If you’re considering joining a travel club, this Ottawa couple’s experience will give you second thoughts. They wanted to fly from the national capital to Venice, but instead of booking them flights out of YOW, the travel club sent them two tickets to Italy via Ontario, not the province, but the one that is a city in California.
Keri Oakley posted her story on Facebook and said the club wouldn’t correct the booking or refund the tickets so she and her husband had to find a way to get to California so they could enjoy their three-week vacation to Europe.
“Our amazing race begins … with a 4.5-hour drive to the Toronto airport, from (Toronto) to Atlanta, Atlanta to Ontario, California, then Ontario to San Francisco, (San Francisco) to Frankfurt, Germany, Frankfurt to Venice,” Oakley said, adding it will be the same route on the way home.
She appeared on local radio station CFRA earlier this week to describe her situation, but wouldn’t name the travel club, although she noted she probably wouldn’t use their services again.
Travel clubs usually charge a subscription fee to give members access to discounts or deals on travel-related services ranging from airfare to car rentals, cruises and full vacation packages. They are slightly different from vacation clubs which generally center around accommodations, often using a points system for specific properties.
