Chicago Boat Rentals — Local services in West Chicago Township

The people working here are super nice and sweet but, If your visiting Chicago do not rent a boat here. There is no phone that anyone will ever answer, and the only contact is to write an email and hope on the days that they’re open that they write you back, which means it can take quite a few days before they even respond. The boat rental place is nowhere near anything tourist and you need to take public transportation to get there and just hope that everything went well on your reservation. I had to reschedule my rental date and it was changed to the wrong day. Calling them once again is not possible so I had to wait for response to my email which took three days.The stress this caused me as a traveler was not worth it. There are so many other companies that are in the tourist areas, that it’s not worth it to rent from here. Only if your from the area, then I can see this company being a valid option. The people working here are awesome and amazing, it’s the business model that does not work, that’s why they do not give refunds because they know once you figure out the details of your rental you’ll want to cancel. The boat ride was amazing but everything else getting to the boat was a...

I booked a rental on 6-6 to take place on 8/23/25. Upon speaking with family I realized I would have to reschedule our outing for the following day. I tried to contact them to reschedule, to no avail. 6/6- I emailed them asking to reschedule 6/7- followed up via email; still no response 6/8- I texted them about the reschedule, someone texted back "What is the booking number?" I sent it immediately, then no response 6/9- sent another email and texted asking about my reschedule. No response. I then say that I will be disputing the charges. Then I get the following text: "Excuse me? We are closed on Mondays but I happened to come in. Happy to cancel your rental since you are disputing charges." I said yes go ahead and cancel it (why would I want to work with this company?) then.. surprise... no response. It is now 6/11 and nothing has been done and that was all I ever heard from the company. I had to dispute the charge and now I have to get a new credit card... all because they couldn't answer their email and reschedule me one day, 2 months in the future... absolutely insane... Would not book with this scam organization!...

Let me just say that the actual boat was excellent and our experience on the water was great. This review is on the instructor before we stated our rental. The guy was condescending and treated us like kids who will destroy his boat. He spent most time telling us how we will be charged thousands of dollars if we ruin his boat and spent little time actually explaining how to function it. We had a 3 year old child on the boat — like does he actually think we were going to be reckless? Just not customer friendly and welcoming. For $350 spend, it felt like he was doing us a huge favor. It just made a mockery out of their business. Advice: Be welcoming to your customers, don’t talk down to them and trust the fact that they’re risking their own lives on your boat. There is a better way to message this. Focus on teaching how to use the boat rather than talking down at the people and threatening/scaring them. People come here to have fun. People are responsible. Read...