If it was possible to give less than a one-star review, I would. Unfortunately, I will have to select "one star" which they don't even deserve. First of all, their website indicates that they are open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. This is a complete sack of crap since out of the numerous calls (and left VMs each time) I have made over a span of three days, they have answered three times total. Secondly, there is no way to make ANY changes to your reservation unless you call them, and as I mentioned previously, that is easier said than done. Lastly, they managed to completely screw up my booking and charged me close to $400 for a tour I did not get to do, and because they are impossible to get a hold of, I can't even get a refund from them (I am giving them till Monday and then getting in contact with my credit card company). A day before the activity date, I booked a dinner cruise online since my friend was coming to visit me in NY. After we booked it, I realized that it was NOT the dinner cruise I wanted. We wanted the Bateaux and NOT the Spirit of New York. I finally got a hold of someone and they changed my booking and said it would be confirmed the next day. By 10:00am the next day (the DAY of the tour), the booking wasn't confirmed so I called them AGAIN and was put on hold for 22 minutes while they finally got it confirmed. I got an email voucher that ended up not even having the correct check-in location. It just said Pier 61 instead of the kiosk on Pier 60 where we ended up having to go. Upon check-in, I was told that I was confirmed for the Spirit of New York instead of the Bateaux, even though that was what I paid for! After 10 calls over two days with no response, I finally got a hold of someone who said that they would need to "investigate" if I went on the Spirit of Bateaux. I told the agent that I would wait while she put me on hold to call them and after some stuttering she said that it would take "days". Rather furious, I told the agent that I would just call Spirit Cruises and make a conference call. Which I did. And even after getting confirmation that I DID NOT GO ON THE BATEAUX, the agent STILL insisted that it would take days to authorize a refund. I will be contacting my credit card tomorrow if no refund is made. Seriously, I will NEVER EVER book anything with City-Discovery EVER again and will be sure to tell anyone I know to avoid their website like the freaking plague. read more

See all

Their tours look fantastic but, beware! What was advertised was false. They charged 49.95 for a tour that if you go through the local company is only $45 if you go directly to OnBoard tours. What we were hoping to do was a DC monuments night-time tour. They advertised a 4 hour tour (http://www.city-discovery.com/washington/tour.php?id=4105) that stopped and let us wander at: - US Capitol Building - World War II Memorial - Jefferson Memorial - Vietnam Memorial - Lincoln Memorial - Korean War Memorial - Iwo Jima Memorial - White House - END AT: Old Post Office What we got offered when we showed up was a 3 hour tour that stopped so you could look from the bus at the various monuments and you could get out and wander around 3 of them. No dice City Discovery! If I get my money back easily I'll be surprised and let you know here. read more

We booked a Hop On Hop Off bus tour of Barcelona. My family of 4 was very excited about seeing this marvelous city. Our flight was delayed by several hours, so we had to rush to the cruise terminal. We totally missed the chance to take the tour, which cost us more than $100. When we returned to land, I promptly contacted City Discovery about a refund. After several days, I was told a refund would not happen because our vouchers had been used. I replied, they had NOT been used, as we never got on a bus for a tour. City Discovery has now chosen to ignore my email, so I am turning to Yelp to warn everyone. Stay far,far away from this rag-tag company. They ripped me off. ****Update*** No update. Company is to be avoided. They took my money. Do yourself a favor and stay away! *****Update number 2*** I just checked my credit card statement and discovered Visa issued a refund for my bus tour that we never were able to take. I had disputed the charge. read more

Next time I will stick with Viator or Expedia. This tour company sucks! If you book a ticket today it will take several days to get the ticket emailed to you and it's likely you will have to send several emails and phone calls to remind them they owe you a ticket. On their website they're listed as a 24/7 company but I think it's probably one or two people running a "small get to it when I can" type of business. Even when you speak to someone by phone there's loads of static and unprofessional like customer service. Whatever you do don't book a last minute ticket with this company you might not get to go on the tour since it takes days for them to send the ticket even by email. Their excuse is that they are waiting for the tour company on the other end to respond. Just not worth it. Seek a more professional and reputable company for your tour needs. read more

Bought a tour of Barcelona. 30 minutes. after placing the order I wrote and asked them to cancel the order, due to the fact that we would like to go on that tour another day. We just got the answer that stood in the conditions, that we could not cancel as it was just too bad - What POOR customer service! But I must praise the staff as they were able in a polite way to write "F*CK YOU - we have law on our side" ... Their prices are far from cheap, so I would recommend just ordering the tours when you arrive. read more

Actually, I would REALLY rate it a MINUS 10! Their own emails to me stated "pending bookings are confirmed within 24 hours. However, due to time differences and for some activities, reservations can take up to 72 hours to be confirmed." The confirmation time is more like 5 days...by then, I had made other plans assuming the company was a fraud and was charged a cancellation fee...what was worse was my credit card company, American Express, sided with them!!! I suspect that City-Discovery Tours is not in the business of travel services, but of promising a service, not delivering and pocketing a 5% refund fee...a pretty slick business model that is highly fraudulent and perhaps should have legal authorities look into their practices. DO NOT DO BUSINESS WITH THIS COMPANY...EVER!!! read more

I booked The Big Apple Helicopter Ride activity through City Discovery webpage because was the only one having the a slot at 1:00PM. This is the reason we booked though City Discovery although there were several other websites more cost effective. At the end I have to call myself to the company and change my other schedule for this. My agent was doing nothing, I complaint to him and got no solution. Really disappointing. Please use an alternative agent. read more

I booked a Rome to Naples and Pompeii tour which was to be fulfilled by a company called Gartour in Rome. I was supposed to have hotel pick up but it was not included on the voucher. City Discovery said to contact Gartour. Gartour will not answer their phones, does not have any type of answering machine or service and will not respond to email. There was absolutely no customer service help from either company. Numerous calls and emails to both companies yeilded no help. After taking a taxi to Gartour on the morning of our tour, we were told that they had sent someone to the hotel to pick up my husband and myself. The tour was supposed to be in English but it actually was in English, French and Spanish. The guide on our bus had a very heavy accent and though I only took French in high school, I understood his French better than English. In Naples, we picked up 2 new guides. One spoke Spanish and took 10 people on a walking tour in town. The rest of us went with the other new guide. There were between 25-30 French and English speaking people. The tour took twice as long because it had to be told in 2 different languages. All of the buildings we looked at were covered in plywood or scaffolding. It was all quite boring. When we ended the tour near the harbor, 6 people were missing. We waited for over an hour while the guides searched. 2 showed up with cold beer in hand, 2 showed up after that and the last 2 had gotten tired and went back to the bus without telling anyone. Perhaps some instructions from the guides would be in order before exiting the bus. We lost a lot of time due to this. Lunch in Pompeii was a huge disappointment. Next a video at a cameo factory which was another waste of time. Finally we get into Pompeii to see the city destroyed by the volcano Mount Vesuvius. The highlight of tour. And guess what? They rushed us through and it was over in 1 hour and 40 minutes. The tour guide did not even point out the mountain until I asked him twice about it. After the tour, we were not given the opportunity to use the bathrooms, get a drink or look at souvenirs. We were on the bus and gone within 5 minutes. Halfway back to Rome, the original bus guide gave us a small lukewarm bottle of water to share with our seatmate. How generous! This vacation was a once in a lifetime opportunity for my husband and I. I don't think we will ever get to come back again. This day was a total loss for us as far as being able to look back with fond memories. It was totally unorganized and I put equal blame on both Gartour and City Discovery. The ad by City Discovery said we would see things that we actually never saw. They say they have customer service available; not so. They will however take your money as quickly as possible. They got $244.50 from me. I have contacted them and Gartour with no response from either one. I would never do business with them again and would certainly not recommend them to anyone considering a tour with them. Don't waste your time or money or both. Find a reputable company to use. This one certainly is not. read more

Update 15 Jan 2015 Just saw my credit card bill. They overcharged me by 8%. Seriously, avoid these guys! Original Review, 27 Dec 2015: Really horrible experience with these yahoos. - Booked a helicopter tour for 2 people. The website had an error that booked me for a private tour for 6 people. Tried to call to fix their error but no answer despite claim of being open 24 hrs. Sent an email instead. - No answer to the email, so gave them a call the next day. Nice guy on the phone. I asked him to fix the error and make sure my tour is in the afternoon. He was super helpful and everything seemed to go great. - Received a "how did we do" survey email a few days later that included the confirmation of my tour. They mistakenly scheduled it for the morning. Tried to call to correct their error but they were closed. Sent an email instead. - No reply to my email, so called to correct their error again. Spoke with someone named "Ana" who was the rudest person I've ever met in a customer service role. I'l spare you the details but I was absolutely blown away but this person. She's in the wrong job. She told me that even though it was their mistake, it was too late to change it and either I could use this appointment or lose the money. Helicopter tours are not cheap, so I was really frustrated by this. Anyhoo. These guys are horrible. Really really bad. So please do your best to avoid them at all costs. You'll be sorry if you use them! read more

WORLD AIRPORT TRANSFER I booked a cab to the Airport in Barcelona. They never showed and I almost missed my plane. Now they are playing games about refunding my money. DO NOT USE THIS BUSINESS. read more

Terrible, terrible, terrible. I booked "skip-the-line" Eiffel Tower tickets for 4. I was going to be late and attempted to contact the tour provider, as City Discovery suggested. The telephone numbers City Discovery provided were out of service. City Discovery will not budge. They will not refund my money. Completely dishonest. I'd give 0 stars if that were possible. read more

Classic bait and switch scam. I wish I had checked Yelp! earlier. all the negative reviews... I booked a transfer service for 4 people through City Discovery. A short 3~4 miles from hotel to port of Barcelona. Gave them all information regarding the ship schedule. Boarding time ends at 4:30 pm and ship departs at 6 pm. Requested transfer around 13:30 and was "confirmed". They told me to reconfirm with the local operator. By the time I checked into hotel, less than 2 hours after I arrived at Barcelona and before I even have a chance to call to reconfirm, the local operator already left a message with the hotel stating that they will pick us up at 10:30 AM instead. 3 hours earlier than my requested time. My ship does not leave until 6 pm and I had the morning planned with friends already. I Called the local operator and told them 1 hour earlier we could accomodate but 3 hours? And we had to wait more than 2 hours in humid summer heat before ship even lets anyone onboard?? Also asked them to send another car and they told us take it or leave it. We ended up taking taxis to the port from the hotel for about 28 Euros, 20 Euros cheaper than the transfer service! Emailed City Discovery about the situation and they responded initially and stated they will contact the local operator and then contact me but they never got back to me until 4 days later. So much for customer service. I'm filing dispute with my credit card company Capital One and City Discovery lied to Capital one stating they told me the pick up time BEFORE I even booked!! Total BS. They don't even "confirm" the booking, less alone the time for pick up, until several days later (to put customer into company's no refund window) and my requested time was clearly stated on the request form as they instructed. They didn't even give me a chance to call their local operator Agility Cars after I arrived in a foreign country and just changed the time to suit their own convenience. Very difficult company to deal with. It's actually cheaper to get taxis from any Barcelona city hotels to the port later I found out. BEWARE OF THEIR BAIT AND SWITCH read more

I have not even used my vouchers yet but already I have experienced so much trouble with City Discovery. The first problem that I have run into is the vouchers take longer than 72 hours to get to you. So if you are selecting an activity hoping to use it right away, you'll have to wait to get the voucher. The second problem I ran into. My credit card information was stolen after I booked through their site! Myself and four travel companions all used their site to book our activities for an upcoming trip and all of us had our credit cards compromised! I have tried reporting it to their customer service office but have not been able to get through with them. Be careful when booking with them! read more

A month in advance of a business trip to my company headquarters in San Francisco, I booked ahop on/hop off bus tour with a visit to Alcatraz for myself and my teenage son, who was traveling with me. I am a single parent and wanted to have my son ride the bus tour the first day while I worked, and then have both of us take the bus and Alcatraz tour on the second date. Unfortunately, when my son took the bus tour on the first specified date, he was told that we had to take the Alcatraz that same day, conflicting with my work meetings. I am very disappointed with the experience I had with the customer service. After an email query and phone call to try to change the Alcatraz tour to the second date, the customer service rep, Glecie, stated the policy on their website that the Alcatraz tour had to be taken on the first day of booking. Their policy did indeed cover the tour organization well by placing the note about the departure date BELOW the scroll line in the Notes section of the website. It is unfortunate that the service fails to accommodate my use case where a single working parent wanted to work on the first date, have their teen ride the bus tour on the first day, and then have the parent and child take the Alcatraz tour on the SECOND day. VERY non-accommodating. The tour company was completely unwilling to work with me on a refund, a partial refund, a change in date, or any other method of making this experience right for me. Overall this is a very inflexible organization that clearly is out to make a buck at the expense of good service to their customer. read more

DO NOT USE THIS COMPANY!!! I booked a day tour prior to my holiday.There were not enough participants so City Discovery offered me the option to cancel,which I did,Unfortunately,City Discovery already had my debit card details,and so they charged me anyway. I did receive a partial refund.They still owe me £2.70 in bank charges and exchange rate differences which they are refusing to return to me. STAY CLEAR OF THIS COMPANY-THEY ARE CROOKS!! I managed to book the same tour with a local company when I arrived at my destination and it was much cheaper anyway. read more

As I used to be a 20 years pro airlines/travel agent, their customer service is above average. although when I called customer call center, it was very rare to pick up phone in person immediately, but after I left a message,they quickly return the reponse by email, and they modify/refund my itinerary within 2days. Not bad. Very interesting tour company.I will def. use them for my future travel plan. read more

I have booked a one day tour from Zurich to Mt. Pilatus in July. The views from Mt. Pilatus were great and the weather was also very nice, however three things ruined the atmosphere of the tour right in the beginning. First, after standing for 15 min in a queue in +28C heat to validate the voucher, we got on the bus at 9.15am. We were pleading with the driver to turn the air conditioning on, but it was only done at 9.35am when we left Zurich. Secondly it took almost 2.5 hours to get to Lucerne as we were dropping off one couple for another adventure (the return trip was just 1 hour). Because of it, we had limited time in Lucerne, only 35 min. There was also no toilet break on the way down. To all our questions about the toilet stop, our guide Evelyn would reply: When we get to Lucerne, or can you wait? We had so many children on the bus and children cannot wait. We were finally dropped off at the shop which had a few toilets upstairs and a long queue. There was hardly any time to buy lunch, but not to eat it. Many families ended up eating on a bus to Kriens. A tip. Use the toilet just before boarding the bus and take your lunch with you. Also Viator has the same tour but longer free time in Lucerne. P.S. I have posted the above review on their website, but it was not published. read more

We booked a joint tour of the Eiffel tower and a cruise on the Seine to beat the queue. I was very disappointing with the service i received. Firstly they took 3 days to confirm my timed visit to the tower, when i received the confirmation, i was told that i had to print out the voucher even though i had already left home and was already in Paris. I managed to sort that out but their response time was very very slow (perhaps because it was coming from the USA?) and when i turned up with my family... they had reserved the wrong number of tickets with the provider. It was all sorted in the end but i don't pay good prices to be stressed out because of the companies inefficiencies. Peter read more

City Discovery...no one answers the phone...They run international tours...and all they have is a voice mail on Sunday morning.....Need info before I get on plane....No one there to help me. I'm cancelling their tours...as this must be an indication of how their tours will be run and their lack of professionalism. read more

At best inept. At worst Charlatons. No stars! After many attempts to get a resolution to my problem, I have been ignored and dismissed. I am a travel professional and used this service for clients when I couldn't find their unique requests with my preferred suppliers. City-Discovery has slick advertisements on TripAdvisor, a website and an agent site for professionals; however, they have absolutely no resources to handle business. Phone calls are never answered and emails are not monitored. They use a service that is actually so bad it takes weeks to generate a generic email response. I would urge consumers and travel agents to avoid this company at all costs. Stick with the legitimate companies like Viator. The real kicker is they have an A- rating from the Better Business Bureau! HOW????? read more

City Discovery is a total rip off. Upfront and online, they demand a color photo ID before you can book a tour. It took over a week just to book one, because they don't answer emails for days at a time. They lied to us about how to get to the right bus platform, and didn't offer to pick us up, although many other tours do. We got there but the bus was hidden behind a bunch of other buses, and we didn't see it. We were not allowed to go out and look, either. They left early, even though we had our concierge tell them the night before we would be there. They are refusing to give us a refund, even though we got absolutely nothing but disappointment and rudeness from them. We toured with many other companies while we vacationed, and did not have any problems with any of the others. Often, we waited a few extra minutes on the other tours for people they knew were coming. Hire ANY OTHER tour! They will steal your money and disappoint you! read more

don't use them....can not get a hold of them to confirm reservations. had 15 people reserved for a tour and could not get a hold of them!!!

Tried to book a tour today with City Discovery. Got a message saying it was "pending" so I called them. I was told that the tour was booked solid and my credit card would not be charged. So I went with another tour company. Hours later I get a confirmation from City Discovery that they had in fact booked the tour and charged my credit card. I now had double tickets to the same event. Since City Discovery had told me they were fully booked and would NOT charge my credit card I called them immediately and requested a refund. I was told by Dianne that a refund was not possible. 100% cancellation fee and she was curious why I would had booked with another company after having spoken and booked the tour with them. Duh!! She also refused to let me speak with a supervisor and refused to refund my money. Do NOT book with them. They are a rip-off. They will charge you for tours they say are full. This company lacks in integrity and hopefully will have enough complaints filed with the BBB that they file for bankruptcy after people stop using them. I intend on taking them to small claims court. read more