Strongly negative experience and holiday compromised by questionable management to say the least.
Our experience was ruined mainly by the management of skipper Andrea and, more generally, by a series of inefficiencies that we consider unacceptable.
On the day of boarding, scheduled at 18:00, at 17:55 we were still on the platform without Andrea having shown up. Only a few minutes after boarding we received a phone call in which we were informed that, together with another couple, we had been transferred to a sailboat with another skipper.
It was, in fact, a downgrade compared to the catamaran that had been assigned to us, on which we were supposed to live the experience with skipper and co-skipper.
The reason we were given was that of "overbooking". A paradoxical situation, considering that Andrea would have directly accepted further personal bookings, thus coming to no longer have room for people who had been regularly assigned to his crew through Sailsquare.
The thing that we consider even more serious is that there are conversations, WhatsApp messages, communications via e-mail and via Sailsquare in which Andrea expressly confirms our presence on board, mine and my girlfriend's. It was therefore not an improvised last-minute assignment: our presence on the catamaran had been agreed and confirmed.
Our story had already begun with a change of skipper. Initially we were assigned to Emanuele, Andrea's son, who canceled the tour about six days before departure due to problems with the boat. A situation that can certainly happen and that, taken individually, we would have understood.
The problem is that we had already organized and paid for four flights and a three-day stay in Stromboli, just for the Sailsquare tour. We had therefore already incurred important expenses and organized our entire holiday, trusting in the alternative that had been proposed to us.
To meet the discomfort, Sailsquare had assigned us to Andrea with a catamaran upgrade, together with another couple. The assignment had been regularly accepted and confirmed by Andrea himself through the various communication channels. For this reason, in our opinion, talking about "overbooking" later is not an acceptable justification.
In the end we were transferred to a third boat, a sailboat that was filled on the day of embarkation until we reached about 10 people. On board we also met another guy who, like us, had initially been assigned to Emanuele and who confirmed to us that he had experienced the same situation.
What made the experience even more unpleasant was the subsequent behavior. The new skipper, Matteo, has repeatedly expressed his problem with the non-payment of fees for the additional people he had embarked. We were asked to urge Sailsquare to resolve the economic situation as soon as possible, despite the fact that we had regularly paid Sailsquare for our trip.
The situation has reached the point that we have also been offered the possibility of having to disembark in the middle of the week if the payment was not resolved. Although this eventuality fortunately did not occur, we consider it absurd that a customer who has regularly paid should spend his holiday with the doubt of being able to be disembarked due to administrative problems between the platform, skipper and boat.
Andrea's behavior, which we perceived as arrogant, insolent and totally unprofessional, was for us the most serious point of the story. We do not dispute the fact that unforeseen events or changes of plans may occur: we dispute the way they were handled, just a few minutes before boarding and without any real choice.
Behind a holiday of this type there are months of work, money, organization and expectations. You work all year round to be able to go on vacation, and being on the quay five minutes before boarding without knowing what would happen is a situation that should never be experienced by a customer.
We believe that there have been serious shortcomings of organization, communication and professionalism, both in the management by Sailsquare and in the behavior of the skipper Andrea.
A holiday can be changed due to an unforeseen event. What should never change is respect for customers.