Fareboom is a horrid company - stay away!

TDW - thanks for the tip, but the 'fine print' offered no hint that the ticketing agent would add fees almost 50% over their own published fares when redeeming their voucher and YES, we do check offers against the airline offering. Finally, trusting the BBB "AAA+" banner on the Fareboom webpage was a mistake: going to the BBB website for Fareboom shows dozens of recent complains about the company.

So they don’t even honestly show their true BBB status? Misleading and disreputable. I hadn’t heard of them, but now appreciate this info.

so glad to learn of the prompt response to a post on Rick Steves website: that is why I shared this negative experience with Fareboom here, to spread the warning and hopefully save some folks the pain and money.

Maybe it's called Fareboom because it blows up in your face. Sorry about your experience, another reason to book directly with the airline.

Gets even better: official name of corporation is "Best Travel Store" - an oxymoronic name, for sure!

A 30 second Google gave me their review ratings. Why anyone would use them is a mystery to me.

Anyone familiar with this forum knows that third party booking sites are generally not recommended, and cautions are usually given to be very vigilant about understanding ALL of the terms and conditions BEFORE you book. Not after you need to make a change. It seems you've learned the lesson the hard way.

Funny, people actually think that a BBB rating means anything more than the company paid for a rating. All it means for any practicality is that they respond to complaints, not that they don't have them, or very very many complaints. They responded to, and resolved your complaint, so you actually helped their rating.

BBB is worth zilch. Tough life lesson but good for you getting them down to $75. Let us know if they do come through with a refund. The airlines were hard enough to deal with but these online ticket sellers are the worst.

I feel I must post an objection to the screaming headline. Clearly there were issues in the course of this transaction, I don't know why, and I have no access to the details.

I saw a recommendation for Fareboom back in 2018, I forget where, it may have been here. I saw a tremendous deal there, it was for a combined flight BA out, AA back. And for whatever reason, you could not get this great price from either BA nor AA websites, in spite of the fact that these were clear codeshares. We had sworn off non-airline sites, but we researched reviews on Fareboom, decided that they were legit, purchased the combo flight, and had no issues. They even allowed advance seat selection on AA . The following year we saw a similar discount on a combined BA/AA routing and again purchased. Again, no issues. We would not hesitate to use them again IF they were able to provide a similar package that we could not get directly from the airlines. I will note that we did not find AA/BA options for the trips we had planned and cancelled in 2020, and those tickets were purchased directly from airlines, full refunds or vouchers were obtained.

Larry: You said "Clearly there were issues in the course of this transaction, I don't know why, and I have no access to the details."
and so I don't know why you felt like "I must post an objection to the screaming headline." Why the objection to what happened to me? We have been fortunate in our many years of traveling to not have had this issue before now. So glad you didn't experience what happened to us, but we have the 20 + emails back and forth with Fareboom to attest to their attempt to over charge for a published fare, as well as their resistance to a refund, mandated by federal rules covering cancelled flights by airlines. This was our experience, Larry, and before COVID hit, we truly believed we had booked a decently priced flight with a reputable company, and thanks for the opportunity to add some clarity to our experience, justifying the 'screaming headline'.

Such a bummer, so sorry this happened to you. Reading this forum has helped me to avoid so many pitfalls that can happen when traveling, especially as a novice traveler. Travel is so exciting and fun so when things like this happen it can be a real damper. I hope you still get to take your trip and this is just a bump in the road.

Letizia: So glad to learn our post has been of value. Exactly why we explained our experience - to spare people from having to deal with a company which treats their customers so poorly.

I’m sorry this happened to you and thank you for taking the time to post this warning.

Larry, even Bernie Madoff had some happy customers.

@chgodiego - Thank you for your post. Many of us who follow this forum, are not travel experts. We learn lessons from others, like yourself, who take the time to share their experiences, both good and bad.

Thank you, Lisuza, and the several others who have responded with kindness, concern and encouragement to what was intended to be a helpful 'heads-up' about a company which treated us poorly and took advantage of us because they had our money.