Zanzibar Spice Tour

We did Zanzibar Spice Tour, Blue Safari and all transfers with Mohammed-Ali and his driver. Very professional and reliable team with nice, kind and attentive service. Mohammed-Ali helped us to buy fruits and translate at the market which was really helpful. Moreover Mohammed-Ali was so nice to go back to the hotel in the North where my son forgot his book and he brought it back to us at Stone town.

When I booked this tour my hotel was not listed as a possible pickup site. Fine, no problem. The Zanzibar Ferry Terminal was listed as a meeting place, so I selected that location. At 4:00, the time for the tour to start, I was at the terminal looking around for the guide. Nobody was there. I sent an email to the company, and followed by messages on WhatsApp. There was no response. I sent several more, telling where I was, sending a photo of myself to help the guide find me, asking how to recognize the guide, asking if anybody was coming. Silence. I waited there for over half an hour, which was rather unpleasant since a foreign woman alone and looking confused attracts quite a bit of attention. And I had to talk to each man that approached me wanting me to go with him because I never knew if this was finally the guide or not. Finally I gave up and left. Later that evening I got a message on WhatsApp with a halfhearted apology and an excuse about them having some trouble with their email. No explanation was given however as to why the WhatsApp messages were also ignored. They offered to do the tour the next day instead, but I declined for two reasons. First, I didn't want to go with a company that would let someone book a tour and then not bother to show up, or even send a message letting that person know that nobody was coming. Second, I had booked in advanced and didn't plan anything else that afternoon so I could go on the spice tour. I wasn't going to clear the rest of my afternoons for them too so that I could sit around and wait until they decided to show up at their convenience. They said they understood and promised a refund. That was ten days ago. For comparison, another tour I had booked in Zanzibar had to cancel. They notified me in advance and I got the refund that same day. For this tour it has been ten days and there is still no refund in sight. I have sent numerous messages to the company, and each time the response is a promise the refund would come. After a few days of seeing nothing I asked when that would be. That's when they tried to tell me that the tour wasn't supposed to be for another month and that I would get a refund at that time. I reminded them that the entire reason for the refund is that the tour date has passed and they didn't show up. They then promised again that the refund would be given. Several more days, several more messages, still nothing. I asked yesterday again for a time to expect the refund and again they tried to tell me that it's July and that the tour isn't scheduled until August. I sent them a photo of the ticket with the July date clearly visible. More time has passed and I'm still getting the run around. Every time they say they're going to refund the money, but then do nothing. Then they act genuinely confused as to why I am still here asking for a refund instead of going away and being satisfied with getting a bunch of empty promises and nothing else. Lesson learned. If you schedule a tour with this company, don't trust them to show up for it. If nobody is coming to meet you, don't expect to be notified. If you request a refund, don't expect them to give it to you.