Waitlist on RS Tours?

My first trip to Europe was when I was called on a wait listed tour. I had two weeks to get it together but it was worth it and I have been back every year (it was in 2006). I have also met other people on tours that were wait listed. The tours need to be paid for two months before it starts so usually if someone is going to cancel that is when it will happen. Not sure why the people on my tour cancelled at the last minute but it does happen. Hope it works out for you.

Hello,

On my first tour, I was watching and waiting to sign up. I checked almost every day, but my father was going through some major medical issues and so I wanted to see how he was doing before fully committing. Then , finally I went to sign up and the tour was full - I was so upset -literally the day before it was still open. However, I figured there was no harm in signing up anyway, so I did waitlist myself. I called the RS office the next day, and because I was a single, it was easy to just add one more person. However, if there are three or four of you (you said your children are going too?), I'm not sure if they'll have room for that many. It IS possible another family may have some sort of emergency come up, so I wouldn't say you have no chance, but it might be hard to get flights, etc on a somewhat last-minute basis. I would waitlist yourselves and then call the tour department directly and just ask what the numbers on tour look like already. In the meantime, I would look at some other itinerary choices. Sorry I can't be more specific or positive at this point, but hopefully it will work out.

Also, I am a teacher and I work in the northeast, so I too have to deal with snow days. At this point my last day of school is June 23. If you feel you may do another tour next year (or whenever), I would recommend singing up your family with your best [departure date] guesstimate so you don't get wait listed. Then, you can always call and change to a different tour or departure date without a penalty if it turns out you DO have to push back your departure due to snow. That's one of the great benefits of the RS Tours. I hope this helps a little. I will cross my fingers for you! Good luck!

The wait list is used in a couple of ways. Spaces on a Rick Steves' Tour could open up at any time due to a traveler cancellation, which is hard to predict. For travel dates and itineraries that have a long wait list, a new departure is sometimes added, but now in April, dates are no longer being added for June.

I was wait listed on a tour I had my heart set on. Informed by RS office that I had a good chance of getting on the tour as I was high on the wait list (3 tour dates selected), and cancellations usually occurred. After about a month of waiting, I selected another tour, but remained on the wait list. Never had an opening on any of the three tours I was wait listed on, so I was happy I picked an alternate tour. BTW, despite being disappointed that I did not get the original tour I wanted, I loved my "second choice." No regrets in my case. I suggest you pick another tour as a back up. In my case, I just picked a different Italy tour than the tour I had originally wanted.