We Need Your Help – New Coach Holiday Search – Feedback Wanted
May 28, 2008 by Phil
Filed under General News
At Coachholidays.com we are very proud to be in the forefront of technology. We were the first site to be able to search for coach holidays leaving from your home town and now we have made our search even better and more accurate to save you clicking through numerous pages to find your perfect holiday.
We need your help in testing and using the search to find your next coach holiday. If it’s proves to be a success, then please let us know, if it doesn’t work properly, then again, please let us know so we can fix it!
HOW IT WORKS
1. Select the departure date of when you would like to go. You can select either a certain date or just a month.
2. Choose +/- Days to check either side of your chosen date.
3. Select a Duration if needed.
4. Select your Departure Area, such as Surrey or Dorset, then you can enter your home town to narrow the search even more – Quick Tip: if a tour doesn’t pick-up in your town, try a nearby town.
5. Next select an operator if you prefer one to another, if not, just leave this as Any Operator.
6. Now, this is where it has changed. Instead of selecting where you would like to go, i.e. England, France etc, you can now type in your holiday destination. In the example image opposite, you can search for holidays leaving from Croydon, in June and going to Bournemouth. You can type anything you like in this box, a few examples below:
- Isle of Wight
- London
- Torquay
- Dublin
- Paris
- Berlin
- Bruges
- Barcelona
or if you want a broad search like before, just enter the country you would like to visit, e.g. England, Italy, France, Spain etc
You can also put in this box the tour code of the holiday if you know this, e.g. BSSANSD
This new search is still in development and we would love to have your feedback, positive or negative, it all helps in providing you the best possible site to search for your next coach holiday.
Please leave your comments below, use the quick poll or email me personally at phil@coachholidaynews.com
QUICK POLL - What did you think of the new search?
- Works Great! (57%)
- Doesn't work very well! (21%)
- Couldn't find any holidays... (14%)
- Works OK, better then before anyway! (8%)
Total Voters: 14
Loading ...
When I requested holidays in London I got info for Petra!
Mrs Deighton, we have found an error that seems to find holidays with words in the itinerary, so if you were searching for London, the word “London” could be in the itinerary for Petra! We are on the case now and this should be fixed very soon. Sorry for the confusion.
Has all been fixed now!! Phew!!
I think the search criteria need to be broadened. I tried the following: – Peak district, derbyshire, derby, ashbourne, buxton without success.
(I resorted to ‘England’ finally) to get some results up.
From a quick skim, seems pretty good to me!
>> Derek Leach << Do you mind telling me where you are departing from and also what dates you were looking for?
Great idea, by-the-way!.
But go one better, just like the airlines do a last -minute-bargain facility, i.e., forget the destination, just advertise what’s available, ‘last-minute’?.
‘Bums-on-seats’, that’s what really matters?,
A ‘half-empty-coach’, I guess, is not going to make anybody any money?.
All the best , by-the-way, you are a ‘Top-notch-company’.
Regards
J.c.Smith.
Good idea but the search function needs work. I don’t mind where I go and would like to know what’s available on the dates I select. The current version makes me choose a destination. Unfortunately, it doesn’t recognise England or UK as valid options and wants me to pick a town. Cheers
– Jeffrey Smith — Thanks for your comments, much appreciated. Our last minute deals are on our Specials Offers page where you’ll find all the last minute bargains.
– Neil Johnson — You should be able to search for ‘England’ by just putting that in the search box, I just searched for ‘England’ going in June and I got 197 results back. I understand that ‘UK’ doesn’t work but you can also put in there, ‘Scotland’, ‘Ireland’ or ‘Wales’… give it a try and let me know.
You did not reconise WALES or Scotland, c’mon how easy was that, or do WALES and SCOTLAND no longer exist.
Get your act together.
I WILL NOT BE VISITING THIS SITE AGAIN
its, an excellent idea what a time saving site well done ,
– Michael Forde — I just checked the URL you left me and you were very specific with your search so yes, no tours were found. If you had chosen “Any Operator” for the date you wanted, leaving from Lowestoft in Suffolk going to Scotland, we have 61 tours and going to Wales, we have 29 tours.
I have used the search feature and found what i wanted very easily, my only complaint was that i could’nt book it straight through the internet
– Debbie Green — Hi Debbie, I know what your saying, we would like to be able to offer on-line booking but because all coach operators are different, they all have different systems which makes it complicated to achieve a fully bookable site. This is something we are looking into and I’m sure in the future, once all the operators offer on-line booking, we will have this service on our ever expanding website.
keen coach traveller- useful site
Have tried to use the site to sort out a self drive holiday but it did not appear to understand my requests.
Will have to go backwards and use the telephone. Alan
I would like to see details of all coach holidays,all dates, and all locations relevant to my area, to enable me to pick one of my choice on your web page (just like a brochure which I used to receive.) Thank you
- Alan Whitford – I’m sorry you couldn’t find any self drive holidays. When I did a search leaving from Surrey in August and using the keyword “Self Drive”, I was presented with 121 holidays!! May I asked what you searched for?
- Joan Rowlingson – I will look into this for you, it is possible but the only problem I see will be the huge amount of holidays it will return.
Spent a great deal of time looking for holiday break in Weymouth/ Bournemouth…. choice of 2 different dates….found several.
BUT all were fully booked. Gave up.
No matter how good the site may be, my choice would be that it be up to date.
Booked holiday yesterday for Shearings to Fort WILLIAM AND THE ISLE OF SKYE Ref BNFORSC. Thre are 2 holidays on the same day, same codes, 2 different intineries, one has anovernight stay in northern England one does not
OUR PICKUP POINT IS Stoke on Trent.on the 19th JULY 2008.
I hope the coach driver knows where we are going so would I. tnks JR.
I put in ‘london eye’ and nothing came up! ???
- Jan Richardson – I can understand your frustration. We do remove the tours off our website when we find out that they are full but unfortunately, we only find out that they are full when we enquire about them to the coach operator, then they are immediately removed.
- John Riley – You are right, there are 2 holidays with the same tour code, this is a Shearings Holiday and is from their West Midlands brochure and also their North West brochure. The overstay has been corrected, this was an error.
- Mike – It all depends where you are travelling from Mike and also at what month of the year… there are London holidays that feature the London Eye but not a lot.
The first search worked OK – but subsequent searches gave apparently random results (Channel islands searches came back with holidays in New Zealand or Paris!)
your search did not work for me
We booked a ‘little trains of Austria’ holiday with Leger, they have just cancelled on us saying they can’t fill the coach for our dates. Really disappointed! phoned for alternatives, but they want us to pay more money for something that’s not our fault!Not the first time of travel with them, but probably the last! By the way , it is still being advertised for the 23rd August this year. Don’t book.
Nothing wrong with the web site but some people just cannot cope with technology.
But, would like a list of last minute {any place} bargains available from my area. Booked with you for the first time last month to Eastbourne. Very good service and great bargain. Many thanks.
By far the worst search engine I have experienced. Right now I am extremely frustrated. I typed in London (numerous times) and found myself with Rome to London holidays (even though I had typed in West Yorkshire,Horsforth Leeds departure) After 15 minutes of trying to find a three night coach holiday to London around the 1st August – I give in. Janice Nicholas
Simon – Glad it worked for you in the end (corresponded via email)
Diane – Thanks for your comments… did you have a look at our Special Offer page, this includes late availability?
http://www.coachholidays.com/coachspecialoffers.phtml
Janice – I’m sorry that you feel that way and I understand but it is still in development. If you search for London leaving from West Yorkshire and the departure town Leeds (Horsforth) and type London in the search box, plenty of holidays appear. Try again and let me know.
I had no problem getting to work for. I thinks its’ really good feature to add.
Glenton brochure shows Battle of Britain Hol No. GLTSKC
But cannot be found on there web site ????
cannot get to view a search of all holidays in england or scotland or any one area/country like before. I gave up in the end and went on another site. please reinstate the search area for countrys.
I looked for a coach holiday for my disabled friend. Only self drive holidays were listed. Where is the field for special requirements – ie wheelchair ramp or lift etc.
could not get any search result when searching for holiday in England in September
George McNeill – We are in the process of putting the new Glenton brochure on our site, please check back soon.
Carol Thomas – Sorry that you couldn’t find anything, I’m not sure what was going wrong. We still have the old way of searching as the new search is still in development. Just go to the home page of our site.
Bayley – We don’t have that feature on our site I’m afraid but it will be something we’ll look at for the future.
Roslyn – What dates / departure area were you searching for when you searched?
HELLO HOPE U C HELP ME TA,DAVEY BOY LATER,.
Sorry, not helpful – initial search for Christmas breaks gave me Shearings holidays only with a pick up from Hull when I already know that Applebys and National Express are running such breaks. Searching on National as an operator gave nothing for a Hull pickup, their brochure lists 15. The beta search for England only gave a nil result.
need more pick up points for bargoed, mid-glam
I tried it several times…it works, but.
three items flipped up for me 1. you cannot screen out FLIGHT or AIRPORT …I won’t fly.
2. nothing came up for Lincolnshire [it does exist A1 Grantham not always the answer]
3. Shearings allow boarding at coach transfer depot Bedworth Warwicks is not quite there Exhall].
But I didn’t know it was new and got some answers.
I need to go on a tour to the rynevalley
unable to get any results.
Any trips from Clacton Essex for Beamish Museum
UNABLE TO GET ANY RESULTSFOR 2009
i booked aholiday which in your original offer was 35pounds discount but whwn I spoke to your booking staff ended up as 25pounds.
Ref:Tour BEDORKA EMAIL price 164 pp
I HAVE NO PASSPORT SO I CAN ONLY HOILDAY IN THEE UK OK THANK U,DAVEY BOY 11, AND BE LUCKLY 2,.
I am attracted to your site, but finding a bargain trip is very difficult, as you MUST enter a destination. If i was able to identify a number of bargain breaks I could then decide on a destination. I really hate having to quiz one destination after another so just don’t bother and book elsehwhere. Say a search parameter of trips up to £200 would do the biz.
Not able to get any holiday results for September 2009 in Italy
regards tony tedstone
trying to find a cheap longweekend at easter to poland by bus
going from the nearist destination to richmond north yorkshire
could not get any results for the holidays and desinations i sort, very hard site to use maybe you should look in to making it easeir . many people will be put off booking with you .
Once again we have booked too early and find we would have saved £100+ if we had waited 2 months. It will not happen next holiday!
why are you still charging a fuel suppliment when prices are so low.