We booked a 10-day China tour with AVG Travels (also known as Asia Vacation Group) for four people in early July 2024, paying in full, over a year in advance. The trip was planned for September 2025 and carefully coordinated around our work and family commitments.Then, just two months before departure, we received an abrupt email stating that the tour was cancelled due to “last-minute changes from local suppliers.” No real explanation! No accountability!The company offered us two poor alternatives:1. Reschedule to a later date, which wasn’t possible due to our personal and work commitments.2. Upgrade to a 12-day tour (which included the exact same first 10 days) for an extra $1,600 per person, totalling $6,400 extra for our group of four.This “upgrade” raised serious concerns. The revised itinerary was identical to the original for the first 10 days. Why weren’t we allowed to return home from Shanghai as originally planned? This casts doubt on whether the cancellation was genuinely due to supplier issues, or if it was a deliberate attempt to steer customers toward a more expensive product.After numerous back-and-forth emails, the company agreed to issue a full refund. Weeks passed. We followed up repeatedly, only to receive vague, non-committal replies and no clear timeline:“Please rest assured that your refund request is already on our accounting team’s list and will be processed when it reaches its turn in the queue.”We were left wondering: how many refunds are they processing, and why is there no clear timeline?It was only after we issued a final demand, giving them 48 hours to process the refund or we’d file a formal complaint with the ACCC, that the refund finally came through.The ordeal cost us time, energy, stress, and the card processing fee, which was never refunded. We feel misled, ignored, and disrespected. We paid in good faith for a service they failed to deliver, and they held our money for over a month after agreeing to refund it.To make matters worse, they continue to heavily advertise tours across social media, as if nothing’s wrong. How many others are still waiting for refunds? How many had their tours cancelled at the last minute?This company should not be allowed to operate like this in Australia.We’re sharing our experience to warn others:⚠️ Be extremely cautious before booking with this company.⚠️ Check other reviews! You’ll see we’re not alone.When a company cancels a fully paid service and then refuses to return customer funds in a timely and transparent manner, that’s not just bad business. IT’S UNETHICAL.Until this company cleans up its act, avoid them at all costs.Finally, if only I could give 0 STARS, I would!
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