Ghost Party Haunted Tours — Attraction in Tampa

Decent tour overall. These tours have good potential, but need to step it up if they’re going to target tourists who are used to ghost tours in places like Savannah, St. Augustine, and Key West. I’ve done quite a few ghost tours around the country and I think this company’s tours could be really great if a few of the following things changed:

1. Tell more stories. Our guide told 5 ghost stories and then let us loose in the Cuban Club to hunt ghosts for an hour. We really only covered the Cuban Club and nothing else, which was a bummer. The really great ghost tours I’ve been on in Savannah, St. Augustine, etc. have a lot of stories and cover a lot of ground. I get that Ybor isn’t as old, but there were cemeteries and old buildings that we passed. They probably had stories to go with them, but the guide didn’t touch on anything at all, while we walked around.

2. Show images of ghosts found on past tours and in paranormal investigations and tell the stories behind them. There was no imagery on this tour. Many other tours I’ve been on have ipads or phones out with images saved and stories to go with them.

3. The guide could have been more involved in her stories. The typical story sounded like, “Um...so...yeah...like....there was like....this...um...one actor who got really upset that he didn’t get a part in a play and he like...hung himself...and some people see his ghost around here sometimes.” And that’s it. No more details. That’s the end of the story. That’s how most of our guide’s stories sounded. It’s hard to get into a story when it’s just one sentence long and the guide doesn’t seem so into it.

4. Better training for guides - our guide was new and she seemed like she had a hard time remembering the stories she was supposed to tell and was jittery, nervous, quiet and a bit monotone. I can’t blame her. I would be too if it were my second month on the job...but did take away from the experience a bit. For a $40 tour, we expected more. Maybe give a discounted price for a tour with a newbie?

WHAT THEY DID RIGHT Chrissy was super professional in helping us coordinate the tour, sending us our tickets and getting us reservations in the haunted restaurant before the tour. The guide looked like the real deal. She believed in ghosts, was a paranormal investigator, and wore all black. I’m sure the all black thing is a complete stereotype of what a ghost hunter looks like...but it worked. She looked the part. The guide was also...

POOR BUSINESS PRACTICES FOR THIS TOUR COMPANY! THEY TOOK OUR MONEY AND REFUSE TO GIVE A REFUND! THE RESTAURANT WAS FANTASTIC!! THE GHOST TOUR COMPANY DROPPED THE BALL AFTER DINNER!! On February 11th 2019, I made a reservation for 4 people for the “Ghost Hunting Tour” with electronic devices. Total was $140. We were interested in the “Haunted Dining” at the Carne Chop House Restaurant. The person making the reservation, told us that 6:30 would be plenty of time have dinner and meet at 8pm at the back door of the restaurant in front of the “Haunted Safe” where the tour begins. When we entered the restaurant, we informed the host that we were part of the Ghost Tour at 8pm. He Sat us at a table that was closest to the glass doors at the back of the restaurant. We could see the “haunted safe” from our table. We had our dinner, finishing at 7:50pm giving us plenty of time to walk the approximate 20 feet to the meeting spot. We then walked to the back door, stood in front of the “Safe” and waited for the tour guide to show up. After 8pm, we began to get concerned. We asked the Manager of the Carne Chop House, if he knew of a way to contact them and he did. He sent a message at 8:05 saying we were waiting for our tour guide. We had been waiting for approx. 15 minutes, thinking the guide might be running late. The manager told us that he had sent her a text, but she did not reply to him immediately. At 8:26 we called and a female answered saying that she was out of town and the she had no way of contacting the “New Tour Guide” because they turn their cell phones off to avoid disturbing the tour. She said she would continue to try and contact the tour guide and call us back. At 8:37 we received a phone call stating that tour had met in front of the Comedy club around the corner and never went into the agreed upon meeting spot in front of the ‘Haunted Safe' She also had the nerve to ask if we wanted to join the tour in progress, missing the first 30-45 mins. We said we paid for a full tour and that’s what we expected. We requested a refund since we complied with all of the requirements for the tour. The Ghost tour company refuses to acknowledge fault, even though we were at the agreed location BEFORE the tour...

Very disappointing experience with this company in general. I had signed up on their website to be part of their membership club and received a call from Chrissy that I was really excited about . I was looking to join a paranormal group, meet like minded people, be involved in the community. After that, it all went down hill. I was basically told that I had to pay for and go on a public investigation tour with them to make sure I qualified to be a member (even though they had already taken my money for the membership online). Ok- no big deal. I scheduled one. They texted me the night of the tour to ask if I could reschedule to the later time slot- saying my time slot had a lot of people and they thought I would have a better experience with a smaller group (not ideal since I had to work the next morning but I rescheduled). Then!! They texted me again about an hour or so before my tour to tell me they have to cancel due to not enough people (!!!!)- I had already travelled to and paid to park in that area before I got this text . I Rescheduled for another night and was texted several days before that they were cancelling due to rain expected (come on it’s Florida). They kept pressuring me to schedule certain days/times other than the ones that worked for me (I’m assuming because they were just trying to shift people around to fill a certain tour that wasn’t filled enough) . Finally … I ended up on a public tour/investigation with them . I couldn’t fully enjoy it , and couldn’t actually investigate, because Chrissy just kept talking !!! She would talk and talk and then tell us we need to spend our time investigating but then she would just keep talking. Which prevented us from being able to investigate. We actually had multiple people leave the tour early because they were so annoyed At the end she welcomed me to the “club” and told me I would get a Tshirt (that I never got) and they would be in contact for future events. But then I basically never heard...