am beginning to think I may have said something to upset you.
On the 3rd February 2009 I had a voice message to phone XXXXX at First Choice, I rang her back at 6.33pm.
I rang the number and the call was answered by a colleague of XXXXX, I did the obvious and asked for XXXXX. I was put through to her and she asked who I was, now I gave my name to her colleague before she put the call through.
I said I was Mr XXXXX and that she had left me a message, she said " Have I been talking to your daughter about your booking" I said I hope not she is only 4 years old. XXXXX then said "Is this about Mr Dickinson's Booking" I said no XXXXX you left a message for me, I am Mr XXXXX.
XXXXX then said, oh yes sorry I rang to let you know that your wedding pack is here ready for your wedding" I explained that I have been married since September.
She then went silent and returned by saying "I mean your wedding certificate"
She explained that I needed to come to Bolton (I live in XXXXXX) to collect the certificate, I asked could it be sent to my house or XXXXXX Branch. She said no, got to come here and collect incase it gets lost.
Now common sense surely would send it from your weddings department to the XXXXXX Branch.
So today Saturday the 7th February I travel to Bolton to pick up my certificate that we have been waiting for since we got married.
Now you are going to love this:
The certificate was just handed to me, no time by XXXXX (May have been the same XXXX I spoke to on the phone) to offer to go through it with me.
I went back to my car and had a look at the certificate, to my horror I discovered 2 mistakes, they are as follows
1) The date we got married was registered as the 23rd October 2008, we actually got married on the 23rd September 2008.
2) My Mothers name was registered as Susan Anne XXXX, it is in fact Susan Anne XXXX. She has not been called XXXX for 30 years and all info we gave about relatives clearly stated my mothers name being XXXXX.
Now to get the date wrong is just utter incompetence, how is it possible to have the wrong date on my wedding certificate. Please do not respond and say it is the fault of the Dominican embassy, it is your responsibility.
I told you at the start of my letter that I had a surprise for you, do you like that? A classic piece of customer service yeah?
I returned in the store with the incorrect certificate and XXX rang your weddings department, I was told my Wife (Sorry can I call her that? Are we actually legally married as I only noticed the mistakes in English, do not know what the rest of the certificate said as I am not fluent in Spanish) could at least change her bank account into the name of XXXXX.
Oh great, matter closed at least we can change her bank details. What a stupid thing to say, this was our wedding day, a special moment for both of us but at least she can have XXXXX on her debit card now and wait until she can change every other item.
XXXXX offered no apology, to top it all off I asked when a new certificate can be issued and I was told it could take up to 6 months. Now as you can imagine that comment did not go down to well and if I did not have my daughter with me then I probably would have turned the air blue with my comments.
XXXXX attitude was appalling, she could she how angry I was and I was offered not even a sorry from her, if I was in her position I would be there for the customer by saying " right I cant promise anything but I will try and get this sorted for you ASAP, sorry about the problems" Instead her whole attitude was tough, you have to wait 6 months. Now if she worked for me she would not be in a customer facing role.
I rang my wife (Is it ok to call her wife) and told her what had happened, she was very angry which is understandable and rang your customer services.
She rang me back to say she was told customer services are closed on a weekend and somebody would call her on Monday. Now to have a customer service dept that cannot be called upon on a weekend is a mystery to me. I suppose they all go on training courses at weekends to ensure they offer only best possible service to their customers, yes thought not.
A while ago we said we were never, never booking a holiday with first choice again but unfortunately we have had to go back on our word. Our friends are getting married at the same location in June and we have had to book through you as it's your Village. I hate the fact that I am giving you more money but we are going for our friends.
It's amazing because our friends have not been given any help by you regarding legal paperwork. With our experience we are helping them, I am personally surprised that they have not canceled and gone with somebody else.
So we are going to the Dominican again on the 12th XXXXX, It may be easier just to go and collect the certificate from there?
So in closing as I am sure you are bored now, I do not want to be ignored, I do not want a standard response to this after 3.5 months, I want a response to this within 7 days of the postal of this letter (9th Feb), not the date it finally gets to someone in the relevant department have I have already experienced that could take over 3 months. So a response by 16th February please
What are you going to do about all my comments in this letter and as I stated earlier on in this letter I have never had true response from you or real apology and you have to admit we have been very badly done by and you owe it to us to offer compensation for your lack of customer service
On a final note I have wasted a morning of my time driving from XXXXX to Bolton plus spending time in your shop and driving back home again for no reason. So please consider my time and petrol expense. To save me doing the above is it not a good idea for your wedding department to actual check the wedding certificates before they go out to the customer? And please explain how a replacement can take up to another 6 months?

Mr XXXXX

PS. I am finishing this off on Monday 9th February, the day my Wife was told she would get a call from your "customer Services" department, nothing yet! Don't worry I will let you know if we don't get the call.

Copy: ABTA

Letter Finished, if you are still reading this on holiday truths. We did get a phone call on the Monday but it was from a manager at bolton branch, now I coulsd have spoke to a manager when I was there saturday. He told my wife that somebody from customer services will ring on wednesday, guess what no phone call. We did get a phone call on the tuesday however from weddings stating that the reason my mothers surname was wrong was the fact they took it off my birth certificate. Part of the £900
legal paperwork stated her true surname. They offered no apolgy and said we will have to wait 6 months for a certificate, we will be married nearly a year by then.