Go Ape refusing refund

[Stripyseason]

I can’t work out of I’m being unreasonable or fighting like a mama bear here in the right.
took my kids to Go Ape on Sunday as a treat as it’s expensive (£60 for all of us). I’ll pop my original complaint email in as it explains it all thoroughly. Emails have been back and forth since then with them apologising and offering a discounted voucher for us to return and “give it another go”. I’ve said we don’t want to return as the left in tears feeling like they’d been rushed and the last thing they want is to go back! I just want a refund but 12 emails back and forth are going nowhere. They have said they shouldn’t have been rushed but they don’t do refunds and theyd like us to come back with a discount. Do I just leave it and chalk it up to experience? Or do I keep going and if so how? TIA.

Dear customer services,

Im just writing after quite a disappointing experience at X Go Ape today. It was myself and my 2 children, 8 and 11, one of whom has autism. We booked for the only available slot left which was 16:30 and arrived by 16:15 to be in plenty of time.

We had to wait for a while for the safety briefing which was fine, and we got started. We were told we would have the chance to do 4 levels if we wished. We started off great and were enjoying it until we finished level 2 and my son heard some instructors saying we were “over time”. When we went to wait at #3 an instructor said we were running behind with time and as they were closing soon we likely wouldn’t have time to do course 4 if we did 3 so we felt pushed to do 4. This wasn’t helpful as it felt a big step up from course 2 and my son felt rushed and was worried saying they’re closing, so we hurried as much as we could. It ended in a bit of a downer sadly with the kids just feeling like they’d “taken too long” on courses 1&2 despite being told in the safety briefing that we could take as much time as we needed on the levels.

I’m disappointed because we arrived in good time and if the last slot was always going to be rushed I think that should have been made clear at point of booking. We had to miss out a whole level which we had paid for. It was a lot of money as a treat and we all just left
A bit downhearted after a good start.

I’ve been to Go Ape before and had a really
Positive experience so this felt quite disappointing sadly and I’d appreciate a gesture of a refund and to let the very nice staff know that rushing us didn’t feel fair given we had paid for a slot so feel we should have been given the same time as everyone else who booked for earlier.

Many thanks etc

Well thats good!

I'm glad you don't shout at them.

I hope so. Would love to hear their side.

I think you made a mountain out of a molehill but at least you got a discount (but not the crazy 100% refund that you were after!) Bit bizarre because you've said you don't even want to return!
I know your son is ND but I wonder if his tears and upset was partly down to how you spun the situation. Instead of an upbeat attitude and a 'Well that was fun!', I wonder if your attitude was negative and he picked up on that.

Absolutely! But this couldn't then be blamed on other people.

Absolutely! But this couldn't then be blamed on other people

Quite! @DoreenonTill8

The ignorance about what it's actually like to parent / be someone ND on this thread is fucking depressing. Yes OP just should have told her kid everything was as expected despite the evidence of their own eyes to the contrary. That approach works very very well with autistic children. I'm surprised she didn't think of it.

That is what the extra needs of autistic children ARE. To be told what to expect and for things to run as far as possible as expected in order to have a fun time which is what Go Ape is actually for. People with ND react differently to NTs that's the whole fucking point.

I agree.

I’m all for speaking up when there is an actual problem, and for advocating for children when it’s needed.

But to me this situation isn’t it.

As mentioned, my son has ADHD. He used to get very upset about being “left out” of things, or not chosen for particular activities, like school teams etc. He had a certain amount of resilience but when I found out about the ADHD rejection sensitive dysphoria, I knew I had to help him to overcome/ cope with this.

My way of doing that was to try to reframe what the aim of something is - so the aiming of taking part in football trials is to enjoy the trial itself, the aim of standing for head boy is to see if you can manage speaking in public/ taking part in a democratic exercise etc. Taking away the idea that the being chosen is the main thing has worked wonders.

Or I could have kept going up to the school complaining that “little Johnny” (not his name! ) isn’t being chosen…

But so many kids are neuro diverse these days.

Every child I know seems to have been diagnosed with ADHD/ apsergers/ on the autism spectrum..

Doctors seem quick to throw out the diagnoses these days.

Of course you can't lie to an autistic kid and tell them everything is as expected. But your attitude to things as a parent of ND kids and how you deal with them and what you model in these situations does matter. Both things can be true.

I am absolutely guilty of having overreacted to things in the past and catastrophised and I know in my bones how it feels to an autistic nervous system to have to deal with the goal posts unexpectedly shifting. It's a horrible feeling, like the ground is sinking under you. However, I had to learn to manage that for the sake of my kids. I had to learn to ground myself, remind myself that even though I felt awful in that moment, I was still safe, and I learned to remain calm and not mirror my dysregulated child's energy. We can explain needs and people will usually try their best, but the world cannot be free of these kinds of things happening. I wanted my kids to have a mum who could cope with things going wrong and be their safe person in those situations when others don't get it right.

If we want others to give us and our kids grace when we don't react as people might expect, or move through the world differently, we also need to remember to give others that same consideration when they get it wrong. Too much of the contemporary ND movement feels adversarial and judgemental about "typicals" or indeed anyone who doesn't always know the exact right things to say and do.

I was only replying to the post I quoted, I have also suggested op ask for a part refund but I would not assume you have read all my replies when you are only responding to and quoting one of them.

I am surprized that you 'can't imagine' her children would be aware of her emails though, mine wouldn't have a clue. Why would they? I write, type and read silently.

Well, the waiting list for initial assessment is two years round here. After that the waiting time for potential diagnosis is 18 months, so if you call 3 and a half years quick, then sure.

As long as you believe all that, you will be happy. The problem is that many others don't. Just the fact that you use a capital S on senior tells me a lot about you. "I demand to speak to the manager!".

Its definitely not that long for ADHD

I'm also laughing that she believes that it was a 'Senior' that she spoke to.

When I worked in customer service, if someone insisted on speaking to the manager,

I would get one of my other colleagues (who was at the exact same level as me) to come over and pretend to be a manager.

We had been told by the actual manager to do this.

Yep @Nannyoggapple did same when worked in a restaurant.. 'duty' manager.... 'ooh I'm terribly sorry, can I offer your table free coffee as an apology?'....

A fair result, OP. Well done for persisting.

I’ve worked many many years in customer service. The “poor staff” angle is baffling. The OP has been very polite throughout, and if the staff are facing countless abusive calls a day then that’s the fault of the management.

I’m glad the management made the right call in this case, though.

Your post on trip advisor is bloody obvious it's you.....

Do they know they are being discussed like this on here.

All publicity is good though for business.
You gave them free advertising.

Which location is the go Ape you're looking at on TripAdvisor?

There are so many different Go apes in the UK.

Exactly.
I feel all of this as someone with a family who nearly all have autism.

we can use the diagnosis to help us understand our struggles and articulate our needs but it's important to keep a sense of balance too

It's a pretty phyrric victory. You've taken up a hours of your life hand wringing over what was in reality a matter of minutes

And surely no one is naive enough to think that just because a business apologises that means they think the customer was right. Far from it based on my experience of being the other side of the table.

Which Go ape is it on TripAdvisor?

I looked through it but there's so many different locations, I couldn't find it

Likewise, as the senior manager I did not have time for every whinger who insisted on talking to me. And it was very rare that I actually took action, most of the time the member of staff knew full well that I had their back regardless of the platitudes in my response letter

Some of the reviews on TripAdvisor are ridiculous/funny.

Couldn't figure out the car park - 4/5
The chipwood at the end of the zipwires was filthy - 4/5
My 5-year-old got too scared and sat with staff while the rest of us had fun - 4/5
We were left to get on with - it 3/5
The soup cost £4.10 - 3/5
It was too busy - 2/5
It was expensive - 2/5
It was closing time and the staff wouldn't let the 11 of us do another course - 1/5
They wouldn't give us the details of someone else's party when we phoned - 1/5

So many people complaining about the parking charges when the car parks aren't even owned by GoApe.

So I don't understand why you ran out of time...except they were a bit late with the safety instructions so you started about 5 pm? Presumably it takes half-an-hour to get everyone out of the trees and out of the harness? It seems to be they estimate 15 minutes per level, so had you only done two levels in about 40 minutes? Because altho the slot is 2 hours, the time slot for the adventure is one hour, not one hour and a bit extra if you are slow? The other hour is to make sure you know the safety drill and you all get out of the adventure kit by 6.30, and it allows for possible delays in getting you started?
I think they did their best and a voucher is sufficient.
Some have said don't book the last slot, but it occurs to me that the system runs on people taking their allotted time, because other people have time slots as well, and there is probably a limit on the number of people on an adventure at any one time, so the answer is to be a bit quicker, not assume they will give you extra time in the adventure - because they won't/can't as this is not just to other customers who have paid the same and kept to the time-table.

Give over.

If someone is crying over the type of emails OP was sending they need a strong word about resilience. She wasn't rude or personal.

BTW I worked in banking complaints for 6 years, yes I did cry when a man clearly having a psychotic break told me it was MY fault he was going to get his fingers broken, MY fault his wife had murdered his children, MY fault the mafia was after him; in fact, practically all the ills of the world were apparently my fault because I couldn't resolve a complaint the way he wanted. He had my name and as at the time I was the only person in the country with that name, he could have found me.

But sure, repeated emails saying "I'm not happy with this outcome" are the same