Anonymous
map-marker Silver Spring, Maryland

Ll Travel 5 Day East Coast Tour Review from Silver Spring, Maryland

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We took the 5 day east coast tour and were very disappointed. This tour is geared towards Chinese and we did not know that.

The tour guide spoke very little English. The tour just drove by the 9/11 memorial and ground zero; they DID NOT stop there. As Americans, these were very important to us. They rook us to the Empire State Building which we had already gone to on our own because it wasn't listed on the itinerary.

They took us to a $12 buffet and charged us $20 for it. At the end of the tour they tried to leave us in Baltimore instead of dropping us at Dulles airport. They were always late whilw telling us we had to be on time.

I wanted to choke Eason the tour guide every time he said the bus will be here in 10 minutes as we stood outside in the freezing cold. HORRIBLE TOUR COMPANY!

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Reason of review:
Bad quality
Anonymous
map-marker Melbourne, Victoria

Ll Travel 4 Day Bus Tour Review from Melbourne, Victoria

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My experience with L&L Travel was exceptionally bad. Not only was the tour guide (Fay) rude, disrespectful and arrogant she was in my opinion not very knowledgeable.The tour was poorly organised, the tour guide's English was so bad we had to ask the bus driver what was said by Fay when we stopped for a break. The charges were ridiculous. We were not allowed to go through a public national park because we hadn't paid a fee!!! We were even allowed to use the restroom on the bus!!!! We had to wait for the bus to stop somewhere!

A"service fee" of $8 per day per person was requested in cash on top of the tour costs. This in fact was the guide's and driver's tips. It was a compulsory payment and not disclosed that it was their tips. Take Tours confirmed this.

Once Fay took the money she departed the tour and another tour guide took her place.

We were taken to L&L travel NY depot where we were told to get off the coach bus When we asked L&L travel how are we getting to Washington DC they said we will be given tickets to travel in a public bus to get there. When we expressed our disappointment of how we were just dumped on the sidewalk with our luggage theL&L travel rep got aggressive. We told L&L rep that we paid for coach yravel and not by public bus.

The public bus from NY to Washington was dirty, unroadworthy and being driven by a very nasty driver who was driving over the speed limit in the rain and never informed us as to what was going on. On this bus with us were families with young children who like us were on holidays and touring with L&L travel. There was no regard for our safety whatsoever.

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Reason of review:
Bad quality
Tiffannie Lny
map-marker Los Angeles, California

LL Travel - Tour Review from Los Angeles, California

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DO NOT WASTE YOUR MONEY.

FRAUD! FRAUD! FRAUD!. Most of their tour guides are international students who don't have authority to work in the United States, and they are paid off the books to avoid paying taxes. They over charge their customers. Like they actually charge to go the Metro Museum in Manhattan NYC but in all reality that museum is actually free to visit to the public. And on attraction that are not free they raise the price for their customers. Like the wax museum in Time Square NYC if the cost is $12 a ticket LL will charge $15 to their customers. They are also very unsafe. They make the driver's break DOT Federal laws and even if the weather is terrible they will NOT cancel the trip, they would rather risk your life, your children and families lives for their selfish greed. For instance, they had a mini bus get stuck in the snow through a winter storm near Buffalo NY in Dec 2014. The people were there most of the night, no food, no drinks, just stuck in this storm. This tour was not cancelled because LL Travel wants YOUR MONEY. So they risk those people's lives, and if the bus company refuses to work in those conditions they are punished. drivers drive too fast for safety and if they refuse, the tour guide will yell at them and then call their boss, who will then call the driver to force him/her to speed. This is because they have the drivers driving sometime 550 miles in 1 day and 18 hours on a shift. They do this because they cramp too many attractions in their tours so that they make big money. Look up AM USA EXPRESS INC on the government website at http://www.safer.fmcsa.dot.gov/query.asp?searchtype=ANY&query_type=queryCarrierSnapshot&query_param=USDOT&original_query_param=NAME&query_string=184****&original_query_string=AM%20USA%20EXPRESS%20INC . This bus company was doing a trip for LL Travel's biggest competitor who runs their company much like LL Travel. This bus flipped over in (2014) due to an overly worked exhausted driver who was too tired to drive. More then 20 people were severely hurt and few unfortunately died. This was in the news as well. L&L Travel runs these tours like a production line in a factory. Tour guides must produce, which means making attractions at all cost. Also when you get to the attraction after hours in the bus, you will get 15 mins to enjoy your self. Yep, 15 mins. Like I said, it's like a production line. If your lucky you might get 30 mins, and if you do be grateful. Be prepared to eat chinese food the entire trip, and also be prepared to pay more for that dinner then anyone else who comes to the same restaurant to eat. This is because LL charges more for the dinner and then kicks back some of the money to the tour guide. In the beginning of your tour, your tour guide will tell you his/her "tips" is their only pay. THIS IS A LIE. They are making money on you, on every attraction, lunch, and dinner. They will SCAM you. This is only a fraction of what I know, if I were to tell it all on this post, it would be too long, I will save the details for authorities. Be prepared for your miserable unsafe humiliating trip.

When you are done, you will feel used, abused, and angry. But it's okay, feel free to email me, at jjblackeagle22@***.com. I will be getting people together with the same terrible experience that I have been through, and contacting the D.A's office where state prosecutors work.

This link is to the news coverage of the recent fatal bus accident doing these type of tours. This bus was heading back to China town.

http://6abc.com/news/2-women-dead-in-new-castle-co-tour-bus-crash/318157/

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Reason of review:
Pricing issue
David L Byf
map-marker Melbourne, Victoria

Don't travel with L&L Travel from NewYork

We disappointed with L&L Travel's decision on offering 20% discount on our next tour rather than upfront request of ony $68 compensation to share our additional cost $340 plus time and missing scheduled tours for 4 of us. I guess L&L fail to recongnise the important of company's good will which should be worth much more than $68 just to keep us happy with trip in US.

I hope good Karma will come to whoever offer good customer needs.

David and famliy

========================

angelicariv wrote on 2012-09-29 16:11:49

Dear David,

I have received a response from the manager, George, at L&L Travel. He has agreed to offer you a 20% discount off your next tour that you book with them. I hope they will be good enough for you. Whenever you want to use the discount, you may contact us directly or L&L Travel. Feel free to write back with any further comments. Have a good day!

Should you have any further questions, please feel free to contact us via e-mail.

Sincerely,

angelica

Take Tours Travel / L&L Travel

=================================

David wrote on 2012-09-26 02:07:43

I have book a 2-Day Niagara Falls back in June 2012 under confirmation no.: 786871, 025324, 322380, 550761 and have completed our trip with great disappointment and additional costs. We have departed the tour on the next day at lunch time on 22-Sep-12. Formal complaint have been posted as a results of the Tour guide failed to contact us on 21-Sep-12 on the given cell phone number at Flushing Queen, NY at 7:00am and simply left us (3 adults and 1 child)behind without warning neither a courtesy call. We have contacted on the day before 20-Sep-12 to the L&L Travel office number and have contacted the Tour guide Miss Ella (Cell Phone 1-64*-*******) with phone advice that the arrival of the bus at Flushing to be around 7:30am and we reconfirming this is not inline with the written booking after the phone conversation on the day before with her strong Chinese English accent. When we turn up on the stated pickup location at the front of the Sheraton Hotel at 7:30am, there was no bus and thus we immediately call Ella on her cell phone to find out what going on? Ella simply suggest we have to make join the trip at our own cost to catch up her bus in ChinaTown Mahanton in 15 min at 8:05am. We knew this is impossible based on the traffic condition and taxi booking process, and we have been advised by Ella to also try join the tour by GreyHoun bus to meet her at Niagara Falls or Buffalo using local Greyhoune bus. We could not persude her to make a U-turn to pick us within the 5 minutes and we have to ask the bell boy in the Sheraton hotel to help booking a Taxi to Mahaton ($60) plus internet booking with GreyHoun bus to Buffalo at $74 per adult x3 and $55 for 1 child. We spend total 13 hours to catch the bus from L&L Travel with extra cost of more than $340. i.e. ($74x3+$55+$60+ $8 from buffalo to Niagarafalls via public bus).

Although we have successfully catched up with the tour bus at 8:30pm the same day but we believe this cost can be avoid if the phone confirmation by the Tour Guide (Ella) on the day at 7:00am was made before she decided to left us behind without giving us a warning call or try finding out why, or any incident occurs to her customer from overseas.

We have arranged this holiday 3 months ahead and have been over caution about the itinerary for smonth transfer from Melbourne to NY and to Canada.

We are seeking TakeTours'compensation on the above costs at least this is not a good practice to left your overseas customers behind without any call. Furthermore, a family with a little boy travelling to a strange place in NY at night...

I am looking forward to hearing postive response from Taketours or L&L Travel soon.

David & Family

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Loss:
$340
3 comments
Guest

518-431-****

Guest

NY number is: (518) 431-****

Guest

You can call the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration to report on this situation. Their complaints hotline is: 1-888-DOT-SAFT or 1-88*-***-****.

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