Dream Bandas Uganda Reservations team
Dream Bandas Uganda
- Located In:
- Size:
- 5-10 employees (Founded in 2015)
- Member Of:
- USAGA, UTB & UWA
- Tour Types:
- Custom budget & mid-range tours that can start every day
- Destinations:
- Price Range:
- $70 to $550 per person per day (USD, excl. int'l flights)
Reviews
IT
Email Gianni | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Fraud, stole 200€ from me. Police is involved.
I booked a hike in Bwindi, he quoted me $450. We agreed that I would pay a deposit of 200€ and then the rest would be “paid on the day of the hike”. Too bad the guy the company sent who was supposed to pay the park fees/guide didn’t actually have enough money and he only had cash (UWA does not accept cash). The guy there told me he would refund me the deposit after the hike, as I had to pay the entire sum myself on the spot despite the early booking. His boss then refused to refund me the deposit, claiming that I told him we were “EAC citizens”, even if I have the messages showing I told him we were “EAC residents”. He also claims we didn’t pay the full amount, which is true but we again we had agreed I would pay the rest ”the day of the hike”. And regardless, even if I had paid him everything in advance, we would have not been able to do the hike anyways because he made a mistake thinking we were “EAC citizens” instead of “EAC residents” and the guy he sent only had cash and UWA does not accept cash. I filed a police report and the Ugandan police said they will arrest him, let’s see.
Other than completely incompetent, he’s also dishonest and a brazen liar.
P.S: I told him I was ready to pay his services (meaning help on WhatsApp how the hike worked and the fact that a guy showed up at the hotel and went with us to the UWA HQ) regardless of all the mistakes, but he simply decided to take the 200€ that were supposed to pay the park fees/guide while he did not pay a single cent. This is malicious fraud, simple as that.
Reply from Dream Bandas Uganda
Posted on Oct 4, 2023Hello Gianni,
Thanks for you feedback but we regret to inform you that your review is misleading and full of lies.
First, Living in East Africa does not make you an expert in planning Uganda trips and therefore you should have trusted our recommendations and listened to our advice before going ahead to make these losses.
In the first conversations we had you clearly indicated that you had a group of 5 EAC Residents and 2 Non Residents. The hike fee for residents is $40 and non-residents is $50 which would cost a total of $300 and we quoted $450(427 Euros) to cater for the activity booking including park entrance and agency commission, you paid a deposit of Euros 200 and you accepted to pay the balance on the day of the trek directly to our guide such that you may sit back and wait to your trek.
Without consulting us at office, you deliberately chose to pay Uganda Wildlife Officials at the Information Centre a total of $570 and blocked our company representative from doing his job.
Questions;
1. Why on earth would you pay $570 for 7 people if divided meant each person costed $81.4 instead of paying Euros 227? Balance which meant it would be $64 per person?
2. It is no excuse that our representative had cash and not paid. I would like to bring to your attention that we have a mobile money system that would get this payment done in no minute if you had complied and made your full payment as agreed. Can you please clarify on whether we requested you to complete paying before trip and why you refused to pay at the hotel where you had internet to use the payment link we shared and opted to pay at the information Centre?
3. Why did you insist to pay by yourself although our representative advised you not to do so?
And the end of the day you threatened us to ruin our company reputation and maliciously damage our brand using you position and connections in Rwanda if not refunded.
As a company, we have clear guidelines in our cancellation and refund policy and in this case you violated each of them and blocked us from executing our services. This is a vice that has been noticed from some group leader who fraudulently obtain money from their colleagues and for some reason try to block their friends from directly contacting the agency they are traveling with.
We would like the warm all travelers with friends in Africa to always go ahead and contact the agency other than paying to their friends who get a lot of money from them and tend to run these tours cheaply by themselves.