Sorry to say I found Edinburgh Tour Guides (recommended on p. 745 of RS guidebook) rude. I tried to book a 10 AM walking tour online a day and a half ahead. After accepting PayPal payment and generating a confirmation email, the site generated a second, rather enigmatic, email stating that their booking scheme was being overhauled and we would be getting a refund because the site shouldn't have allowed us to book this tour. The refund would take up to 30 days to be processed.
That left me wondering if Edinburgh Tour Guides were running any tours that day, or what exactly was going on. So, I emailed asking for an explanation and checked my in-box several times over the next hour but no reply. In the morning I called on the phone and the woman who answered said in a rather annoyed tone that she had already emailed me and didn't understand why I had not received her email. (I had not had access to WiFi that morning so I had not seen her message.) She said the tour was fully booked. When I got on WiFi I found they had written me a rather snippy email saying, similarly, that this tour was fully booked and the website shouldn't have allowed me to book.
I consider this rude for a couple of reasons. First of all, the words "sorry" or "regret" or "we apologize for the inconvenience" were never used. Second, someone is making a 30-day float on the money we paid PayPal for the tour. Third, they could have said "Although the 10 AM tour is fully booked, we do have space on so-and-so other tour that day..." if such was the case.
They did mention that this 10 AM walking tour was fully booked until 3 days hence. This was not an option for us since we were flying home. Not much chance we would rebook our flight and stay in Edinburgh for 3 extra days just to be able to take their walking tour. Ideally a booking site would allow you to first choose your date and time of day, instead of having to choose which tour you want before finding out what time it runs and how much it costs. From the traveler's point of view, the date when you'll be in town and the hours of the day when you want to be on a tour are more crucial than the particular type of tour. At least, that's my opinion.
We enjoyed our time in Edinburgh but I have to say the communication with this tour company left a bad taste in my mouth.