Chan Brothers Travel

Went to the above three countries with Chan World Muslim tour & no regrets.

Nice hotel & good food. Highly recommended.

The guides were friendly & caring.

The 11 days for Highlights of Europe in my opinion, was more like a recee trip for one to plan a revisit to a particular city in future.

As stated "highlights" was more of a touch & go experience.

The optional tour charges were exorbitant. 

Citing one example, - Versailles Palace was charged at 90€/pax. The basic entry pass cost abt 32sgd via online purchase.

Optional tours for 2 oax was 500+ €

Our tour manager was an experienced guide who stayed on to complete the tour despite an emergency family crisis. 

The staff ( who claimed to be a tour manager for more than 20 yrs ) sold us the package at NATAS redirected our questions by emphasizing that we will have "pre-departure briefing" where more trip details would be shared on top of being able to meet the rest of the tour group members. However, we were informed 2 wks before the trip that pre-briefing sessions have ceased for more than 2 years. If so, how was he unaware of that?

We did the tour over CNY in 2024. Overall we were quite happy with our hotels and sight seeing spots. For me personally the Lofoten were the highlights of the trip. Our tour guide was very experienced with Scandinavia (he had done this tour many times before) and was very enthusiastic about his job. Hotels and restaurants were well pre-booked by him, so room keys were ready upon arrival and finding seats in restaurants went quickly. The tour bus had an onboard toilet for emergencies and USB plug-ins were available for every seat. We managed to see the Aurora only for one night, although our tour guide kept an eye on the Aurora forecast the entire trip. In the end it was thanks to him to bring us to a field next to the hotel where we managed to take some photographs. However, there were certain points during this tour I was disappointed with. 1. Meals: Eating cod fish ore steamed salmon becomes quickly a fad after 3 days in a row. But this seems to be a cultural thing with Scandinavians with fish in abundance but other meat being more a rarity. 2. Ice Igloos: It's apparently a one time experience but IMO not worth a S1000 per night. The room was crammed with hardly any space for our overnight bags and no facilities to hang or store our heavy winter gear. Definitely NOT! a luxuries accommodation. So everything ended up scattered around the room. The ensuite bathroom had only hot water for 20 min. The glass windows were without heating and therefore the view was obscured from a previous snowfall. We didn't see the Aurora anyway but that was nobody's fault. 3. Campfire experience: As mentioned by others the tent was too small to provide seating for the whole group. The campfire smoke (due to low quality fire wood) was another annoyance and making my clothing reek from the smoke the next day. Absolutely ludricous was the so called professional photographer taking our portraits, while someone was waving some silly lights behind us. I deleted the final "portrait" instantly upon receipt. The only positive side of the whole experience was the cheerfulness and good humour of our group while we made the best out of the unpleasant situation. The Travel Agency should skip this itinerary and find something better. 4. Crampons: As seasoned winter travellers we had our crampons with us but half of our group didn't. During the pre-tour meeting at home it was not mentioned that crampons are necessary when walking on snow and ice. Therefore on our first night in Helsinki there was a frantic search to find a shop which still had crampons in stock. As expected and being the winter season most shops had run out of them. Would I recommend the tour? Yes, but I would also pre-warn others to lower their expectations by a few notch. No tour is perfect and our tour guide definitely tried to make the best out of any unfortunate situation. So, kudos to him!

I joined Chan Brother's mid January "13 Days 10 Nights Lapland Northern Lights with Lofoten Islands (EN13LW)", and the overall experience left me feeling somewhat disappointed. Despite being marketed as a Northern Lights tour, our accommodations were consistently in the city, limiting our chances of witnessing the auroras due to light pollution.

One of the planned activities, labeled as a "Northern Light Hunting Tour," turned out to be more of a gathering around a campfire in a tent, waiting for the Northern Lights to appear. With 28 people in the group, the tent sponsored by Chan Brothers was too small, and some of us ended up standing in the freezing cold weather. The local tour guide even mentioned that mid-January isn't the best time for Northern Lights due to weather conditions. Again, given the information, Chan Brothers perhaps shouldn't have marketed this as a Northern Lights tour, especially when it's evident that many of us joined with the hope of witnessing the Northern Lights.

The meals provided during the trip were okay, but most were on the salty side. Only two or three meals were truly enjoyable. Interestingly, during our free and easy time, the meals we had outside the tour were much tastier. It might be a good idea for Chan Brothers to taste-test the meals themselves to ensure a better dining experience for all customers.

When our group asked the Tour Leader about the Northern Lights, his response seemed like he was avoiding the question. It would have been much appreciated if he had shared some tips and made an effort to help us maximize our chances.

Another puzzling aspect is the inclusion of the Arctic Circle train in the itinerary. The tour leader mentioned that nine times out of ten, the train doesn't operate due to weather and railway conditions. If Chan Brothers were aware of this, why include it in the itinerary?

In short, I wouldn't recommend others to join this tour ????. The experience doesn't measure up to the cost, and what's more, the pricing is notably higher compared to other travel agency.

Feedback on my Horrendous Chan Brothers tour to Central Japan on 1-8 Oct 2023

Normally my feedbacks are positive however this trip was truly terrible and beyond words that could measure. If I could give a minus rating it would minus 5 stars.

1) Tour guide staff attitude and character

The group was led by tour leader and tour guide, they were unprofessionally, rude and obnoxious . The tour sights were not highlighted as supposed to and the tour guide kept talking about his personal life about his family , house and income. He was always brushing off the other tour members requests and being very rude to the members, calling for us to be seated as if we were school children, and the way he projected himself was very disgusting and uncouth . He is very inexperience and does not know how to take care of the member’s concerns especially when there were quite a number of seniors in this tour.

2) Hotel Room Request

I have travelled to Japan via JTB and I have always requested for western rooms for onsen hotels in their tour and they always deliver what they promised.

For this tour, we specifically made the request with the sales agent at the natas fair, for a western room (no tatami room) before booking the tour, which she promised she will ensure we will get our room request. I also made another follow up email on 15 September to remind the officers regarding my western room request.

When we were approaching the 1st onsen hotel at Wakayama on the 3rd October, we clarified again regarding our western room request with them in the bus in front of the other patrons,and he made a nasty remark saying that when u come to tatami hotel, everyone must use tatami rooms and western rooms are only for handicap persons. This is very insulting and detestable. This shows how he portrait himself in front of the customers. And there also other incidents with the other patrons but I will leave that to the rest of the patrons to feedback.

The hotel in Wakayama was terrible , moudly rooms , smelly and dark, and even blackout several times. He rudely remarked that because we boiled hot water in the room that was why it caused an electricity surge that caused the blackout in the entire floor. This is the 1st time I heard boiling water can caused a power trip in a hotel for tourists. Worse than a guest house. Because of that I could not have hot water and was feeling unwell . We couldn’t even sleep at all because the room smelled moudy and ventilation was bad and thus causing us to fall sick the next day.

The 2nd hotel onsen in Fuji, Hotel fujikawaguchiko was a tatami hotel again on the 5th October , he claimed this hotel has no western room hotel and only tatami rooms. Why was this not told to us in advance before that? This Cause me to have back pains , unable to sleep and I was already sick at that time, and I need rest but couldn’t rest. Please take note we cannot sleep on tatami was due to health reasons not for fun. We checked with the hotel and found out that they have western rooms so why weren’t we given western rooms like we requested? Obviously they lied to us from the beginning when we reached the hotel premises. We were not the only ones who made requests for no tatami rooms. We made the tour booking 2 months before department and why did your sales officers not make a request to reserve western rooms for us? This shows that Chan Brothers do not take customers requests seriously and only make promises to close the deal.

3) Food

The food was horrible. Everyday we were having the same repetitive food, that were cold and hard and extremely salty. The food was always prepared in advance before we arrive at the restaurant hence it was always cold and hard. It was totally inedible and everyone couldn’t even eat much and we had to buy our own food after that. We were always brought to a small and unventilated restaurants for our meals, where it was extremely uncomfortable to even breathe not to mention eat there.

4) Sight seeing

There were not much sight seeing done but always asked us to have free and easy time and to go shopping. Wakayama Marina city was in the itinerary but we were not brought there as he claimed that it was under renovation. How could a tour guide not know about the renovation of that place in advance? We were only told that the itinerary would be changed to another place on that day itself. All of us were looking forward to going there but were so disappointed. We were brought to a shopping mall instead to replace Wakayama Marina city, and were left by ourselves again. Im sure Japan has a lot of beautiful places to see which they could have brought us instead of a shopping mall.

Overall, this tour was a disaster. I have never been to such a lousy tour before,

I called Chan Brothers to book for the 3D2N Summer Pop Live in Hong Kong free & easy package. The ticketing dept requested for full payment in order to secure seat for the concert.

So, I've make a trip to the ticketing dept, I made a simple request, To have a later departure hour instead of 09:00 from Hong Kong to Singapore. The lady said will take note, and I've made full payment.

After 2 weeks, the ticketing dept called to collect the travel vouchers. Unfortunately, she said schedule not available for later departure hour from Hong Kong.

However, I come to know that there are flight from Hong Kong via Cathay Pacific at 20:00 hour, so I call to Chan Brother request for a change. Here is the replier from the ticketing counter lady : "Yes, there are seats available and S$200 per pax require for flight ticket change." She continued:" I don't know how you come to know there is flight at 20:00 from Hong Kong on 29/08 but when you've paid to confirm the package, there's only 09:00 hour flight available." Very dissapointed!!!

I am extremely appalled at the service of Chan Brothers Travel. I had booked with them on 3 occasions. The first time was a free and easy trip to Taiwan which was ok as the price is reasonable. I went for a second try and that started my disappointment. Booked a free and easy package to London with them and the hotel they gave me was way out of central London and worst of all, extremely poor facilities. I was going on a honeymoon trip with my husband and thought that maybe they could provide something better. It's not as if I couldn't pay but they have to give me a poor hotel, more like a backpacker's hotel. Then I thought I should give them another chance and yes I booked with them a third time going to New Zealand on a self driving trip and the travel consultant cannot even plan for me. I had to rely on my own research and plan the route. My friends who had booked with them before as well on New Zealand recommended me that's why I trust them even though I had been disappointed before but it wasn't to be. It was totally ridiculous to expect a customer to plan the whole route. We are new to New Zealand and we need expert advise but I did not get any. It was just totally lousy, no standard, no customer service. There are many more travel agents out there who could have done better. No wonder they were voted the worst travel agent. They truly are.