Wightlink Isle of Wight Ferries Reviews 405

It’s nothing short of outrageous that an Island Resident with a Multilink Pass is not able to travel with a bicycle on the roof of their car using their pass as a form of payment. To be told I have to purchase a ticket at full price is for want of a better word “disgraceful”.

I bought return fares for two people on the WL fastcat for our holiday. I then phoned WL and amended the time of one person's outbound journey. This evening, my friend and myself returned from holiday and needed to use the pre-booked return fares to be told the barcode was only for one person. Two WL personnel attempted to deal with the situation - one insisting we had only ONE barcode for ONE return fare. At that time, the fastcat was boarding and after a very long return journey, I was desperate not to miss it. One member of staff appeared absolutely determined to deny us boarding whilst I became more and more distressed. Eventually the other member of staff overruled and said we could board. What a totally unnecessary affair and a very upsetting end to our holiday. Wightlink - I hope you're ashamed - absolutely disgraceful behaviour...............thank goodness you had ONE efficient human being on your staff!

Never run on time, queue was unbelievably long despite there being no cars in the lanes. Unhelpful staff, who were also incredibly rude. Not to mention overpriced.

I arrive half hour early to catch the 7am whitelink ferry to Portsmouth, exapecting to be across the Solent by 8am as advised ion timetable, No coffee, drinks or food available as the tills had broken
Only half seating area available as water was leaking into lounge floor
Ferry left an hour late with no explanation as to why, just sat in dock fully loaded
Got to Portsmouth an hour late only for the ferry to be stopped by harbour master in Portsmouth because wightlink had missed its entry time into the harbour.
I ended up arriving an hour and half late and missed my planned appointment by there incompetence

Our ferry was cancelled 6 minutes before it was due to sail with a member of staff announcing ‘this boat isn’t going anywhere…’

The excuse today was ‘a family emergency for a critical member of the crew’

It’s surprising that no one saw a critical member of the crew rushing off the boat…

And why did they not inform the customers before we traveled to the harbour… ?

What a terrible way to treat customers

Shocking service

Just another unchecked rip off uk company akin to any other rogue trader just backed by a bit of box ticking to conform

When on board etc OK it is the cost ridiculous high Look at some of the prices it can be cheaper to go to France I live on the island be nice to have NOT in school times so we can have a really cheap trip you say you think about the people on the island you might ONLY to see how much you can rip us off

I travel to the island regularly to visit my elderly parents, and because I want to make the most of my visits to them, I always take my car across to help with chores and outings. It routinely costs me over £200 pounds to traverse the three miles of water between Lymington and Yarmouth which is, quite frankly, obscene and unjustifiable. For context, In April I flew to (and from) Rome and it cost me less than a weekend return to the Isle of Wight. Wightlink do not provide any discount or assistance for mainland family members of island residents.
I have occasionally tried switching to Red Funnel as their fares are sometimes marginally less disgusting than Wightlink's, although not by much, however that ferry adds an hour each way to my journey so not a viable option.
The ferry companies are holding the Island residents and their families to ransom.
Despicable.

Easy to book online. Good price for one minivan and 9 passengers return.
Staff were friendly. We actually arrived early on both crossings and were able to travel earlier than our booking time. Probably won't return to Isle of Wight but if we did we would definitely use Wightlink. The only teeny negative for me was that you couldn't use cash onboard. Obviously that wouldn't be a problem for most people.

100% recommend wightlink for using to get to IOW. Easy booking system online and the system works really well at port. I changed our return ferry to a day earlier and the new return ferry was cheaper therefore admin change was incorporated so I had nothing else to pay. Very good customer service on the phone. No stroppiness at all! 100% recommend.

Holy Mackeral! Wightlink wants £347.25 for crossing 5 miles from Portsmouth to IOW. Is this for real? We're booked for Devon instead. PS. Came back from Europe on P&O to France in March for £178. Love the IOW, but we won't be used as a cash cow.

You must not leave your dog in the car if you cross on the ferry. When the boat moves, all of the car alarms go off. It turns into a living hell and will traumatize your dog. Now, booking instructions say you can keep your dog in the car, but do not make it clear that owners cannot stay with them. The ferry does warn people when booking and when arriving to turn car alarms off. However some cars, mine included, make this impossible. I used to have a menu setting until my service last year and it has disappeared. I disabled the motion sensor for internal and external movement, but it still goes off.
Having never taken a car ferry at all, took a bit of a risk also taking dogs. But have fond memories of the isle of wight as a child.
Staff are hit and miss. Some very kind. Some arrogant. Pet friendly areas on the boat are anything but friendly. First crossing the floor was really filthy, can't imagine the last time it was cleaned. On the way back, the outside area was really full of screaming school kids. If you have dogs, think through if this ferry crossing is worth going to the IoW - until this improves, definitely won't be going back on this ferry.

Love the island but £240 return is just appalling. Why d0esnt the council do something? Its killing tourism.
Wightlink are crippling the island and no profits remain in the UK. Next year: Skeggy!

They do not except cash in on board cafe .. very poor customer service

Rip off and ZERO interest in customer.
The ferry left early we had 5 minutes left before it went and they wouldnt let us on despite there being space claiming that they had the bridge already up.
These people are trained with zero customer care in mind. Be glad to be shot of them

Myself and my family have been visiting the IOW for over 25 years. Have not been since COVID. Myself and my partner decided on a 5 day break. The cost of the ferry was horrendous. We paid £196 return (including disability discount). When we turned up at Portsmouth was told my ticket was not a disability ticket!
I was upset and appalled at how the island has declined so quickly. The beachfront restaurants & hotels at Sandown beach look like they have been in a war zone! Everywhere is tired and lacking tourists. What the hell happened?? Most shocking were the ferry prices for such a small crossing. It is obviously affecting tourism, trade and the residents themselves!! What sense does it make for Wightlink to charge so much! We are in a cost of living crisis and even the Islanders cannot afford tickets! Surely they are putting themselves, islanders, visitors, tourists etc at risk and will eventually collapse. All through greed! I am based not far from Dover and you can cross Dover to Calais with 4 people and car for less than a one way ticket to Isle of Wight. I wanted to bring my grandchildren over to make memories for them! But not now. Unfortunately the IOW will continue to deteriorate and will lose all tourism!! What a terrible shame and it’s so very sad.

I found this company lovely to deal with - something that is increasingly rare these days!

I've been booking ferry tickets for IOW festival so they're probably super busy at the moment but I can always get straight through to their customer service team who are exceptionally helpful and friendly.

They swapped my foot passenger tickets to a later ferry for no additional cost and gave me very good advice on return ferries too. Thank you Wightlink!

The check-in gate staff desperately need customer service training. I incorrectly named my ticket a flexi ticket and he was fast to rudely correct me. He then informed me he had been working here seventeen years and has never been a flexi. I was not arguing with him but my politeness was not returned.

Extortionate prices. Cutting families off from one another, destroying island tourism. UK’s best ferry operator?? What an absolute farce.

Way too expensive to cross a short stretch of water with a small car, simply cannot be justified! Unreliable, and the toilets are disgusting … a health hazard. Beyond a joke - time for a Ferries Regulator.