You can plan the perfect vacation, but you can never prepare for the robberies you may encounter along the way. These can take many forms, from the sleight of hand of a taxi driver to daylight robberies of well-known hotel companies.
Our core destination experts and in-house editors have years of experience traveling to every corner of the planet. I hope this provides some comfort the next time you find yourself in a sticky situation as they too can get ripped off along the way.
Sleight of hand in Venice
Posted by Nick Trend
When I was 19 and traveling around Europe on a budget of £10 a day, I was camping in Punta Sabbioni on the mainland next to Venice. At the end of a busy and impatient queue, I paid for my water bus ticket to St Marks with a 50,000 lira note, which was around £25 at the time. On the boat, I noticed that the man at the ticket office had given me change instead of four 10,000-lira bills, but only one, with three 1,000-lira bills cleverly tucked behind it. I was cynically shortchanged with 27,000 lire (more than £15) which was the bulk of my budget.
An empty wallet in Iceland
By Mike Maceacharan
I may be a professional traveler (sort of), but I’m not entirely immune to holiday rip-offs and – in my book – Iceland is the king of scams; The granddaddy of daylight robbery. Twenty-five quid for a packet of crisps from a street food van? This hurts. Sixteen quid for a bagel with an almost invisible smear of cream cheese moistening the inside? This hurts more.
And this glacier is just the tip of the iceberg. I visited the Snæfellsnes peninsula recently on a gray October trip with seasonal cold and was charged £300 for a nondescript box room, no breakfast but a complimentary wet dog smell. Another surprise was a fuss-free dinner costing £67 per person. The portion size made me hungry, or as an Icelander put it, “ekki upp i nos a ketti”. Not enough to fill a cat’s nostril. For car rental, this figure rose to over £500 for a day. Sheikh.
An inflated rickshaw fare
By Gemma Knight
There are those amazing moments when you see a scammer coming from a mile away and manage to outrun him. I still feel a pang of smugness when I think of the Shanghai taxi driver who didn’t realize I lived there and tried to take me for miles in the wrong direction to increase the fare. The look on his face when I launch into a tirade in perfect Mandarin in the backseat still gives me great joy.
I wasn’t so lucky during my visit to Amritsar, India, when I asked a rickshaw driver to take me a few kilometers down the road. This was typically followed by a lengthy negotiation; I convinced him of what I thought was certainly fair, although not quite cheap, and we were off. When we arrived I looked down to count my rupees and when I looked up I saw the driver was with 20 of his friends; They were all big and unsmiling. “The price has tripled,” he told me. It’s a sticky situation and one that no amount of Mandarin can save me from. I swallowed my pride and paid the price to live to fight another day.
Close meeting in Naples
By Rachel Cranshaw
Last year I came to Naples by train and took a taxi from the stop in front of the station. We asked the driver if he accepted payment by card, and he said he did, and since there was no taximeter, we agreed on the fare. However, when we arrived at our hotel, the card payment failed. We said we would try another card but he wouldn’t let us, insisting on taking us to an ATM where we now had no choice but to pay for a hugely inflated fee.
It set a sour tone throughout the entire visit. Later that day, I was walking down the street with a group of four women and we stopped briefly for a few of us to check our phones for directions. We noticed two men standing at opposite distances making signs to each other suggesting they were about to rob us. We had to duck into a supermarket for security reasons.
Many people told me how much they loved Naples, despite it being a bit of a rough city, but as a generally savvy traveler, I was disappointed and embarrassed to have such a stereotypical experience of the city. I’d like to go back and try again one day.
Daytime robbery at dawn
By Chris Moss
Luxury hotels are snakes and scammers: They woo customers for exorbitant deposits; they rob anyone who likes an impudent miniature; they charge ridiculous rack rates. But their biggest rip-off is room service; crazy fee for delivery of an item to the room. When I checked into a five-star hotel after a long and terrible night flight, I said I wanted to have breakfast. The reception staff smiled obsequiously and said there was no need to go to the dining hall, they would send something to my room.
Half an hour later, when I had almost given up, a small selection of items arrived from the all-you-can-eat buffet: a strawberry cut into ten strips, a cooling coffee, some scones and wasteful mini jars of jam. I was later billed $30 for the privilege. I know, I fell into a trick. I was made into a trophy – or rather, just usurped.
An opportunistic dealer in Kerala
By Chris Leadbeater
The first two mornings I stayed at a no-frills hotel in Kerala, I noticed a man standing on the beach, holding pieces of clothing for purchase, hoping a tourist would emerge from one of the rooms above. But it was a quiet off-season for Kerala. So on my third morning I decided to do the job.
The clothes were actually quite good quality. There was a selection of Nehru collar shirts in various primary colours. They had bright scarves and well-sewn shawls. In fact, it was so well prepared that I decided the upcoming birthday and Christmas gifts could be bought in bulk. I selected about nine and prepared to pay him.
I’m still not sure what caused the conversation to progress this way. But when he suggested me a figure, I panicked, losing just a few hundred rupees, and waited for his reply. He turned a little pale, agreed, shook my hand, and we completed the transaction. It was only when I returned to my room and pulled out the latest exchange rate that I realized I had paid European street price for my shopping spree.
I never saw the seller again. He was pleased with his windfall and clearly had the weekend off.