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CB Travel and Vacations Orbitz horrifying service, dishonesty, scams
Orbitz

Orbitz review: horrifying service, dishonesty, scams 90

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Author of the review
12:00 am EST
Featured review
This review was chosen algorithmically as the most valued customer feedback.

I have been using Oribtz for many years and I used to love their service even when I ran into problem. But for the past 6 months, My husband and I have had numerous problems with them although we have separate accounts and have never dealt with them together on 1 particular case. Their India Call Center is horrible and I was hung up on multiple times by that call center in India (by Joseph and another lady) and by a supervisor named Brandon in the U.S. Call center. The funniest call was the one that I just had 10 minutes ago where I was being conferenced to Alitalia, but instead, Orbitz hung up and I ended up with Alitalia alone, then I was on another hour hold with all kinds of strange noises and finally they hung up. I have spent at least 8 hours in the past 3 days trying to straighten out my credit with them and use it to purchase another ticket.

My experience tells me that whenever you cancel something with Oribtz, they do their best to annoy you and put up road blocks so they can steal your money. I was told clearly by their rep when i cancelled a trip that I can book the flight within 1 year of that day for any travel date. I stressed with them: "are you sure I will be able to book it for a later flight as long as I book by Jan xx, 2007, they assured me :"yes mam etc.." Now I call back, on top of everything else, they suddenly tell me i have to travel by the 10th, and I told them that some screwed up, and their supervisor's response was that even if their reps told me otherwise, there were policies stated online" I told him:" I tried to look for that, and it says it's not available". He said: "well, it should have been there when you booked". Well, I talked to them after I booked and cancelled, their words mean nothing obviously and has no credibility.

My husband was going to use them as a corporate travel agent since his company is always sending people all over the place for consulting work, but after this, we are going with expedia. I haven't had the energy to call back since the last time I was hung up (15 minutes ago) because it's just not worth it and that's probably how they make their money. I'd rather lose 1400 dollars than have to go through that kind of torture again, first with people who didn't speak English or could even comprehend me, then with people who claim not to know how to use their phone and hang up on me, then to supervisor that put me on "hour long" hold, and then finally hanging up on me again. I am sad that my favorite travel site has come to this.

90 comments
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Christopher Lombardo
Sep 17, 2007 7:31 pm EDT

Caution is advised in highlighting Orbitz's dishonest business practices. I complained a bit too vociferously about a $1,600 Orbitz rip off in 2005, and Orbitz hired a high-priced litigator with a large international firm to threaten and harass me. I'm just Joe Consumer who booked one trip and got ripped-off on the airline tickets. This calls for Harvard-educated litigators who will stop at nothing?

The attorney, working for Orbitz, even got a dishonest local police officer pretending to be on official business to threaten to kill me in a police lockup.

Orbitz's attorney invited me to visit his office to discuss my complaint. I did politely, only to find that, despite the invitation, he wasn't even in town that week. As soon as I left the building, the attorney was on the phone from wherever he was trying to file a false complaint of trespassing, claiming that I bypassed security to get to his firm's palacial lobby in the highrise office building in which the firm is headquartered. Bypassed security? I still have the security pass issued to me by building security after I showed the attorney's letter of invitation and my driver's license. His firm's receptionist told me he was out of town, so I left.

I can't afford to hire $2,500 per hour litigators nor to pay-off local police. The question remains why would a business deny a legitimate claim of $1,600, then spend three to ten times that amount trying to make me go away, attracting more and more negative attention along the way?

Good luck, and be careful dealing with Orbitz.

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J. G
Oct 22, 2007 12:00 am EDT

I bought a ticket through Orbitz; received an email saying that total trip cost is 910.68$, called customer service and they confirmed that. But my credit card was charged 995.36$. I called customer service again and they said that they miscalculated the price before and they will still charge me 995.36$ and they will send me a voucher for 50$. Can they do that? Is there nothing I can do to pay only the amount on my receipt? Any suggestions?
Thank you.

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Ira G Neal
Dec 01, 2007 6:46 pm EST

I made reservations with Orbitz's with a motel in North Carolina..
Found out the price was way higher that a Direct reservation.
When I called Orbitz, I was given the , and so? treatment.

I WILL NEER DO ORBITZ AGAIN, THEY SUX...

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Lee Clark
Dec 13, 2007 11:00 pm EST

Orbitz generated a "ghost booking" selling me eight tickets for a party of four. Charged two service charges for their error, and even though they refunded the four ticket charges, refuse to refund the $71 service charge. The call center in India says "Orbitz is entitled to the service charge because they did issue the tickets and then refunded the ticket price. That is service for which they are entitled to a fee." When I disagreed, they elevated the complaint to a supervisor who could not speak English and she hung up on me. The email customer service response is equally useless.

Though I have purchased seven trips around the world with no problem, their bad attitude on this one means I will never use Orbitz again. We travel to Eastern Europe twice a year, but will never use Orbitz again.

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Austin
Jan 06, 2008 6:56 am EST

Can you verify first if you have a paper tkt or etkt. it might be an additional charge for the delivery fee of the paper ticket. ialways booked orbitz. i NEVER have a problem w/ them.

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Lisa Schweig
Mar 18, 2008 4:59 pm EDT

I will never use Orbitz again! I made reservations in August 2007 for a February 2008 trip, and everything was fine at that time. A week before our trip, I checked on the itinerary to find.

(1) our Boston to Tampa flight, through Dulles, now ended in Dulles

(2) our return flight was changed to include a missed-connection in JFK.

Everything was worked out in the end, after 4 phone calls over a week (and many hours), so maybe I am lucky! But the money I saved wasn't worth it at all.

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Fernando Ortiz
Apr 04, 2008 7:34 am EDT

TLG *GREATFN [protected]

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Laurie
May 15, 2008 3:14 pm EDT

I think it is Orbitz fault that your flight was change. It was the AIRLINE. Orbitz don't own the airline.

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Courtney
Jun 02, 2008 8:43 am EDT

This review is written in an attempt to appeal to consumers who may not fully understand the extent in which companies, like Orbitz, are willing and able to rip you off and leave you high and dry. My story begins 1 year ago in June 2007, just around the time I was getting married and trying to negotiate my honeymoon plans. My husband and I always wanted to go somewhere tropical, since he's from England and I'm from Chicago, so Jamaica seemed like a very logical destination. As we began our typical search we started noticing that our best financial bet would be to purchase a package deal, with airfare and hotel included. After having several good experiences with Travelocity and Expedia we turned to them in hopes of being able to purchase a package, however, in the home stretch due to a minor price difference we ended up reserving with Orbitz--what a mistake that was! Several days after our wedding it came to our attention that my husband would not be legally allowed to re-enter the states without authorization which is only obtained through a lengthy and expensive process. Now armed with that information we knew we had only 2 options, either cancel our honeymoon or postpone it to the following year--which brings us to June 2008. Of course we decided to go ahead and postpone our honeymoon, to the tune of $1, 900 in cancellation fees, re-booking charges, and rate changes. Our only other alternative was to cancel the honeymoon without any sort of compensation due to the short notice that we were provided. It seemed like a no brainer--pay a bit of extra money and don't lose over $3, 000 and we still get to go to Jamiaca---WRONG!

Several days ago we were contacted by Orbitz who initially told us that there was a cancellation with our direct flight to Jamaica. After several hours of trying to straighten things out with Orbitz and our flights, it came to light that there was no problem with Air Jamaica, in actuality the problem was Orbitz--who never made the official changes to our reservations. At this point I have spent nearly 8 hours on the phone with Orbitz alone, not including the time I have been forced to spend on the phone explaining this to everyone from the resort (who believes we were a NO SHOW last year--and have charged us as such) to the whole family. Unfortunately, we have still not resolved this issue as Orbitz has done nothing to try to fix this problem. All they were willing to do is to try to get us on another flight that would be at our expense, with the average difference costing us around $700-800. The audacity of this company is unbelievable, especially considering that we paid $1, 900 last year to have the flights changed and we received confirmation of that change through an e-mail and a credit card statement. To make matters worse Orbitz never even extended an apology, instead they choose to say "sorry for your inconvenience", isn't that the understatement of the year! Right now we are trying to sort out something with the resort, but all things considered it looks very doubtful that we will receive any compensation for this horrible injustice (which totals $5, 700) which has cost us our Honeymoon and a small part of our sanity!

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Leia
Jul 21, 2008 11:50 pm EDT

I booked a ticket from San francisco to phildelphia on 6/30 and i didn't receive my confirmation email. I called the customer service next day and the agent told me the booking didn't go though because i filled the security code of my credit card wrong. I will have to book another ticket. I double check with the agent to make sure they won't charge my first booking. The agent said since it didn't go through i won't be charged. So following that night i found another ticket from oakland to phildelphia since i also live closed to oakland airport. Just few days ago I found i got charged for the first reservation too. I called and talk to the customer service supervisor and she said it is because i filled my email wrong in the first reservation. She said i filled yahoo.coon. Anyway, they can't refund the money to me, but i can use the credit in a year. I just need to pay extra 150 rebooking fee. I learned that their customer service doesn't really help you, they just make everything worse. and now i am all broke!

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Oh.Brutha
Nov 18, 2008 11:44 am EST

So, you put your email in wrong. Then you called Orbitz and gave them the correct email. OF course, it's not under that, since you entered the wrong address. How is that Orbitz fault? They can't have a person go to each booker's home, stand behind them, and smack them in the head when they do something stupid.

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A. Archuleta
Nov 30, 2008 1:42 pm EST

I booked a package deal with Orbitz for Thanksgiving and suddenly had an emergency and requested to change my return flights, but when I called orbitz they just gave me the run around. I must have spoken to about 8 people but veryone of them would just transfer me to someone else. I finally got tired af dealing with them as I was in the hospital and extreamly ill. They have absolutly no customer service and a don't give a [censored] attitude. I will never book with them ever again. I just book other flights directly.

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zartan
LAWRENCE, US
Feb 05, 2009 7:59 pm EST

orbitz is horrible. i booked a flight with them online, and when i got to the airport, i found out that orbitz had voided my ticket. i had wasted $55 in cab fare to get to the airport. now i am stranded for another day, and scrambling to buy another ticket to leave town. thanks orbitz.

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Sad customer
Roswell, US
May 04, 2009 5:11 pm EDT

I am going thru a similiar issue right now. Had to cancel my tickets to a destination because if Swine Flu and am trying to rebook to a destination of my choice. Spent the whole day trying to talk to the airlines and Orbitz. All fingers pointed at Orbitz and their people are brainless - Sounded like India or Phillipines. They have been telling me the same thing over and over again to no effect whatsoever. I don't know where go go from here. The tickets I see online for 800 bucks due to all their restrictions are only available to me for 3 grand per pop.
What a scam this is.

I had an issue with expedia last Dec and they tried to resist a little but I don't remember arguing for more than a 1/2 hour before they agreed to do what I preferred at a cost to their company. Orbitz should go out of business

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MEG
US
May 29, 2009 1:58 pm EDT

I WILL NEVER EVER EVER USE ORBITZ AGAIN EITHER! F**KING ###...
MY BOYFRIEND AND I BOUGHT TICKETS AT THE EXACT SAME TIME AND WE KNOW
THAT WE BOUGHT IT ON THE SAME DAY AND SAME TIME.
THE NEXT DAY I GOT A CONFIRMATION EMAIL THAT SAID THAT MY FLIGHT WAS A DAY LATER THEN MY BOYFRIENDS. I CALLED THEM AND THEY TOLD ME THAT IT MIGHT OF BEEN A GLITCH IN THE SYSTEM.
IT WOULD TAKE 10 DAYS TO CHECK IT. THEY SAID SOMEONE WOULD CALL MA AND NOONE EVER DID.

SO THEN THEY SAID THAT IT WOULD CHARGE ME $250.00 TO CHANGE MY TICKET. I WAS FURIOUS AND CALLED DELTA AIRLINES AND THE INSURANCE COMPANY. THEY SAID THAT IT WOULD BE $500.00 TO CHANGE IT.

SO I CALLED BACK ORBITZ THINKING THAT I WOULD SPEND $250.00 TO CHANGE IT.
AFTER THEY ADDED IT ALL UP, THEY TOLD ME THAT IT WOULD COST $800.00 TO CHANGE THE FLIGHT EVEN IF THEY WAIVED THE $30.00 FEE.

I PAID $595. FOR MY FLIGHT TO SPAIN FROM COLORADO.

ARE YOU KIDDING ME!
NEVER USE ORBITZ!

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tenderg
Boston, US
Jun 24, 2009 12:50 am EDT

I asked for a simple cancellation of only the return part of the ticket for only one of the two passengers. After holding me on the phone for 1:15 minutes(not kidding) They said the cancellation would cost me $1040 because they have to reissue a new ticket.

Never ever again...

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Yvonne Ou
US
Jul 14, 2009 4:23 pm EDT

As a mathematician, I travel a lot for conferences. Like manyof you, I had had good experience with Orbitz until my Denver meeting last week. I booked a package deal for my flight and 5 nights of hotel because I thought a package deal should be cheaper than if I booked the flight and the hotel separately. I paid $1144.68 for the package, knowing that the Orbiz price for the flight is approx. $580 and the official rate for the same flight on the UA website is $686.20 when I booked the package deal (I still have a copy of the quote from UA).

I stayed in Crowne Plaza, Denver (this is a hotel you might want to avoid if you are claustrophobic like me). The morning when I was about to check-out, I accidentally found out the five nights in Crowne Plaza Denver cost $398.32 because they did not realize I had prepaid through Orbitz already hence gave me the invoice. Of course they did not charge me after I explained to them. Now, let's do the math.

If booked separately through Orbitz: 398.32 + $580 = $978.32
If booked separately from UA website and from Crowne Plaza website: $398.32+$680.20= $1078.52.

Can anybody tell me why I ended up paying at least $66 more by the package deal?

I called them. I guess it's also the India center. After being transferred to the third person, they offered me a $50 voucher and implied I either take it or leave it because there is nothing else they can do... She also told me they actually paid $469 to Crowne Plaza. I confronted her by asking why I had to pay $469 for the hotel when it actually cost only $398. Guess what, she started citing some terms from the contract when I paid for the fare as an answer to my question. All I can say is : I feel like an idiot and I will never trust Orbitz package deal again.

Lesson learned: Package deal from Orbitz is not always cheaper than the non-package ones.

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extremely_disappointed
Greensburg, US
Sep 08, 2009 6:20 pm EDT

I wanted to do something special to celebrate our 22nd wedding anniversary, so after much debate. I located a Mystery Dinner Theatre taking place on an old steam locomotive!
This started to sound like something we would both enjoy, which we did in spite of the choice of lodging. We researched the area and decided to go that little bit extra for a one time event like a 22nd anniversary weekend. We booked and paid for what appeared online as a splendid old historic INN ... perfect, well not so fast.
We booked and paid for our nice little historic suite through ORBITZ 2 nights for $267.42 -- then when we got there the "hotel" ask for our credit card as "confirmation." The room was a typical 'bait &switch' any Holiday Inn express would have been as delightful! -- over a month has past -- numerous phone calls have taken place -- the double charge of 210.90 by the hotel has been credited to our account -- but we have still paid $56.52 more than what the hotel was charging us. ORBITZ made us feel like they were the injured party and they would refund us the $210.90 we were overcharged, and wanted us to go away thinking the difference between the 56.52 and the 210.90 was their way of apologizing for our disastrous weekend! Only to find that the "hotel" had already credited the money back to ORBITZ as a miscommunication. Bottom line we still had a 'bait & switch' room without the airy balcony and the accommodations displayed on the website, and were harassed by mouthy little condescending desk clerks for attempting to retrieve our overpayment!

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tigerlilyhb89
Lansing, US
Oct 04, 2009 2:50 pm EDT

You're post would make no sense unless 1) you work at a hotel, 2) you work at orbitz or 3) you're you.

How were you harrassed by "mouthy little condescending desk clerks"?

And thank you for insulting my proffesion. Just because of the title of Front Desk Representative and comments like that, people assume that you can't help them.

When if I had been in that situation, it would have taken one call and your money would have been credited back. Oh wait, if you were at the HIE that I work at, that wouldn't have happened. Because this "desk clerk" as you've given such a great negative conotation has developed a way to make double charging .com reservations impossible.

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EdwF87
US
Dec 09, 2009 5:34 am EST

Orbitz Customer service is horrible. I talked to 5 people up to the night supervisor.

I booked a cruise with Orbitz on November 3rd, 2009. Had a family emergency and called for a refund on November 4th, 2009. I have not been through so much crap with any company like orbitz all my life.

It was a nightmare trying to get my refund back. I waited till December 1, 2009 to get my refund and it wasn't there. I called Carnival Cruise line and they informed me that they were waiting on paperwork from whomever I booked the cruise through. This was Orbitz Worldwide Inc.

This is where the nightmare began. I was on the phone for 2 hours after an Orbitz Associate told me that they had to re-send some information to Carnival Cruise line. Who knows what would have happened if I didn't call Carnival in the first place...because in the beginning of my call...an Orbitz employee told me that it may just take a bit longer. After I told him that I have talked to carnival and they are awaiting information to be sent from Orbitz that should have been sent 4 weeks ago.

So with that out of the way...The orbitz cruise customer service employee informed me that she would be calling me back on December 8th, 2009

This was a week away and I couldn't wait until I received that phone call with good news that my refund was on its way.

December 8, 2009 I left early from work so that I could receive the scheduled phone call from orbitz customer service. An hour goes by from the time in which I was supposed to receive this phone call.

Sitting with a confused question mark over my head...I decided to call Orbitz. Wow I didn't know that it took me talking to 4 different people that I would finally get someone from the Orbitz cruise customer service department. This person puts me on hold to call the cruise line and 10minutes later explains to me that today my refund was processed into my account and I should see a refund soon.

At this point I have had enough...I didn't know if I could believe this person and based on the poor customer service and trouble that I have gone through so far...shouldn't I get the 100.00 fee refunded back?

(for those who don't know...whether you cancel your cruise an hour after booking or days after booking...Orbitz charges a fee of 100.00)

So here I am... I ask for the supervisor after the Orbitz associate started yelling through my phone expressing how it's not their fault and how I received false information from the Carnival Cruise line and the Orbitz employee that I talked to last week.

This supervisor did no good and took 30minutes to get to talk to this person. He basically said good luck getting the 100.00 back and said he was the highest leveled employee that I could talk to.

I would basically avoid dealing with Orbitz overall. They have bad customer service and don't admit a mistake when clearly they made one.

Here is a list of the people I talked to today on the phone.

Edgar-basic customer service with Orbitz

Kayla-Sales department with Orbitz Cruises

Beronica- Cruise Refund Department (this was the person who called Carnival and then proceeded to yell over the phone about how Carnival lied to me about the paperwork not being sent)

Pablo-the highest supervisor that you are provided to talk to at night (after 5pm) this man was very rude and didn't offer any help or assistance with my situation.

After reading online...I found out that a popular Radio host "Clark Howard" has had a bad encounter with Orbitz. He wasn't able to get a refund until he decided to talk about the poor customer service he received over the air waves. Promptly after the airing of the radio show...he received a call from an Orbitz employee offering a full refund. He declined because he believes that he should have received the refund in the first place. This occurred in 2008. It's now a year later and Orbitz still hasn't improved their customer service.

It's sad to see a company be so horrible with customer service.

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Chandra09
US
Dec 12, 2009 1:46 pm EST

I booked a flight to Texas along with car reservation. I got the car resvervation confirmed and did not get the flight reservation. After 2 days price had gone up from $350 to $800. When i called to ask why i did not get a email notification or a not confirmed message when i booked, they had no explanation and said sorry you can buy the cheapest ticket available now. I went and booked on a different website. I had been using them for 6 yrs and they just suck now.
ORBITZ lost a good customer who booked 10-15 flights a year permanently.

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Anzhelika
Staten Island, US
Mar 04, 2010 10:32 am EST

I booked a travel package and came to realize 24 hours later that another website had the SAME deal for $500 less. $500!
I called Orbitz to express my frustration and got nowhere.
1 hour and 45 minutes I was offered $75 voucher. Really for a $500 price difference?

They should be ashamed of themselves for overcharging by $500 and refusing to give adequate restitution.

Not to mention that I have traveled with them before 5 times, I am a returning customer, and that is how they treat you, $500 price difference, and they brush you off with a $75 future travel voucher, USELESS to me since I will never travel with them in the future.

Beware.!

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ugh annoyed
Lincoln, US
Mar 04, 2010 2:03 pm EST

I booked my flight to Costa Rica two days ago. My bank account is negative because Orbitz charged me twice for my ticket. After spending way to much time on the phone with a so called customer service representative I found out the charges would just 'fall off'. Ok well if my account wouldn't have gone negative no big deal but I am flying home tomorrow on absolutely no money. I received my confirmation e-mail saying X amount of dollars would be charged to my account and as of now I have been charged double. I don't understand this...three of my friends booked the same flight and they don't have this extra 'fall off' charge? Customer service is horrible. I try telling them the issue and they just pause for a long time and say 'hello'? I'm guessing because they have no answer for this stupid situation. I just got off the phone with them and am supposed to call them back in a hour. wish me luck.
Never ever will I use Orbitz again.

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Cavanio
US
Apr 06, 2010 6:26 pm EDT

I have purchased several trips using orbitz. in the past they have always been great to work with. but they have gone WAY downhill! I purchased airlind tickets for 4, good price and all, but the following day the airlind dropped the price on the same itinerary, all of orbitz' competitor did the same. expedia dropped, hotwire dropped, priceline dropped, Orbitz raised by 140 dollars. When i called customer sevice about it, they said that if an orbitz cust purchased for a lower price, then i would get a refund, no one can buy for less, because they RAISED thier price!

A customer service supervisor said they would place a voucher for the difference in my account. didnt happen!
They will tell you what you want to hear, then not follow through.

I will never use them again, and would advise all to not use them!

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Orbitz
Chicao, Illinois, US
Apr 07, 2010 9:44 am EDT
Verified customer This complaint was posted by a verified customer. Learn more

Hello,

I am with Orbitz Customer Relations. I saw your post and would like the opportunity to asssit. Please forward me your Orbitz Record Locator and I will review and promptly reply.

Thanks

Mike Snyder
Mike Snyder
San Antonio, US
Apr 11, 2010 6:37 pm EDT

At least I'm not alone. Orbitz confirmed a r/t flight Barcelona - Turin for 18 - 21 July and just informed me the flight's been changed to the 19th. Well, we want the 18th and already have reservations. Bombay Bob told me there's a penalty to cancel the flight - it turns out to be 50% of the value of the tickets! This on top of losing out on hotel rooms that have already been paid. I checked with Alitalia and they have bunches of flights for the 18th. It's very hard to get through to Orbitz customer service, but I'm going to try Skype (I'm calling from Mexico). I swear I will never use Orbitz again.

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Mtn mama
Silver cliff, US
Apr 16, 2010 1:59 pm EDT

Orbitz would not honor our request to cancel our flights (when we should have been able to cancel).

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Mtn mama
Silver cliff, US
Apr 16, 2010 11:09 pm EDT

I could have received credit on the tickets, if they would have accepted my cancellation.

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Camp Suzanne
Gainesville, US
Jun 15, 2010 10:23 am EDT

I booked a room through Orbitz for Day Inn Charleston, SC. 3 days after I booked I had to cancel. The online reservation said that Orbitz "never charges for cancellations, but that the hotel might". Well, I spoke with Days Inn, Charleston and the reason they charged me any way was for 2 reasons:
1.) Even though I cancelled the reservation 20 days ahead, Orbitz never bothered to inform the Days Inn, so my reservation was treated as a "no show" therefore charging the entire amount to my AMX card.
2.) I spoke with the Days Inn's Dorreen Carlson and was told that basically the room reservation was no refundable because of the "discounted reservation code". So, I asked what the normal rate would be and she stated $517.00 for the 3 night stay. The price I paid to Obitz was $495. For a $22 dollar discount, they say this is a special rate that is not refundable even though the reservation was cancelled with Orbitz over two weeks ahead. The result was Orbitz never bothered to inform Days Inn of the cancellation and so both Days Inn and Orbitz now have $495.00 of my money for nothing. Never use Orbitz to book hotel rooms and I would say don't stay with Days Inn because they are in this scam together.

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What happened to customer service?
Urbadale, US
Jun 24, 2010 11:21 pm EDT

HORRIBLE customer service! They charged my card several thousand dollars for a trip when the website said my card couldn't be processed. I spent two hours on the phone only to be told it wasn't their fault because it was a computer glitch. They couldn't book me for it over the phone, nor could they immediately refund me so I could book the trip through someone else. Not only that, but every offer advertised that I wanted didn't even exist. On top of that, they wouldn't even do anything to make up for their error and my time and money!

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Saywhatagain
US
Jul 06, 2010 8:12 am EDT

We bought flights, hotel reservation and rental car for a trip to San Francisco for three. The flight went well, both ways, the car rental was fine, but when we arrived at the hotel (Ramada SF-Airport, San Mateo), they claimed not to have received the registration and tried to move us to a location much further away from SF. We ended up for hours on the phone with Orbitz and all they offered to help was to get another hotel with us paying the difference that was much higher than what we had seen earlier on their site. Ramada did not want to refund us despite the fact that they didn't seem to have our reservation and no room. We found another hotel ourselves for a night (that one was decent, but didn't have a room for our entire stay.

The Ramada then had a room and we stayed for 2 nights, because we couldn't find anything else. It was filthy, the bedsheets didn't seem to have been washed properly, several of the towels were stained with large yellow and red (blood ?) marks spots, others were gray. After several discussions with Orbitz they seemed to have managed to have Ramada agree to refund us and we moved out.

We eventually received a refund which covered the nights we didn't stay at the Ramada, but only after seriously pushing they agreed to compensate the extra $26+ we had to pay extra for the first night - pathetic (their offer was for a $25 rebate on future trips - hah are you kidding me after spoiling our vacation).

Be warned and stay away from Orbitz, they don't help you if things go wrong. Aside from that they pocket an extra 20% or more for the booking, just check the hotels yourself.

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codybear
Sewell, US
Jul 31, 2010 12:23 am EDT

We just had a similar experience. Booked a hotel with them at San Francisco and that went fine. The hotel was great. We then traveled 8 hours to LA and checked into our other hotel that we booked through them. The hotel was filthy. There were ants in the room, dried boogies on the door frame, dirt on the floor, and hair and stains on the sheets. Orbitz also advertised the room as a 2 bedroom suite; however, it was not 2 bedrooms. It was a 2 room unit without a living room. Just 2 rooms with beds with an adjoining door that posed a safety issue in that it had a dead bolt and no door knob. Long story short, I called orbitz and THEY WERE ABSOLUTELY NO HELP AT ALL. She called the front desk but since they had no manager on duty, she told me that they couldn't do anything about it without speaking to a manager. They could not refund our money and place us in another hotel. In fact, when we asked for some help in getting another place (and getting the refund later), she told us that reservations were closed. This was only 9:30 PST and all hotels have someone working at their front desk. We just wanted some help after driving for 8 hours. After GETTING NOWHERE, we wanted to speak with an orbitz manager and she told me there wasn't one on duty at that time. We gave her our number and asked that she get the manager to call us (supposedly, there was one "on call"), but no one ever did. Fortunately, the front desk walked us over to the hotel next door and they took care of the tab for that night. The next morning, the manager at the hotel called orbitz and they refunded the rest of our money.

I WILL NEVER EVER BOOK WITH ORBITZ AGAIN! BEWARE that they do not care about customer service. When there are issues, they do not want to handle them because they already got their commission. BOOK WITH TRAVELOCITY...they took care of issues when we had them in the past.

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Den452
Santa Clarita, US
Aug 03, 2010 5:34 pm EDT

NEVER PAY ORBITZ FOR GROUND TRANSPORTATION. They overcharge somtimes more than 20%. I went to Vegas and pre- purchased a ground transportation voucher and Paid $15 per person. The sign on the ticket booth was $12 per person. I still had to stand in line to redeem the voucher so there was no reason to purchase in advance except to pay Orbitz a premium. The ticket person said that they get complaints form Orbitz customers all the time. Customer support was not helpful and would not give a credit for the difference. WHAT A SCAM!

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Robin J. Jones
St.Clairsville, US
Aug 30, 2010 11:13 am EDT

Orbitz has been a nightmare ever sense we made the first call... A trip with 8 other couples that should be a happy experience is becoming a total heartache... These people do not know or care what they are doing... We have been hung up on a number of times... they have changed our tickets and times a number of times..moved people to other flights where they have to fly alone.. My sister's first flight .. and she is scared... has to fly from Pittsburgh to Philly alone now... they put 4 of us out of the group on a very early flight off our cruise .. so now that 4 will miss there flight and have to pay an extra $50.00 and wait for a seat on a later flight... it was Orbitz's mess up ... but they won't make it right... unless we pay $150.00 per person now to fix it... I will never deal with them or any of these so called money savers again.. I will deal direct with the airlines... the tickets would have been about $25.00 more per person but well worth it.. Do not trust or deal with this Orbitz... and also .. if you use a travel agent.. some of them go threw Obitz and others like it... you must do your homework or your dream trip can become a nightmare like ours... If that travel agent tells you they use Orbitz or one like them.. make sure that agent will make everything right when Orbitz starts changing and messing things up...

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Equil
US
Sep 21, 2010 1:04 pm EDT

I purchase my airline tickets in July and at that time I requested the seats, and never was I told my seats were not reserved. 3 days before I am to fly I go on line to print out my itinery and find out my seats that were selected were not requested by Orbitz with the airline. I have tickets but no assigned seats. Then the person I spoke with at Orbitz Iwas told that at my connecting flight I could request another seat if I got to the airport 2 hours prior to my flight. I will be in first plane and not able to be at the airport 2 hours before. Orbitz had no problem taking my money they just can't deliver the service.

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Orbitz
Chicao, Illinois, US
Sep 22, 2010 9:18 am EDT
Verified customer This complaint was posted by a verified customer. Learn more

Hello, I am contacting you from Orbitz Customer Relations. If you could e-mail me your Orbitz record locator to customerrelations@orbitz.com, I will be glad to review your reservation. Please place the e-mail to my attention, and please include your blog and screen name.

Thanks,

Nadeem
Orbitz Customer Relations

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Droten
US
Sep 30, 2010 1:48 pm EDT

When you use the call center to make a change it takes twenty to thirty minutes. The person at the other end put me on hold for five minutes, then came back to confirm the nature of the reuqested change, then left to research the change, then came back to say that he could do it, then had to put me on hold so that he could execute the change. The change was simple; the hassle used valuable time. Orbitz: I am a CEO of a small company. Don't have time for this. Will look for other options to support my business travel planning. (By the way, your website makes no provision for this feedback.)

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Orbitz
Chicao, Illinois, US
Sep 30, 2010 2:53 pm EDT
Verified customer This complaint was posted by a verified customer. Learn more

Hello Droten, I am contacting you from Orbitz Customer Relations. If you could e-mail me your Orbitz record locator to customerrelations@orbitz.com, I will be glad to review your reservation. Please place the e-mail to my attention, and please include your blog and screen name.

Thanks,

Nadeem
Orbitz Customer Relations

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Leonard Eilbacher
Fort Wayne, US
Oct 06, 2010 8:54 am EDT
Verified customer This complaint was posted by a verified customer. Learn more

On the return flight of roundtrip flight to China, Orbitz booked me for a 25 hour layover in SFO. I tried to correct it, to leave SFO a day earlier, while at ORD during an outbound layover, but the representative with whom I spoke disagreed with my reading of my itinerary. She didn't seem to understand the significance of the International Date line, and that I could arrive at SFO on the same day I left Hong Kong on an all-night flight. Thus, I had to stay at a hotel and wait around until the next night. Orbitz record locator: AP110101N3OP2032.

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zepplin200053
PL
Nov 03, 2010 7:11 am EDT

I am filing a small claims suit against orbitz for overcharging and fraud. Would you be willing to sent me a signed and dated summary of your experience, so I can use it to prove that it is routine practice for Orbitz to screw people

Let me know if you would be willing to help.

Thank you Very Much,

Tyler
zepplin200053@yahoo.com

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