Terrible customer experience
by Maria P. on Sep 3, 2021
2 out of 5 stars
Earn 2% Money-Back Rewards on purchases in two 2% Money-Back Categories of your choice, and 0.50% Money-Back Rewards on all other purchases with Tangerine World Mastercard®.
I have booked a flight with CIBC rewards, and I am abroad and I need to book my ticket, and I have currently been waiting for 3,5 hours on the phone (paying for minutes, as I am calling Canada from a foreign country).
I thought being a CIBC Visa customer would come with some perks, but instead, it comes with nothing but uncertainty and pain.
As soon as I am home from this trip, I will change to another VISA card!
DO NOT CHOOSE CIBC VISA for travel point and service - the service you'll get is nothing!
Travel on an airline at the best of times is stressful. Trying to negotiate a vacation in today's climate makes you wonder if it is worth the effort. We had a flight booked, arranged our accommodations accordingly, the flight was cancelled, were given an option of another flight 2 days later, which was not going to work for us. Found another flight that would work for us but, for some reason, the Aventura representative was not able to get us on the flight that was available. Consequently, we are missing 2 days of our vacation and paying for accommodations that we are not able to use.
Earn 2% Money-Back Rewards on purchases in two 2% Money-Back Categories of your choice, and 0.50% Money-Back Rewards on all other purchases with Tangerine World Mastercard.
What else will you get:
I have been waiting online for more than 3 hours and still no luck. I am trying to book a one-way ticket from Paris to Vancouver and was unable to do it online.
I thought the Aeroplane was bad - Aventura is even worse.
I will be switching credit cards immediately... It is unacceptable that CIBC is allowed to provide such poor service.
To book a trip its 234,000 points or some lower trios 60,000 points plus 1,400$ . These prices are way more than on the travel websites. It will take 10+ years to get to 234,000 points if you spend 2,000 a month. Given that the fee is $129 a year, you're pretty much paying for the trip yourself. Other cards are way better.
Don’t waste your time with CIBC. The main bank system and the rewards department cannot figure out who does what. You make any change to your details you need to wait 3-5 days to do book a trip. Then after that they still can’t help you because their systems just don’t update or work together correctly. I wasted over a week and many hours trying to get help. No one knows what they are doing. Wanted to book airline tickets for my family trip to BC this Christmas and there is an error in their system that no one that no why’s or can fix it. Was told sorry it may take weeks to fix and you can use your points for airline tickets. This is after waiting a week for their systems and by that time prices of tickets went up by 1K and flights I wanted was no longer available. Told me nothing they could do. They said I can put a complaint in and only way to maybe get a call back is to then escalate the complaint. Otherwise they just sit in a database. Lol. So no care about your complaint and no care that now I could not afford the trip for the family because I was banking on using those points.
Literally talked to about 10 people and most people didn’t know what to do or how to do it. If it’s not on a script then they can’t help you. Will just waste your time sending your call to mother departments.
So angry at the service and knowledge that I’m thinking of changing banks altogether.
Horrible experience. Don’t waste your time. You will not get the service you expect. There are other cards out there you can count on in terms of using your points.
Earn 2% Money-Back Rewards on purchases in two 2% Money-Back Categories of your choice, and 0.50% Money-Back Rewards on all other purchases with Tangerine World Mastercard.
What else will you get:
We booked flights through your CIBC travel agency, one being paid for my rewards and the other by cash. It has been a nightmare we don’t get notice and I thought that we had it all complete when we asked to have that email to get an explanation on this. Very disappointed to get a form letter back which does not address our problem at all. We are truly not throwing away people which we are being treated like!!! It would’ve been good if they were honest in the very beginning that it was a travel agency that we were booking through because we certainly would not have booked through a travel agency back east when we live in the west. And not being able to talk to anybody is absolutely unacceptable.
Costs are extremely high compared to booking directly with airlines. If you experience a problem while traveling assistance is non-existent. Attempts to get support go ignored and customer service staff are non-attentive.
Very poor value for the high cost.
I booked a flight with points plus $300 tax which I had to cancel, they kept the points and money, not even providing a credit. Will cancel the card immediately.
Earn 2% Money-Back Rewards on purchases in two 2% Money-Back Categories of your choice, and 0.50% Money-Back Rewards on all other purchases with Tangerine World Mastercard.
What else will you get:
I have had multiple bookings with them. The flight prices are 2X than other websites or even booked directly. Reaching customer care is almost impossible and could take one entire day always. I am taking my bookings else where and cancelling the card!
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My experience with CIBC Rewards Centre has been horrible. To book a trip on the phone, the waiting time is 1,5h or more and you still don't get on hold of anyone to help you.
Another problem I had is when I exchanged my points for some Save on Food gift cards. I realized this chain of supermarkets is not available in Toronto, so I called the Rewards Centre the right way to cancel the order. They said they would try to help, but it wasn't guaranteed. How come? I called only 1 hour later after my purchase. It doesn't make sense the operator can't do anything. I don't know why, but I do believe the system should be more flexible when it comes to orders and cancellations. My overall experience with the CIBC Rewards Centre has been terrible. Don't recommend it to anyone.