Paddywagon Tours Reviews 98

I'm afraid we did not al all enjoy our tour to Wicklow and Kilkenny. The audio was bad, the airconditioning malfunctioned (temperatures reached up to 33C in the bus and there was no water. A kid in the bus actually threw up), there was poor communication about lunch destination resulting in lunch at 15:30 in Kilkenny, and not being able to properly appreciate the town or the castle, we arrived back in Dublin more than an hour later than eta and, what I find most unacceptable, Paddywagon tours is not responding to any or my emails or feedback forms whatsoever. When I checked other reviews on Facebook, all my hopes of a refund or even proper response went away. I am utterly disappointed, they should be ashamed of how they advertise themselves.

Do not book this company!! Terrible customer service!
On our booking email there was no details about arriving at the bus stop 5-10 minutes early for our full day Belfast day tour. So we arrived on time (8:15am) and the bus left right in-front of us!
Absolutely terrible when people have paid good money to visit Dublin & for the tour. Our day was wasted and we were so disappointed to miss this experience
We have called the head office hundreds of times with no response.
It’s just terrible. The students who take free walking tours around the city care provide better customer service! More care should be taken.

The 3 day ireland tour was a total disappointment. There were multi day tours offered and most of them who paid for the tour weren’t sure which day tour they should group themselves into as there were hardly any knowledgeable organizers around to manage these different groups, resulting in a chaotic situation. The tour eventuality took off late but with not cheerful,keen and happy looking tourists aboard the bus. The driver of the tour bus wasn’t fulfilling his job duty either in providing information on the places that we visited. Just kept quiet most of the time. To worsen the situation, the microphone in the bus wasn’t working at all, thus the rear passngers couldn’t hear or make out what the tour bus driver was talking about. We passed certain places where we should have stopped but the tour bus driver just kept on driving. I have paid premium money, time and travelling half the world for this tour and is totally flabbergasted by the way this tour has been managed. If i have the opportunity to turn back time, I certainly would go for the Ireland tour but not with Paddywagon Tours. Total waste of my time and money not well spent is how i would summarize this tour.

Don’t recommend this tour agency! Very rude and disorganised! We departed late and there wasn’t any comments on the stops so wasn’t much of a tour as just passing by those places! Everyone keeps waiting for the bus till bus driver arrives then everyone is heading to bus driver asking is this the bus for the tour? Omg, no one from Paddywagon to assist us, could even see a lady cancelled the tour due to the same problems! We feel that the advertising of this holiday was misleading, the organisation poor and the cost too . If we known what it was really going to be like, we definitely not have chosen it.

We booked the 3-Day Southern Ireland Tour Including Galway and Kerry from Dublin with Paddywagon which turned out to be the worst decision ever.

On Day 1, we followed the instructions set out in the tour details which asked us to check-in at Paddy's Palace 15 minutes before departure. The departure was supposed to be at Paddywagon Tours Ltd and the departure time stated was 8:00 AM.

We reached Paddy’s Palace at 0730 only to find out that that’s where Paddywagon Tours used to operate and they’ve moved since. The people in that building asked us to wait in the road opposite instead, which seemed very random and odd. We ended up rushing to Paddywagon Tours and to make sure that it was the correct pickup point, we asked a female staff from Paddywagon Tours who didn’t know anything and asked us to ask the bus drivers who parked their buses by the road INDIVIDUALLY. After asking 3 bus drivers, the last one asked us to ask a male staff called Sonny/Sani (guy in orange shirt in the first picture, don’t know how to spell his name). When we explained our situation regarding the different check-in point and asked politely about the correct meet-up point, this is his exact response: “That’s your problem!”. Imagine him saying that in front of the whole group of people, who were in a similar situation as us and waiting for their turns to ask the same thing. We felt very humiliated and absolutely disgusted by his rude attitude and behaviour towards their customers. Surprisingly, (or maybe not so surprisingly?), when someone from the UK asked him about the same thing, he was smiling, being very polite and courteous. (We are international tourists if that’s not obvious). Why hire this kind of racist morons when you are operating a tour agency which obviously attracts international tourists mainly? By the way, this tour costed 1500 EUROS, fun 😊

To make things worse, the area outside Paddywagon Tours where everyone was waiting was in complete disarray and shambles, due to how disorganised Paddywagon Tours was. Not a single staff was doing the obvious thing to take names and check number of travellers etc. They also didn’t bother to group people into different tours, which may seem understandable if there’s overlap between different tours but imagine this: When a different bus arrives outside, everyone rushes to the bus driver asking the tour that the driver is operating. This was a back-and-forth process and one bus even forgot to stop outside Paddywagon Tours and just went on. You can see the second picture for an example of this. Eventually we got on the bus at 0840 but there weren’t enough seats. The driver, maybe acting on the instructions of the tour agency, had the audacity to ask if anyone wants to GET OFF the bus. One lady volunteered because she commented that it was a SHITSHOW, to which the driver agreed. We ended up departing at 0900.

To make things worse, the driver said that the mic was broken, through the mic no less! We passed by all those places without knowing their history. We didn’t even know what we were looking at and just alighted the bus when all other tourists did to take photos etc. We had to keep asking the driver regarding how long we are stopping at each location, what we are doing, what’s the plan etc. We could move up a little to hear more clearly but there’s obviously only so many seats available. There was pretty much no commentary through the mic throughout the 3-day trip and the driver only spoke out loud, expecting the whole bus to be able to listen to him clearly, with the engines running and people talking in the background. The whole trip was pretty much the driver fetching us to all these stops while talking to those in the front row seats only.

Oh before I forget, to make the tour more interesting and full or surprises, below is a list of things that were different to what’s advertised in the tour:
- No free Wi-Fi on the bus
- 2 breakfasts instead of 3
- We passed through Adare but didn’t even stop there. We were most excited about this given the description on the ad: “We will enjoy a stop at one of Ireland's most picturesque villages - Adare with its fabulous thatched cottages which line part of the village's broad main street , renowned for being regularly voted Ireland's tidiest town. It is known for its beautiful stone buildings, medieval monasteries and ruins.”

Maybe Paddywagon Tours doesn’t understand that tours like this are usually considered by others are “trips of a lifetime”. It’s just infuriating how we paid so much money for this totally unenjoyable trip.

“AwArD wInNiNg PaDdYwAgOn, WoRlD fAmOuS tOuRs Of IrElAnD”

“OuR tEaM oF lOcAl TaLeNtS aRe PaSsIoNaTe AbOuT tHeIr HoMe CoUnTrY aNd ThEy WiLl PrOvIdE yOu WiTh StOrIeS tO lAsT a LiFeTiMe”

What an absolutely terrible joke.

I do not think I would recommend PaddyWagon.

I would like to make it clear that the first impression was very good and the trip was pleasant. Of course, at the time of departure we were slightly behind schedule: they had left back a customer and had to go back and retrieve him. However, it is clear that this was a physiological error and could have happened to anyone. Moreover, the guide also made the wait enjoyable-as well as the rest of the trip-thanks to his excellent sense of humor.

Anyway, the experience turned out to be bad only on the second day after the trip: I checked my bank statement - which, as is natural, takes a few days to update - and realized that PaddyWagon had charged me twice for the same tickets - that is, €133.77 twice.

I realized at that moment what had happened: when purchasing two tickets online for me and my girlfriend for a tour from Dublin to the Cliffs of Moher for the next day, the paddywagon Internet page had stopped working and informed me that the payment had failed; consequently, I repeated the ticket purchase process and, this time, the site page informed me that the payment had been successful. Therefore, as i realized after four days, I had paid twice for the same tickets.

I contacted the company the same day by e-mail explaining to them in precise terms what had happened, including with reference to our names, the dates of the online purchases and the trip, and the order number of the tickets. Despite this, not only did they never refund me the amount I had unduly paid, they never even bothered to respond to me.

I now read that on the Internet they describe themselves as "probably the world's best-loved tour company!" If you'll excuse me, I have my doubts: a company beloved by customers does not behave similarly with some of them.

Had a great experience with this company going to the giants causeway, Jackie our tour guide was friendly, hilarious throughout the tour and shared some real good knowledge about the locations we visited, we stopped off in Belfast aswell for an hour on the way back from the giants causeway so it was nice to have a little look around, grab something to eat and stretch your legs as it’s a very long day (around 12 hrs) I would recommend if you are looking to go to the giants causeway from Dublin/ Belfast!

Do not use this tour company!!!!! After 15 months, we are still trying to get a refund for our 6-Day Tour of Southern Ireland. Their website states a full refund if cancelled 30 days before the tour. We cancelled 4 months before. They are giving us a runaround saying they are not in the office and cannot issue a refund, or lately that they are behind on their refunds. DO NOT USE THIS COMPANY!!!!

Killarney - Nov 2019. A White knuckle ride comes to mind on a luxury 25 seater bus. hold on for dear life while the driver ignores your pleas of please slow down through the ring of Kerry (which is stunning) but you cant get to see too much as your too busy holding onto the seat. Plus the stops are selective and they stop at a the famine village, (which you need to pay for) so you have half an hr to whizz yourself round the famine village and the shop and the café and if you wanted a bite to eat or a pint eat and drink up fast. There was no microphone from the driver he bellowed all sorts of crap (I am from NI so I know crap when I hear it), I pity the poor foreign tourists who might not have heard or understood a word he said (Brian). There was no other communication (translators) used. We stopped for lunch at the one and only local pub (pub grub) for toilet needs etc. I went to the toilet and didn't eat at there recommended location, we used a beautiful wee café just up the road which served homemade soup, wine, beer, dinners, scones etc. lovely company lovely and clean. The onwards for another bumpy ride passing the large 40 seater other company buses on the way. Down to the park (toilets not open so hold on till Killarney. NEVER AGAIN I would use a different company.

I took the Ring of Kerry tour when I was in Ireland two years ago and it was amazing! The guide was beyond lovely, very funny and captivating, the tour itself was great! I loved the comfortable bus and we stopped in all the right places for a decent amount of time! I recommend this company so much if you feel like touring Ireland but don't want to rent a car!

VERY BAD option for groups. We had a group of 10 and we were split up onto 2 busses and all spread out in the bus so essentially we all were on a tour alone for 11.5 hours. When we arrived in the morning they apologized and asked that we just sit in the spread out seats and they would fix everything on the first stop. We said we would just leave because the entire purpose of our trip was to be together. They then reassured us that they would fix it. But then when we came to the first stop, they said too bad. We just had to deal with it. The only option we had was to call a cab. They absolutely refused a refund or any further assistance. We got a stone wall. When we got back to the office at the end of our day they gave us a stone wall again and said too bad. While the tour itself was ok, being flat out lied to and then getting stonewalled at the office made us realize they are a terrible company. They have no integrity. GROUPS SHOULD NOT BOOK WITH THIS COMPANY.

Brilliant Irish Tour company. Highly Recommended.