Getaways through Groupon?

hgotsparkle

I just wondered if anyone has ever done a Getaway deal through Groupon.

I've found a few that I would really love: Vienna, Valencia, Florence or Venice and I want to surprise OH with a short trip away.
A couple of them have flights included, and the others I've looked at flights with Ryanair. For Vienna, we would have to fly to Linz and travel out to Vienna which would shorten the trip somewhat, being only a 1 night stay.

Has anyone had troubles with bookings through Groupon or the like?
I'm really in 2 minds about it.

budgetflyer

I don't think the ones abroad are any cheaper than self packaging.
If you are flexible you can get flights for under £60 RTN for a lot of cities with Ryanair or Easyjet etc
Using Trivago, Hotelscombined and hotelscomparison.com should ensure you book your accom at the cheapest rate.

Bratislava is handy for Vienna.

PolishBigSpender

I would steer clear of Groupon. There have been quite a few reports of trouble through Groupon in Poland, especially as they (the travel agency) have to pay a large cut to Groupon.


The usual scam with Groupon is that you have to pay on the day for extra services, for example, paying the bus driver to store luggage, or paying for the bus parking in the airport. Steer clear.


And yes, Bratislava is excellent for Vienna. It's an hour away by train, and Bratislava in itself is worth a few hours.

Vini123

We've done a few with Groupon, and it can be very restrictive.

Our last trip was to Paris, I think it was £129 for 1 night, including Eurostar.

We paid £129 for the 'voucher', but when we called to actually use it/book, we were limited to about 4 dates (i think they offered us a Eurostar leaving Friday at about 8pm, then returning Saturday at about 10am, technically thats 1 night...!) that fell into the £129 'voucher' (because the Eurostar prices were higher at 'decent' times)... If we wanted to go on specific dates, the price increased.

Our previous experience was similar, and as such we're not going to use Groupon again for trips like this, its far less hassle to just DIY and avoid Groupon.


Sure, not all 'offers' might work like this, but 2 from 2 with us.