STA Travel Reviews

It's been a long time, but thanks to STA Travel, I booked an around-the-world-trip that changed my life to the better. Travel agencies in general have had a difficult time the last two years and are receiving worse reviews than before.I hope they overcome this crisis and the challenges that go along with.

Star Travel contacted me regarding a ticket even after I said I had bought one. However, the price seems attractive and for future reference I asked some other questions to compare against what I had bought. The person who contacted me was really rude. You can imagine how their customer service would treat you even when a potential customer is treated like this.

Awful customer service, wouldn’t even bother trying to ring them.

This company has gone into liquidation, bunch of amateurs, basically fancy thieves praying on gap gear students and sell you a dream but they are basically full of hot air.

I lost alot of money and my tour cut short, no way of reclaiming money.
This company is a complete shambles. Word of advice ! If you ever wish to explore a count don’t be lazy. Do some research and plan your own trip, network and find like minded people with similar plans and buddy up to reduce cost. These people shove you like sardines on a coach for hours on end and give you cheap activities to do. They include cool stuff on itinerary’s at extra costs and high sound great, just words on a page, you never actually Experience these things. If you want to take a gap year network and plan your own trip. It will be cheaper and you won’t be stuck with loads of people you don’t really know or like or have to put up with group dynamics. I’m actually tempted to start my own travel company to get bespoke trips with very intimate groups to offer people a quality experience. I’ll be keeping an eye out for these company’s if they resurface under another name,I will petition to expose what these fakes are all about !

Disappointed after waiting 3 months for a refund

I FEEL SORRY FOR ALL sta travel CUSTOMERS AS MUCH AS I FEEL SORRY FOR MYSELF. WE ARE ALL STUCK WITH their UNLAFUL POLICY - ABSOLUTELY USELESS sta credit INSTEAD OF FULL REFUND FOR CANCELLED FLIGHTS AND OTHER QUESTIONABLE PRODUCTS.
NOW WE ALL HAVE ALSO USELESS EMAILS ADVISING US TO CONTACT AIRLINES WHIH ARE URESPONSIVE!
YOU KNOW WHAT IS COMING? NEW NAME AND THEY WILL BE ON THE MARKET AGAIN ...

In May 2020, I paid a deposit of £49, to book a return flight to Sydney Australia, at a cost of £690.67. The remaining balance was paid in a further 2 installments, of £400.00 and £267.67. The Travel Agent in question was STA Travel. I had previously booked flights with them, on a couple of occasions and, had no reason to suspect otherwise. On the 21st August 2020, STA Travel went into administration, stating that it was due to Covid19. On the 26th August 2020, and in view of entry into Australia still being closed, to non Australian passport holders, I contacted Singapore Airlines, the Airline that STA Travel had booked on my behalf, to give me flight credits, to travel in 2021. When the Australian borders reopen to non Australian passport holders. To my astonishment, they advised me that, they could not do this, has my flight that I was due to travel on, in November, had not been paid for. I attempted to contact STA Travel, to no avail then, I contacted the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) to tell them of my situation. They asked me if STA Travel had given me a ATOL certificate, of which they had not. The reason being, is that if I was in receipt of a ATOL certificate, I could claim my £690.67 back through themselves. Due to this, they advised me to contact my bank card issuer. I had paid my 3 installments for my flight, with a Visa debit card. I search online and, found a template to ask my bank, to instigate a chargeback. A chargeback is when a customer requests his/her bank, to claim the money back, from the businesses bank account. In this case, STA Travel's bank account and, return funds back to the customers bank account. I was very thankful of the CAA advice, they had given to me, with regards to this matter. As for STA Travel's message on it's website. It states that customers would be contacted, in the coming days. As for this, no one from the company has followed this up. Simply disgraceful. As a update on things. Singapore Airlines informed me, by email, a few days ago, that the flights I had booked, have been cancelled. Due to the Airline's schedule, because of the covid19 situation. If this is the case. I am due a full refund of money's paid.

I got an IEP Visa for New Zealand though BUNAC - a subsidiary Company of STA. And because of Covid-19 I can go so I asked for a refund. I was told that I'd get my refund within 60 days. Of course on day 60 STA has gone into administration.. There goes a much needed £800. Does anyone have any suggestions for what I can do?

A COMPLETE SHOWER OF DISINGENUOUS INDIVIDUALS - MK STA Store

Further to my earlier review in April. Little has changed other than STA has gone under; no surprise there. They were floundering even before the lockdown with their ever shifting statements. If they had taken their heads out of the sand (keeoing it polite) they might have seen excellent examples of good customer care demonstrated by their competitors e.g. Kuoni and Trailfinders.

At the onset of the FO non-essential travel ban the MK Store were trying to pressure my daughter to cancel her own holiday to the Far East thereby saving themselves some financial exposure.

Despite continued requests for a full refund, as required by law, MK refused to acknowledge their legal responsibilities merely sending waffling emails about how they could do no more and it was now up to customer services; the Store Manager stating that the issue was out of their hands and she was going on leave!

STA Customer Services must exist in a sound proof box as nothing was heard from them until a few weeks ago when they called my daughter stating that a full refund £3200+ would be paid in the next 60 to 90 days.... marvellous. THEY'VE NOW GONE BUST!

Disappointingly it appears that many of their customers, no doubt young adults like my daughter, who worked hard to save and then spend their money with a 'reputable' (ha ha) company are now left high and dry having to sort STA's mess out for them.

Part of the initial challenge being that STA document is as good as useless; the invoicing was appalling (lack detail and not making sense) and in full absence of provision of their ABTA / IATA certification at the time of booking.

This company will not be missed now that, thankfully, it has disappeared from the High Street.

After being told that our School trip for 20 young people to a tune of £15,000 would be refunded on July 2nd following a "60 day refund period" of course STA have now gone bust. Quelle suprise! This money belongs to parents and families who may have lost their jobs or been furloughed yet STA have made no effort to remedy this. I am beyond furious and I would like to request STA CEO Casper Urhammer to dig deep out of his own fortune and pay us back. This is a very shady business and I rejoice they have disappeared from the high street.

not a surprise they have gone bust as they way they dealt with customers resulted in such negative press that they were never going to get any further business.
I like many others had to deal with their shady practices to try and hold onto customers money. The regulator ABTA should be questioning it's existance as it did nothing to support travellers.

After being offered a refund from Cathay Pacific I contacted sta travel who said we can rebook the flight but from Heathrow not Gatwick, ok that's fine. The whole holiday stopped due to covid 19. They informed me I can only have a credit note which isn't true and asked me to send an email to agree, this was a complete scam. Anyway none of this matters now as they have gone bust. Thank god for my credit card. I'm sure those that were involved in palming off the customers so sta could keep trading off other people's hard earned money without a flight or holiday feel as used as I do. £1150 .

Absolutely appalling company!
Our holiday of a lifetime to Thailand for my 50th was cancelled on 31st March (due to fly mid April)
They flatly refused To refund us cash- stating all we could have was credit notes (with no clear advice on expiry dates or what would happen if we didn’t rebook).
Anyhow after a month of emails back and forth about them breaking the law, they still refused to issue a cash refund.
So I made a claim against my credit card at the end of April.
Due to unprecedented times there was a back log of claims and therefore taking months to process our claim.
A temporary credit had been placed back on my credit card however with instructions that it could not be withdrawn for Minimum of 30 days incase STA travel appealed.
On 31.7.20 STA travel contacted me saying I had requested a call back (I never had!).
During the call they said if I cancelled my credit card claim they would issue an immediate refund (I had to provide evidence in writing from my credit card company).
I did question why they would offer this at this time, but they assured me they just wanted to help resolve the issues I was experiencing.
I cancelled my Credit card claim On 1.8.20.
7 days later no refund from STA travel so I email them to find out where my ‘immediate’ refund is.
Another 7 days Later I eventually get a response from STA travel - will be 8 weeks before refund is issued.
Another 7 days later - STA TRAVEL HAVE GONE BUST!

I find it very difficult to believe they didn’t know this was coming when they rang me claiming they were ‘returning my call’ then offered to issue cash refund!!!!!?
I’m normally more astute than this n wish I’d never cancelled my credit card claim now.
It leaves me with no other opinion If STA travel than a disgusting, deceitful and corrupt company who has no regard for their customers.
If they had not gone bust I would be telling everyone I know to stay clear of them!

I’m honestly not surprised this company has gone bust. An example of how not to handle customer service in a pandemic.
To summarise; here is how we got treated:
I was a loyal STA customer, this was my fourth year in a row of booking with them, they’d always been pleasant in the past and cheaper than many competitors. When I booked to go to Vietnam in May back in January for myself and a friend, we were aware coronavirus was looming although didn’t know how serious it would be. We were reassured when booking we were all covered if the worst were to happen, but pushed into paying our balance ASAP.
The trip obviously got cancelled, given it was ATOL protected and my experience of STA thinking they were a known high street brand I wasn’t overly concerned about getting our money back. How wrong I was.
I first contacted them in April when it had been cancelled, only to be told that we could only have a refund credit note. The first member of staff was relatively pleasant, playing almost dumb to it all saying that was all they knew currently. I declined the credit note, knowing this wasn’t what I wanted for various reasons. I saw on the news that everyone who had booked a package holiday was legally entitled to their money back, although some firms were being slower than the 14 days maximum. Sta were not adhering to this - first catastrophic error on their part, they angered all of their loyal customers. I then got a rude email from another member of staff telling me I take the credit note or I get nothing. The member of staff also brought their own feelings and emotions into it too, almost trying to make me feel bad for asking for my own money back. I continued to decline and opened a dispute with my bank for the money back. The emails continued, back and forth, rude in tone each time and no progression. I looked at trust pilot and other sources and saw STA travels reputation was going downhill rapidly, they were digging their own grave. No one would dare book with them given how they had treated people.
A month ago I got a call from an extremely friendly member of staff, apologising for everything they had put me through. He told me I would definitely be entitled to my refund and he was so sorry it had taken this long. He then said that in order to get my refund he could see that there was a dispute open blocking it from going through. I was confused by this but he assured me if I cancelled that with the bank I would have my refund. I called my bank to do this and reluctantly I cancelled the dispute. Days and weeks went by with no money in my account. Up until 2 days ago I was constantly chasing for the money I’d been promised and asking why they had lied to me so blatantly. And then yesterday, there we have it, STA travel files for insolvency and enters administration.
If any other company sees this, let this be a lesson of how not to treat customers in a pandemic or at any point. I feel like I was lied to from the word go right to the last moment. Who knows if I will get my money back, I will speak to the bank explaining this - I even said to the bank when cancelling my dispute that I was anxious, so hopefully this will help my case.
Bottom line, treat your consumers better during a global crisis no matter how hard you are struggling, they are struggling too!

My daughter, who is a care worker, had saved up to purchase flights which were cancelled back in March by the airlines - still no refund from STA. Worse, our bank refunded my daughter but have just taken back the refunded amount with no notice as they tell us STA have now told them she has accepted a credit note. This is a lie. My daughter is in tears. How does this company get away with outright lying? Please anyone considering ever using this company don't do it, I should hate anyone else to feel as upset as my daughter does today.