**Note:
The management handled the issues and complaints we had very nicely and provided a full refund without any extra friction. Had they not, I would have left a... read more 1-star review. The tour guide Ceren is likely fired I think, but if not then you better be aware.
Is my experience the norm amongst all tour guides at this company? Probably not (at least I hope). I don’t want this review to affect all the honest, hard-working, smart and kind tour guides who are working with this business. I am sure there are wonderful guides associated with this company. I just wish we had gotten one of them. One bad apple shouldn’t ruin the rest.
Should you still book this tour? Yes, because honestly if you book through another company, you are probably just as likely to encounter these issues. To give Ceren credit, she knew her history, BUT here is what you need to be VERY careful about when you book with ANY guide, through this company, or any other one.
Also the management was very respectful, kind and apologetic!**
Here’s what happened:
We had high expectations due to all the fantastic reviews. We were fine paying a higher price for a private tour with a well-reviewed company in order to have a professional tour guide and avoid all of the common tourist traps where the guide spends half the time trying to take you to their friends’ shops for their sales commission in order to rip tourists off.
Unfortunately, this is EXACTLY what happened. Our worst nightmare came true about the tour, and after a very nice informative 90 minutes, the tourist traps began.
Tour Guide:
First Tourist Trap:
“Do you like ceramics and pottery?” I know a company that makes high quality ceramics that the government regulates the pricing of, so the prices are fixed and excellent quality.
She proceeded to bring us to a 30 minute demonstration of some guy making a clay pot in a private room. It was an extended sales pitch saying how good their products were. Then they proceed to try to sell us their pots. A small ceramic pot was $470 USD. Of course this is the normal government regulated pricing so it must be accurate and not a tourist trap! (sarcasm...)
Later I found out from our hotel’s boutique at the Four Seasons Hotel the real prices of the exact same ceramics (10x cheaper) unsurprisingly. It was a total lie from our tour guide as well as the store.
Second Tourist Trap:
“Let’s tour the Grand Bazaar”
Ceren proceeds to take us to the Grand Bazaar which is definitely cool, except she explained almost nothing and took us straight to one of the 100 same nut, spice and dried fruit shops. She said it was her friend’s store who never rips off people, it’s the best deal.
He is a nice guy, proceeds to give us a ton of samples. I didn’t suspect that much at this time honestly. I felt bad to not purchase anything due to his generosity (which is normal for someone who has empathy) and decided to buy some things such as some tea, spice, pistachios.
At the time of checkout, somehow my few items amounted to $220 USD which I was a bit shocked at, but the shop owner already swiped my credit card and my “trustworthy” tour guide had said so much how they’re super honest so I figured it was OK... until I thought about it a little more and tried to do the math.
Long story short, the shop when we weren’t looking, added extra weight to what we were buying, and tared the scales incorrectly so essentially something that weighed 300 grams was charged to us at 1 kilogram (1000g).
He did this for every item, so what should have been perhaps $70 was 3X the price ($220). I was pissed off when I discovered it and caught him red handed. I yelled at them, told them to refund everything and then give Ceren an earful because I had trusted her (as I trusted this tour company and all the 5 star reviews).
Only later the next day when I saw some shops on the street, did I realize that in addition to charging 3x the price by completely lying, they also marked up everything by 10X. For e.g., Dried Prunes are normally 34 Turkish Lira per Kilo, and at the shop it was 340 Turkish Lira per Kilo!
3rd Tourist Trap:
Well I think you readers get the point now. But she actually had the heart to try to take us to another Rug Maker’s shop (who was disappointed when we said we aren’t interested) and then a jewelry shop, and then every other shop that her “friends” aka “commission business partners” had.
I told her to end the tour, and cancel everything else.
LONG STORY SHORT (TLDR;)
We paid $150/per day rate to do a 90 min tour, and then get dragged onto 2 hours of glorified sales pitches and scam artists. Exactly what you want to AVOID by booking with this tour company! We ended booking the next day through our hotel with literally the most amazing tour guide ever through the Four Seasons.
He cared about us, he was honest, he showed us how amazing Turkish people can be and how thoughtful as well. He thought of the small details to make us have an amazing time, AND there is ZERO tourist traps, ZERO mention of anything that would take away from knowing the real local history and culture.
I still recommend this company above others, but you need to be aware of all the scams out there and the places that your tour guide will likely take you. It is possible we got very unlucky with Ceren, because it‘s the worst when your tour guide is in on it as well. The scammers are insanely good at scamming so if you aren’t super aware of what’s going on, you will get scammed for sure.
For management, in my opinion you should have every single one of your guides tell your tourists to be careful and only take them to shops if they request it explicitly. They never should be trying to pitch guests to go to shops out of the blue.
Good luck and enjoy Istanbul.
+90 542 591 99 25
+90 532 569 09 91
3-day Private Guided Tour Best of Istanbul is perfectly organized and guided. Despite the COVID19 restrictions, we managed to expirience all of the major Istanbul highlights. Our guide Ali... read more