Composite letter  27th May 2008                   HOME
This letter is a composite of 3 letters.
1. My original complaint printed in black
2. Thos. Cook response in blue
3. My reaction to Thos. Cook response in red

Thomas Cook Tours
PO Box 5,
12 Collingsbury Road
Peterborough,
PE3 8XP

Re:- The Eastern Spirit Tour . ref: 66021394

Dear Sirs,

Please find attached our completed holiday customer feedback form.

Dear Mr Parker,
Thank you for taking the time to contact us with regard to your recent tour on the Eastern Spirit. Initially, I would like to apologise for our delay in responding and I thank you for your patience.
Thomas Cooks' responses to all correspondence has been lamentable. This evidences a complete lack of interest in ourselves as your clients. What replies have been received have been sent outside the ABTA code of practice. Answers have often been made without properly reading the letters sent. This is obvious from the many answers which have not related to the question/ complaints. Many points have either not been addressed, or have been 'fobbed-off'. Far too many of our letters to you have never been received (Lost in the post?) …. Far too many for us to believe it is entirely the fault of the postal services. At least one letter has the appearance of bearing a back-dated date …. either that or it was allowed to fester on a desk somewhere before sending it out. (9 days). Thos . Cook motto is that "Our world revolves around you" …. we see no evidence, of this as you will note below.

This letter consists of three parts
In black our original letter of 31st October 2007.
In blue Thos. Cook's response dated 16th January 2008.
In red our observations relating to the 16th January letter.

You may wonder why there is such a delay in our responding to your letter. If you look at our website www.dfparker.co.uk you will see that we have been trying to get from Thomas Cook, confirmation that copies of your letter of 16th January 2008 had been sent to the Tonbridge branch, and to your Director's office. It took us four reminders to get a response … that is why there has been a delay. We needed this confirmation because we could not believe that what was written in the 16th January letter would be acceptable to the Directors. As we have not heard anything from them, we are assuming they are completely happy with the content, tone and delays.

Before commencing with the real purpose of this letter, which is to comment on our recent Thomas Cook holiday, we felt that it was worth-while letting you know what our expectation levels for this tour were.

We knew from the description of the holiday that it would be lot of travelling. We also knew that Thomas Cook were not providing any meals. We were therefore aware of the potentially tiring nature of the holiday, and were quite happy to be able to purchase food, thereby giving us a chance to eat what we wanted, rather than fixed (set) menu of Thomas Cook's choice.

We have already been on four touring holidays, one with Cosmos when we travelled similar distances in the West Coast of America, and three trips with Journeys of Distinction in New Zealand, Canada and China. As JOD didn't have an East coast of America trip, we decided to take your 'Signature' tour.
We could have taken a far cheaper alternative, but decided that as your Eastern Spirit tour was one of your 'Signature' tours, (one, we assume you wanted to be compared against), and as it was by no means cheap, that it would be quality throughout.

First impressions count for a lot and we were very impressed with a young lady named Holly in your Tonbridge branch who was very attentive and helpful. The taxi journey to Heathrow and driver were excellent, as was the lady who welcomed us at Heathrow. The Virgin flight was one of the best we have ever had.

We were feeling really good and buoyant, and looking forward to more of the same.

We expected to be greeted by our Tour Guide at Heathrow, either at Check-in or the Lounge (excellent), but, in fact he did not make himself known to us until shortly before arriving in Dulles Airport. He advised us that we had got to the airport too early and 'must have missed us in the lounge' …. (in fact he seemed to have missed everybody).

I was sorry to read that you did not have the opportunity to meet your Tour Manager at Heathrow Airport. It would appear that on this particular occasion, there were a number of guests that did arrive early and checked in for their flight and then continued through to the lounge, therefore, not having the opportunity to meet him. I do, however, regret any disappointment caused.

If a number of guests did arrive early, and went into the ordinary lounge, then that is as maybe. We were in the private lounge, with other Thos. Cook travellers. The tour manager was not there. It was the ideal place to contact us with the minimum of effort by himself. There were two hours available to him between check-in and boarding. He chose not to bother. He didn't make himself known at the boarding gate. He wasn't anywhere to be seen until he had no option but to seek us out and speak to us … and then only to give confusing and conflicting instructions.

He advised some of us to meet him at the top of a particular ramp at the exit at Dulles, and others to meet him at the bottom … not a good start.

He was absent on arrival at Dulles airport, offering no support until we clients tried to sort out where we were to meet him. He eventually arrived and instructed us all to go outside and await the coach.
This we did, waiting for over 1 hour in 90 degrees temperature. He was not present for most of this time and left us with no idea what was going on. Communication was nil …. which transpired to be the norm for the entire holiday. After an hour he was asked whether it was time for him to provide local taxis, as some were suffering from the heat. He said that the coach was only five minutes away. After a further 30 minutes, the coach arrived. He mentioned that the delay was the coach-driver's fault, although the coach driver had his own opinions.

Naturally, it was disappointing to learn that your first impressions of the tour were not of a standard we would expect our company to provide. The first impressions were fine …. it was when the tour manager got involved that problems started. It would appear that due to human error, the coach driver arrived later than anticipated and the coach company have asked that we apologise for any disappointment.
I can't understand why the coach company would apologise for a problem that was patently not of their making. The coach was virtually within sight, and the driver was waiting for the agreed-upon call to collect us …. Why would the coach company apologise for waiting for a call that the tour manager obviously didn't make. The tour manager was useless at managing the situation, and showed no concern for some of the passengers who were severely suffering in the heat. (Myself included).

The Channel Hotel Washington hotel was fine, although there were no convenient eating houses near, leaving us to eat in-house which proved a nice meal. The guide for Washington was monotonic and tried to rush everybody from place to place. Some passengers were not able to keep up his pace. To do justice to the Tour Manager, he did try to slow him down, but eventually gave up.
It was pleasing to read that you were happy with the Channel Hotel Washington. Although I appreciate you were not fully satisfied with the tour guide on this occasion, It would have been nice to hear that the tour-guide company had apologised … (as did the coach company?). I suppose you will continue to use this tour guide … perhaps he worked within your agreed standards. I do hope that you did get the opportunity to see some of the many wonders Washington DC has to offer. Washington is a really nice place to visit.

The highlight of our evening tour of Washington was being deposited for dinner in a dirty, fast-food hall which should have been condemned as being unsanitary.
You seem not to have noticed this comment. It is to do with the safety of your clients. Are you not concerned? Have you advised the tour manager not to go there again? You would probably have been as pleased as I was when I entered the Gentlemen's toilets, only to find the lavatory pans overflowing, used toilet paper on the floor, begrimed wash-hand basins … and to cap it off, a kitchen hand in the fast food stall we used was seen walking directly from the toilet cubicle, back to the kitchens without washing his hands. Was this satisfactory?.... and to Thomas Cook standards?

We didn't realise it at the time of booking, but as an after-thought we find it strange that the next stop was Albany (419 miles) stopping at Philadelphia for lunch. We eventually arrived at Albany at 6pm with no other place than the hotel to eat. We set off for Niagara early to cover many more miles arriving well after lunch, eventually arriving at the Hampton Inn at 6.30pm. What we find it difficult to understand was why did we all have to go such a long way round to get to Niagara? It may have been far better to find a stopping place somewhere along a straighter line. You may like to consider this for future itineraries.
I would like to thank you for your feedback regarding the itinerary and the order in which we visit certain destinations. We do take many different factors into consideration when compiling the tours together. The feedback you have provided us with will certainly be considered and should any adjustments need to be made, we will make the alterations and amend the information as outlined in our brochures.
It is interesting to note that further on in your letter *(SEE BELOW) you state that the coach driver should not drive for long stretches . (The McDonalds … 20 minutes outside of New York), whereas you seem to find these massive distances acceptable … Is there a double standard here?

The coach driver got lost running between Niagara and Toronto. This was the first of at least 5 occasions when the coach-driver got lost, often wasting our precious free time. (We didn't go on the Quebec City tour, but we understand he got lost a further three times there as well).
It was of concern to learn that the driver had got lost" on occasions when travelling from one destination to another. Please be assured, Mr Parker, that this information has been relayed to the relevant areas to prevent any repetition on future travellers.
We lost hours of holiday time, and the driver drove further than he should have done on these 'occasions' as you call them. I notice that Thomas Cook is unable to express anything more than "concern". Not even regret, or even sorrow. Certainly no apology. (Please remind yourselves that "Our World revolves around you"). …. but perhaps not on this 'occasion'.

The Days Inn Hotel was acceptable, and there was at least somewhere other than the hotel to eat.

On the way to Ottawa we stopped at a coffee stop. Lunch was at Kingston, but we were later in the day deposited at a trucker's stop, presumably for high tea.
What is it about Thomas Cook holidays in America? … With all your undoubted experience in designing holidays … why can't you find somewhere other than greasy spoon roadside stalls to eat?

Every time we passed into a new State, our Tour Manager opened his travel guide and read from it. Much was interesting, however he had a great interest in the history of the States, which was at times, over-powering. What we never had, at any time, was local information, such as the name of the river we were crossing, or the purpose of imposing buildings we were passing. We have always had this sort of information given to us on our previous tours, and sorely missed it on this trip. Our coach driver did pass on some information to the Tour Manager, but he generally chose not to repeat it over the microphone, so eventually, the driver stopped trying. Thinking that the Tour Manager was new to Thomas Cooks, and that he had not yet been evaluated by yourselves, he was asked when he first worked for you, and was amazed to be told that he had done so for at least 10 years.
I was sorry to learn that you were unhappy with the knowledge of the destinations you visited from (the Tour Manager). At this point, I would highlight that (the Tour Manager) is a highly experienced Tour Manager and the information he provided was from past visits to these areas. (He read verbatim from a tour guide book! … and then only when he passed a state border) As you may appreciate, our tour managers do travel to many destinations and to ensure that every tour can improve by providing as much information as possible, they will make notes so that they can share this with our guests, who in turn will get as much out of their time overseas as possible.
So this tour manager was up to the required Thomas Cook standards then … interesting !

Everything in Ottawa was really good, with the Lord Elgin Hotel particularly so.

By this time most people were feeling uncomfortable, and we were beginning to realise how 'basic' the coach was, with not particularly comfortable seats. The saving grace was that as there were only 27 travellers on the coach, some were able to spread out into unused seats. If it had been a full trip, I daren't guess at how people would have fared. The air-conditioning was 'patchy' to say the least.
The comments made regarding the standard of the coach provided have been noted with regret. Our records would indicate that the one provided was of a standard that we would expect. I do, however, regret that you were personally disappointed with this. Once again, Thomas Cook seem to be happy to provide services at a lower standard than we have come to expect from other tour companies. What happened to your seat rotation policy? It just didn't happen. He said, (actually said,) that he couldn't be bothered to do it and expected us to "act like adults".

Montreal was fine, as was the Novotel Hotel. What did cheer us up was that we had an excellent guide for the Montreal tour

This may be the time to point out that the Tour Manager was never available to us. He never provided his room number, nor his telephone number. He was never more than 5 minutes early for any departure time, and apart from getting the hotel keys en-bloc, which was very helpful, he disappeared as soon as the coach arrived. In short, he never made himself available.
It was disappointing to learn that you did not feel (Name) made himself available throughout the tour. Although the room number was not provided to you whilst on the tour, I must stress that you did have the facility to contact him via reception should you have had any queries or concerns.
I suppose that it all comes down to what other tour companies do …. and what we have come to expect as being the norm with the other companies. When we tried to contact him via reception in New York, just minutes after arriving …. He was not contactable via the Hotel reception.

According to your holiday brochure, we were next going to a suburb of Boston, with an orientation tour followed by the rest of the day free in Boston.

What we had was as follows:-
We were not in a 'suburb of Boston'. We were not even in Andover. We were some distance outside Andover in a really poor hotel, with unbelievably bad service levels. We were captive here. .. there was nowhere else to go … is this the best that Thomas Cook can offer in a bustling city the size of Boston? Where is your travel agent's experience? Our Tour Manager asked us not make any complaints to the hotel. He said that Thomas Cook were very lucky to have the hotel as a stopping-place, and as other tour companies would like to use them. If we complained, Thomas Cook might not get further bookings. I see you have not responded to this. …. Why haven't you commented? … that you haven't contradicted what the tour manager said probably means that his statement was true. As there were 27 of us with no choice but to eat there, we were instructed to make reservations so 'they could cope with the numbers'. There was one sorely pressed and un-trained young girl, 'helped' by a lady who floated about as if she were in a trance, 'assisted' by a 'waiter' who did no waiting except for going from table to table upsetting people. We paid a fixed price for a four course meal. They tried to miss out the second and third courses such was their command of what was going on. Our food was fine, but other guests were quite voluble about the quality of theirs. Admittedly all our courses were cold when they got to us, but we were so pleased to eventually see the food that we didn't send it back.
What really annoyed me, that after all this they refused to take off the mandatory 18% service charge. All we got was a shrug of the shoulders.
I can't understand why such a terrible experience at your hands can be shrugged off without even raising a comment from you.

Andover is 30 odd miles outside Boston. Surely a few miles further travelling would have been preferable to what Thomas Cook made us suffer at the Wyndham Andover Hotel?
Why were we not in a sufficiently close position to Boston to be able to go into the City and eat?
Why put us in Andover where we were captive to that shambles?
No answers received to this quite reasonable question. What is you said earlier in your letter? "The feedback you have provided us with will certainly be considered and should any adjustments need to be made, we will make the alterations and amend the information as outlined in our brochures".

The following morning we were looking forward to one of the high-lights of our holiday …. Boston.
However, our tour guide decided, unilaterally, and without asking us, to take us to the Minuteman Museum which took 2/3 hours. We were then taken to Concord for coffee, and then Lexington, where we were deposited for lunch.
In addition to this, I have noted that Concord and Lexington give a great insight into the history of the USA and I hope that you did enjoy this.
You don't quite seem to understand … we wanted to go to Boston. Your brochure said Boston, and that is where we expected to have a full day. Does it not occur to you that the Minuteman Museum, Concord and Lexington are not Boston? To go there just because the tour guide fancies it is just beyond belief.
Eventually we got to Boston after getting lost yet again, losing about a further hour. We got to Boston mid-afternoon where we were then taken on a mandatory three hour trip. (In the circumstances, many of us would have preferred to be free to look at Boston on our own, but we were not given that opportunity). …. and he took us around a boat yard, also not on the itinerary …. but then I understand from a fellow passenger that he was interested in warships. When we were finally granted our freedom (approx. 6pm), the Tour manager instructed us to be back to the coach so that we could return to the hotel for dinner. This did not please too many people, so we were allowed to stay at Quincy market for two hours so that we could eat there. He 'allowed' this late departure from Boston, and the ability to eat somewhere reasonable because he had a virtual riot on his hands … did he mention that to you at all?

In summary, our Boston trip consisted of a half day we didn't want… 1 hour getting lost, a coffee break and a lunch break that we could have had in Boston, but didn't. Absolute disaster and a great disappointment.
I was very sorry to read of the problems you experienced on route to Boston. It would appear that you were supposed to arrive into Boston at 10.30am for sightseeing, however, due to an oversight, you were sent to Concord and Lexington and then to visit Boston later in the day.
So this entire travesty of a lost day's holiday was merely an "oversight", was it?

We left for New York and because we were unable to get into the hotel until 3pm, the Tour Manager arranged for us to have a coffee break in a trucker's stop. Once again we had to eat in a dirty greasy spoon. And, even better later on, for lunch at a McDonalds for an hour. Do you know anyone who has ever tried spending an hour in a McDonalds? When getting off the coach, I personally asked him if any consideration had been given to continuing to New York rather than stop at McDonalds. He said it had been considered. I asked him whether the result of that consideration was YES. He said NO. I asked him why, …. and he told me that others had asked to stop there for 1 hour. Try as I might, I couldn't get anyone to own up to this request.
In your letter, you have stated that when you set off to New York, you stopped at a McDonalds on route. At this point, I would highlight that there were a number of alternative eating establishments, should McDonalds not have suited your needs.
How right you are … there was a fast-food, stand up and eat pizza slices for sale which was described as being "Italian food available" by the tour manager! Is this acceptable to Thomas Cook? In addition to this, it has been noted that your driver required a break and I am sure you will agree, if you are travelling long distances, * a break would be recommended for the safety of all passengers on board.
This was one of the shorter runs that the coach driver made, and it was in 'home' territory. The stop was for the convenience of the tour manager … nothing more … nothing less. There was no interest in his passenger's needs …. and why McDonalds?, or are we once again eating to Thomas Cook standards?

We eventually got to New York at about 2.40pm. The rooms were ready at 3pm, but as the Tour Manager was nowhere to be seen, reception would not release the keys. Where was he? We went to reception and asked for him … as you have suggested earlier that we should do …but he was 'unavailable' Eventually we managed to get them to release them to one of our party who distributed them, allowing us to get to the rooms at 3.20pm.
Why was it not possible to get to New York earlier, drop us and the cases, and let us have some freedom for the couple of wasted hours?
The comments regarding the check in at the hotel in New York have been noted with regret. Usually, the check in times for this hotel are 4pm and as you arrived earlier than anticipated, you did have to wait for your rooms to ensure they were ready for your arrival. I did note, however, that you were able to check in earlier than expected. Did you read my comment above? The keys were available … but without the tour manager, reception would not release them and I hope you did enjoy your time here.
With such a high road mileage holiday, the amount of time in any city seems to have been minimal (made worse by continually getting lost, being in Hotels miles away from the centres, stopping at greasy spoons whilst we could have continued for 20 minutes and got a further 3 hours in New York).

Once we left the coach at JF Kennedy airport, we never saw anything of our Tour manager again, except for when he was queuing for the toilet!

The Virgin Airlines trip both to and from the States were excellent, as was the taxi ride home.
It was pleasing to read that you did enjoy your flights and your private taxi home. We use Virgin Atlantic and Hallmark Cars as they have an outstanding service history and I am sure they would wish to thank you for your very complimentary remarks.
What was good on the tour, we have been happy to acknowledge. …. However, has it not occurred to you that that which was good was generally not Thomas Cook, but your contractors

In fact, all the things that went OK were not too much to do with Thomas Cook!

From the foregoing you may get the impression that we were less than impressed with Thomas Cook.
I should also say that instead of writing to you immediately upon our return, we decided to wait until we cooled down a bit. For that reason, we hope that this is a more constructive missive than it otherwise might have been.

Needless to say, we would not be too keen on considering Thomas Cook again, and whenever asked by friends we are happy to relate, at least some of our feelings.

As one member of the tour aptly put it at JF Kennedy Airport. ………

……. "This has been more of an experience than a holiday"

There are, of course, two sides to every story and we will await your responses, hopefully in the near future.

Several times you asked whether we enjoyed certain aspects of the holiday. We can honestly say that the whole holiday was a continuing disaster, made far worse by an incompetent tour manager who had a private agenda which saw very few meeting points with his clients needs.

The trauma of the holiday has not been improved by the seeming disinterest of Thomas Cook. Customer Relations team. The quality and tardiness of their replies makes me feel that you have a massive department there that is over-run with similar queries.

When we started this back in October, we just expected that something would get done about the tour manager;…. that hopefully you would not employ him to further spoil more of your client's holidays.

We expected that Thomas Cook would take an interest in this and, perhaps, even apologise for causing us to waste 14 days of our lives and £3,590 with your agency.

As this has progressed over the last 8 months, we have been made to realise just how bad everything about Eastern Spirit was.

Because we did get some good moments on the trip, we are not going to claim a complete refund of the sum paid.
As we received barely 50% of what we should have done, we have attached our invoice for £1,795.00 (due payable on or before 10th June 2008) which will be in full and final settlement for not providing a holiday in line with your brochure, causing us anguish, loss of time, the dangers you have put us in, and the distress you have caused us by not taking our complaint seriously enough to answer within your agreed upon turn-round times.

We hope that by now you will getting a sense that we will 'not go away'.
We are happy to take this matter as far as due processes allow us.

We expect a reply on or before Friday 13th June 2008 . Failure to respond within this timeframe will cause us to further consider our continuing actions.

Yours sincerely,

David and Diane Parker

Copy to:- Thomas Cook, Tonbridge.

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