CLUB Travel has frozen the
account of an ITC, pending
an investigation into its
relationship with Travel Quest.
Red flags were raised when tour
operators contacted TNW, advising
that their logos were being used
illegally on the Travel Quest website,
www.travelquest.co.za. Travel Quest
is a subsidiary of Leisure Travel
International (LTI) – a Club Travel
ITC. Both LTI and Travel Quest are
membership-based travel clubs that
offer consumers who pay a start-up
and membership fee the ‘benefits’
of ‘specially negotiated prices’.
Tour operators – World Leisure
Holidays, Thompsons Holidays,
Holiday Tours and Beachcomber
Tours – say they did not agree to
display their logos on the Travel
Quest website.
Cathie Bester, national sales
manager of WLH, says that before
TNW alerted her to the fact that
Travel Quest was displaying the
WLH logo, she had never heard
of the company. She says LTI is a
recognised business partner of WLH
but not Travel Quest. “We will be
sending communication through to
Travel Quest and request that our
logo be removed from their website
immediately.”
John Ridler, spokesperson of
Thompsons Holidays, says he
has tried to speak to the relevant
people at Travel Quest to remove
the Thompsons logo but to no
avail. “They get very nervous on the
phone and keep transferring me to
other people. Eventually the phone
is disconnected,” he says.
A representative of Travel Quest
told TNW she was surprised to
hear that tour operators weren’t
familiar with Travel Quest. She said
Travel Quest was a “regular” travel
agency that “just happens” to work
on a membership basis. She says
Travel Quest sells tour operator
packages on a daily basis and often
welcomes the tour operators’ reps
into their offices and that Travel
Quest had been in contact with
Thompsons two years ago, at which
point Thompsons agreed to let the
company use its logo.
John contests that Thompsons
has never given Travel Quest the
authorisation to use the logo. He
says the company will not hesitate
to take legal action to have the
logo removed from Travel Quest’s
website.
Jo Fraser, franchise director of
Club Travel, says Club is in no way
associated with Travel Quest. She
says Club Travel has a connection
with LTI, which has been a Club
Travel ITC for some years and
has never been problematic. She
adds that Club Travel will, however,
be freezing the LTI account with
immediate effect, pending an
investigation into its relationship
with Travel Quest.
This is not the first time Travel
Quest has made headlines. In
December 2011 Noseweek
published an article,
‘Holidays nobody wants’
that relates the story of a
couple who were desperate
to cancel a 40-year contract
with Travel Quest but were
refused. The couple feared
that if they cancelled the
debit order, they would
be blacklisted. They were
quoted in the article
saying they had received
“absolutely no value” from
joining and had been unable
to redeem vouchers given
to them when they signed
up. There are also various
complaints on hellopeter.
com from disillusioned
members about Travel
Quest.
One traveller, who
attended a Travel Quest
presentation in Nelspruit on
March 16, told TNW Travel
Quest representatives had
promised ‘guaranteed 50%
discounts’ on rack rates at
all times with the abovementioned
tour operators.
Membership joining fees
varied, depending on the
length of the contract, from
R24 000 to R32 000.
Considerable membership
discounts were given to
clients who agreed to sign
up on the night of the
presentation. When this
traveller asked if she could
take the documentation
and contracts home for
further scrutiny, Travel Quest
refused.
“We have no such
agreements in place with
any of our travel agents.
Even the Thompsons
Holidays’ staff discount
doesn’t amount to 50%.
How could we offer this to
our clients?” says John.
Cathie adds: “If we offered
a 50% discount on our
published rates to anyone,
we would lose the support
of our valued travel partners
and probably go out of
business.
“WLH prides itself on
maintaining rate parity with
all our partners all the time.”
The Travel Quest
representative who spoke
to TNW said no such
‘guaranteed discounts’
were made. She said most
of the discounts offered to
clients were for bed and
breakfast or self-catering
establishments. She
referred to the Travel Quest
website, where it states:
“There is no guaranteed
minimum or maximum
discount on all properties
linked or featured on our
site. Discounts vary from
property to property and
area to area. In some cases
discounts may go as high as
up to 70% off the rack rates
of resorts.
Stop Press
At the time of publication, the
representative from Travel Quest
contacted TNW to advise that the
company had removed all logos
from its website.”
