CheapCaribbean.com Reviews

Hounded ENDLESSLY by Amstar which was not disclosed by CheapCaribbean - at the shuttle at the airport upon arrival for 45 minutes while the shuttle driver stood there, upon check-in at the hotel again another 45 minutes, then called our room every 2 hours EVERY DAY - every morning and afternoon to try and get us to schedule an appointment with them!!! Paid for private shuttle to and from the airport - crammed into a 15-passenger van...took pictures of everything and filed a complaint with the Better Business Bureau including pictures. This was a horrible trip and I wouldn't recommend them to anyone - their customer service is deplorable and you don't get what you pay for. If I could rate zero stars - I would.

My girlfriend and I booked a weeklong stay in Puerto Vallarta Mexico through CheapCaribbean.com. We booked a European-style package meaning no food or drinks included since we don’t drink a lot. The airfare and hotel were fine. We also booked transportation to and from the airport as well as a Marietas islands snorkeling trip through CheapCaribbean.com. CheapCaribbean is owned and run by Apple vacations LLC, and a company called Amstar coordinates the activities and transportation in Mexico. Amstar also books tours and activities through a company called Vallarta Adventures.

We had 2 issues with our trip: We were not satisfied with the snorkeling trip as I will explain below and Amstar did not pick us up from our hotel to go to the airport. We were told there would be an Amstar representative at our resort. There was no representative. We were told by staff they usually come for a short time in the morning but when we woke up early to catch them, they were not there. Amstar and Apple have absolutely no support and when you call the 800 number for help, you can only speak to offshore call centers that can’t really do anything but listen to you complain and say they are sorry, an unpleasant interaction for both parties.

We filed complaints with post-travel at Apple which is a call center in India by the sound of the agent's accent. Very nice staff who are there to take your complaint and forward it to apple, which then decides to either escalate the case to someone who can actually help or reject it. Then it's up to these poor Indian guys to take all the heat and apologize for Apple's poor business practices. They told us that Amstar was unresponsive and there was nothing they could do.

Apple should have just refunded us and taken some responsibility for doing business with a poorly run company like Amstar. The snorkeling trip was straight-up false advertising, and the transportation was paid for and not even provided! Apple has completely closed all lines of communication, both email and phone, and just pay these call centers to take the heat so that they don’t have to have any contact with furious customers. If I was in the Philly area, I'd try going to their HQ in newton square PA but I'm sure that would be a waste of time also. After some searching, I found that they also have a declaimer on the site that they don’t take responsibility for false advertising, definitely the first red flag that you should not book anything through Apple or subsidiaries.

Here is the description of the snorkeling trip on cheapcarribean.com: “Visit the volcanic Marieta islands made famous by Jacques Cousteau. Snorkel, kayak and explore the wonders of this unique ecosystem and rock formations that make this an experience to be remembered for a lifetime” What the trip is actually like: Wake up at 5:30 am to get to the port. First bad sign, the entire time the boat is underway, they are blasting party rock from the early 00s. Think “party rockers in the house tonight…”. For hours… they suggest to ride up top if the volume level bothers you.

we arrive at the islands and are required to wear lifejackets so no free diving, whatever national park rules. Then we are forced to swim in a group of 40 or so, for about 10 minutes and get back on the boat. That’s it. 10 min of swimming around in deep jellyfish-infested waters where you can’t even dive to see things up close. Then the boat circles the island and we leave.

Kayaks are a lie, secret beach is a lie, even the snorkeling is pretty much a lie. We then cruise on the party boat for an hour or so to a private beach. The whole time blasting party rock with an open bar of cheap liquor and beer. neither I nor my girlfriend drink so that was completely wasted on us. Music blaring the entire time of course.

Then we arrive at the private beach where we have to spend another hour or 2 with nothing to do but drink or ride on speedboat towed, banana rafts (And of course the party rock, they have speakers up and down the beach). I would have loved to go snorkeling at this beach which would have made the whole thing a little enjoyable, but can’t do that because of speed boat traffic from the stupid banana boats. At this point we would have gladly paid to take a taxi back but there are no roads to or from this beach. As if it couldn’t get any worse, Vallarta Adventures makes the poor crew perform karaoke and air guitar reenactments of popular funk and R&B hits with James Brown wig, fake guitars and everything. At least the lead crew member has a great voice, just a shame he has to do these ridiculous skits. This not only wasted an entire day of our vacation but also a night since we had to get to bed early.

Apple should take responsibility for their products and they should hold their partners to a higher standard but I guess that’s what you get when you book with budget sites. Both these companies exist to take tourists' money and provide the bare minimum of service and I’m sure their workers don’t see any benefits of this profiteering. Then each company can say it’s the others responsibility and once they take your money, it’s not coming back whether you receive the product you paid for or not.

My advice to anyone considering a budget vacation would be to go to a site like cheapCaribbean.com and find the flight and hotel, then book directly through the resort and airlines. If anything goes wrong, Apple vacations had insured that they don’t have to take any responsibility for the quality of the products or lack thereof since they only exist as a middleman. This was a good lesson in why you don’t use Apple LLC or any subsidiaries. We are only out a few hundred from it but it's hard to put a price on wasting an entire day of a short vacation.

I just wanted my money back for the transportation that never arrived and was ten times more than the local fares and a refund for the add-on package since it wasted an entire day of my trip. The parent company, Apple, would not refund me anything and simply offered me free transportation on my next trip with the which will NEVER happen. It took over six weeks to get this response and around 10 phonecall and more emails. Horrible company, Amstar was horrible, Puerta Vallarta adventures was horrible, and the parent company Apple is horrible to deal with. Do not get your vacation through any of these companies.

Now I am asking for an extension and since I have until 6/30/22 I have to take within the next 2 weeks and pay full amount for air...So far no resolution for this...They took the $1300...That I paid...And they will not do anything...For everyone that reads this do not book anything with these people they are... Bogus..And very poor in their promises...Do not book with them...

To start, and quite possibly the worst part of the experience, the food. INEDIBLE. I have been on plenty of all inclusive vacations. I know the food is usually ok, but nothing too spectacular. I always go to an all inclusive resort with a realistic expectation on the food not being the best. But I have always been able to find options that I am completely satisfied with. I am astounded that they would serve such poor quality and poor tasting food. The meats always looked like a mystery. The ones we were brave enough to try, we could not even distinguish what animal the meat came from or the texture or flavor was so bad that we could not eat more. My friend and I are not picky eaters. One of the things we enjoy most about traveling together is trying different food. How a resort in Mexico can have little to no Mexican food options, I will never understand.

The 1 Mexican restaurant that is on site should not even be classified as Mexican food. It was cold, bland, grey, and the meats were always weird textures. And that's how the food was at every restaurant and buffet. We had to order food from outside the resort twice for dinner and left the resort to have food in town for lunch too. We should not have to leave the resort or order food just to be able to get something decent to eat, so that we do not make ourselves physically ill from either eating the food at Sandos, or not eating at all.

The alcoholic drinks were equally bad. Despite our many efforts, we did not feel buzzed, drunk, tipsy, or even the slightest bit relaxed like you feel when you drink alcohol. We did not taste alcohol, period. The "alcohol" is either so watered down that it is practically water, or it's actually just water. One of the things that excited me the most was reading the food and drink menus online for the resort. The drinks sounded so exotic and delicious. Every single thing I tried that wasn't a beer was so unbearably sweet, syrupy, and artificial tasting. Everything fruit based tasted like it had a lot of artificial sweetener in it. They also do not clean the reusable plastic cups very well, because they always felt sticky.

The room was not what I was expecting for the Select Club, which we paid more to be in. I can't imagine what the regular rooms are like, if this is what we got for paying extra. The floors were filthy (just walking from the shower to the bedroom barefoot would turn my feet dark and dirty. There were also lots of ants in our room. Our balcony door would not lock and we were told that if we had any food in the room to be careful because monkeys can open the door and will come in to steal food. We were in a building near the adults only pool and every time we walked around the bend to get to our building, all we could smell was a raw sewage smell. It was revolting.

The Select Club was a scam. We paid extra so that we could enjoy adults only perks. The beach and pool mainly. The adults only pool and beach was filled with kids, and no monitoring. So what exactly did we get charged more to be in adults only for? It's really unacceptable. The beach is next. Massive, massive amounts of seaweed covering the shoreline and in the water. If you want to get to the clear (not really clear like I was expecting, but as clear as it could get there I guess) water, you have to wade through tons of seaweed first. Which also makes the beach smell bad. While I can understand and appreciate that this is something that is typical to happen in Mexico this time of year, we had no knowledge of this and would have likely scheduled the trip for a different month if we knew.

It would have been nice to have that disclosure prior to booking, considering we learned that this was not a 1 time phenomenon and it happens every year around this time. During the Royal Elite timeshare pitch, our rep suggested that we visit the sister resort, Sandos Playacar, that is 5 stars. We paid $42 for the taxi roundtrip (literally 5 minutes away) only to experience the same gross beach covered in seaweed and the adults only sections being inundated with children. The food was equally as bad/inedible. So what was 5 stars? The only positive I can say is that at least Sandos Playacar attempts to take care of the seaweed problem by having a beach plow driving up and down and having employees use rakes to move the seaweed.

The night life was another issue. Because there was no night life. There was a nightly show at 8pm. It would be over by 9pm. There would be another hour of the same dj'ed music every night. By 10pm, the entire resort is dead. No energy, no excitement. No dance club on site. I've never been to a resort that had nothing going on at night. So we would go back to the room and put the tv on, only to be disappointed that there are approximately 5 channels available.

One of the most triggering situations is the fact that there are non-stop people violating your personal space and approaching you to sell something. Whether it be a massage, excursion, hair braiding, photos...it never ended. Outside vendors selling things is something typical to Mexico and the Caribbean, but this was on another level. I'm not even sure if the vendors were 3rd party, or working for the resort. Either way, it was completely aggressive, disruptive, and it was happening about 30-50 times a day. Even if you're laying on the beach taking a nap, they will wake you up and ask you to buy whatever they have. This was even happening in the pool, while we were inside the pool.

Someone literally hovered above us at the edge of the pool and tried selling us something. Does that sound like an enjoyable experience? To be relentlessly harassed and followed around and have people begging you to buy from them and not taking no for an answer? The demanding sales people did not stop when you told them no either. You would have to say no 4 or 5 times before they would leave you alone. It made me dread leaving the room to even walk around the resort daily or to go to the beach or pool.

The Royal Elite scam is something I also need to discuss. They ask you to be part of a sales pitch to buy a timeshare, which they keep insisting is not a timeshare. They promise all these free things in order to lure you in and offer to only take 90 mins of your time and that it will take place over breakfast. So we show up for our presentation and are taken to the same gross buffet that's available to everyone. No special breakfast, and certainly not offered anything that the Royal Elite members would receive.

We were rushed to eat and get out of breakfast, but the sales pitch was long and drawn out. We were told that the food and drink quality is way better for Royal Elite members. Two things: 1. Why wouldn't the sales presentation include a meal from the Royal Elite exclusive restaurant so that you can actually experience the better quality? and 2. So, there's better quality food available and they are choosing to purposely feed people the same quality of food as prison slop? I am fully confident that the food in the Royal Elite section is the same garbage they're feeding everyone at the resort.

I have been reaching out to Cheap Caribbean every day since returning home, but they do not respond to emails or call people back. I would not have booked this trip if Cheap Caribbean was honest and disclosed what we would actually experience and what we should expect. We were bamboozled into thinking this was a 4 star resort, when it absolutely is not.

About 3 months after purchasing and well before our trip, I happened to go to the actual website of the hotels, only to find out that the water park has planned renovation for 5 months, during which our trip is planned. Nonetheless, CheapCaribbean STILL says complimentary use of water park. I spent 30 minutes on chat and over an hour on the phone requesting to cancel my trip, as the water park was the main attraction for us. I explained in detail that FALSE ADVERTISING is the reason for our cancellation. This is not an error that we made or our own need to cancel, we simply bought something that is not going to deliver as advertised. We were told that we can cancel but it will use/void our trip insurance, which will not be refunded to us and we will only get a travel credit, not an actual refund.

I repeatedly explained that this was through no fault of our own and requested a supervisor but the agent delayed and made every attempt to keep me from talking to one, even said she talked to one for me and was told there is nothing they would do. I was offered a resort with no beach instead. I continued to request a supervisor, but was told it would be 20-30 minutes because they were helping other customers, then after waiting about 15 minutes was told that none of the supervisors were willing to talk to me because they would not change anything. I will NEVER purchase a trip through this company again.

We decided to contact Cheap Caribbean's "During Travel" department once again to see if they could add an additional day onto our trip (which the resort approved), but once again they were nowhere to be found. After several pointless emails from Cheap Caribbean. Thankfully, the hotel was able to provide us an additional night and the airline was able to adjust our flight to accommodate us. Cheap Caribbean, you guys really dropped ball this time. This trip was for our renewal of our wedding vows as well as our honeymoon. Never again!

I have a credit of $288.86 from a trip booked in 2020. Booked a new trip on Jan 29 2022, well ahead of my deadline to use my credits, and not only were they not applied to my trip after notes clearly say they should, they are now telling me I don’t even have any credits!!! I mean you guys are really just going to steal almost $300??? This is ridiculous and completely unacceptable.

Not only will I be leaving negative reviews everywhere that I can find, I will also be contacting the Bureau of Better Business! Me and my family and friends have booked 5 or 6 trips with you, but not anymore. This was it!!! After talking to numerous customer service agents over the past couple years, and being placed on long holds each time to be hung up on and given false promises and guarantees, I will make sure everyone I know, knows how I was treated and to not book with you guys ever again!!! As a company, you should strive for excellence and you have not even come close!!! As a mgr in customer myself I am qualified to tell you that you suck at doing this!!!

All the other hotels were more money and further away from the airport. We asked for a manager and was told twice there wasn't one available. After insisting we wanted our money back and wouldn't hang up until this was resolved the hotel was miraculously available. We will never book with them again. They are scammers who try to keep your money.

Although I checked that option when I first bought it and reiterated it to multiple travel agents on the phone, they sent me travel credits that weren't even equal to 75% of what I paid for the trip. I specifically said to each and every travel agent that I spoke to regarding my refund, that per the travel agreement, "I do not want travel credits. I would like 75% of my money back." So, when I saw that they had completely disregarded the travel insurance agreement and what I told them each and every time we spoke regarding the transaction, I was very upset.

I didn't want to jump to conclusions, so although I was frustrated, I called them hoping that this was all just a mistake that could get resolved quickly. Per the travel insurance agreement, they are supposed to refund the money within 60-90 days. Mind you, it was well outside of the 90-day window at this point. But I calmed my frustration and explained to the agent what happened.

He put me on hold for nearly 45 min to come back and tell me that they would be able to give me only 500 and something dollars. 75% of what I paid was 735 dollars. He offered no explanation as to why they would only be able to give me 500 something and not stick to the travel insurance agreement. I told him that this was unacceptable to me and that I needed to speak to management. I am a licensed attorney in my state and I don't like to throw that around, but I could clearly see that they were breaching the agreement for absolutely no reason. So, I had to escalate the situation.

It wasn't until after I told them that their actions constituted a breach of contract and misrepresentation and applying much pressure and getting hostile that they finally....after nearly 100 days, did what the hell they were supposed to do and GAVE ME MY MONEY BACK. It's a shame that this is what you have to do to get a company to do what they legally promised to do. The money, all 735 of it, finally came in my account yesterday, but I'm like damn. The fact that I had to fight tooth and nail and drop the fact that I am a licensed attorney and my bar number to let them know that I wasn't playing, is a crying shame.

Corporations need to stop being greedy and dishonest and just do what they are supposed to do without the fear of legal action being pursued against them. I hate that I had to get that way, but it's the only way that I could get my money back. Needless to say, I won't be dealing with Cheap Con Artist Caribbean again in my life! That was the first and absolute last time! They lie and they TRIED to steal from me. The dishonesty and deception is absolutely disgusting.

The third representative also stated that in the reservation my transfer from my original itinerary was not on there when I asked how is this possible if I have an email about my original itinerary that shows that I was charged for my transfer he said he wasn’t sure I ended up speaking with another representative who was very friendly but also told me that my original transfer was not on there and she was not sure why I was being charged more, I had to send her my original email to verify that my transfers were indeed paid for even though it wasn’t showing on their end.

After being on the phone with her for about an hour and a half she decided that it had to be escalated to a supervisor, even though when we both went onto the website the amount that was showing for two people was the same exact amount that the first two representatives had given me even though when I called back a third time the price was totally different, and not one that I had agreed to pay. How are you charging me more than what is currently displayed on your website? And where the heck did my original transfer that I paid for, go? I had to tell them to review the first two phone calls that will verify the amount I agreed to pay, the first two times, and not whatever was showing the third time I tried to call to get it paid. Thank god I had an email.

In terms of supervisor, She said the supervisor usually calls 21 days before my trip which is currently scheduled for April, so what am I supposed to do? Wait until three weeks before my trip for them to figure this out? I have traveled numerous times with Cheap Caribbean and have never had any trouble. This is totally bad business and I am hoping to come to a resolution and fast! Ridiculous that you can’t speak to a supervisor.

They advised me that I was correct, so I proceeded to explain to them that it wasn't fair to keep my money for the transportation just because I proactively pre-booked that not know that the hotel offered transportation. I had to reach out to them to inquire, and no one ever offered to explain or reach out to me. I WILL NEVER BOOK WITH CHEAPCARIBBEAN.COM AGAIN! I have 6 other friends joining us as a surprise to my husband, and I have advised to not book with them as well.

Cheap Caribbean had advertised '24 hour cancellation' that day. They held over $6000 of my money for almost 60 days and only refunded after many emails from me. Their customer service leaves a lot to be desired putting it mildly. Using their menu, once I selected I was calling about a refund my call was always dropped. If you hold to talk to an operator plan on holding for hours. If you email customer service plan on a scripted answer. Never ever using this company again.

So I called 1/3/2022 to make a reservation prior to our expiration date, and was made aware that I had a credit for $1,505.78, obviously $500 less than I paid. This was a cancellation fee I was being charged, although this had never been communicated to me, nor was I the one that cancelled. The pandemic cancelled this trip, the Bahamas cancelled this trip. So after 2 hours on the phone the representative asked that I give them 21 days for the escalations department to resolve this and add my $500 back so I could book my trip using the original amount I paid in full. Fast forward to today 2/4, another 2 plus hour call, and now all of my travel credit has expired as of 12/31/2021, and I only have $700 and some change in airfare credit good through 3/20/2022.

This company is the most unprofessional company I've ever dealt with. They owe me $2005.78 in total travel credit, or a refund for the same amount. It's ridiculous the amount of time I've spent on the phone with this company, and every time I'm asked to call back for the resolve, my credits are lowered. The only positive I will give them is the associates I've spoken with have been extremely nice over the phone, however their note taking must be horrendous, as nothing gets resolved. I've been given an email address to send my request to and ask for my full credit, and extension I was promised through 3/31/2022. I will update this if the company makes the right decision. Have been told this will be answered within 24 hours. I don't write reviews, good or bad. May be the second one I've ever written, but if this prevents someone from using this company, then it was worth the time to type this.