Ava Spruell spent her eighth-year grade year saving up for her class trip to Washington, D.C.
She told her family members not to give her birthday or Christmas presents. Instead, she told them, she wanted money so she could board a plane during April vacation and explore history, her favorite subject, in the nation’s capital.
By spring, Spruell was able to save up $650 for the trip. Spruell’s mother, Susan LaCroix, a single mother, took out a payment plan to cover the rest of the more than $1,000 total owed to EF Explore America, the travel company Rundlett Middle School parents were contracting with for the annual three-day trip.
Now, the family is out most of that money, along with 87 other Rundlett Middle School families.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, EF Explore America canceled all of its trips planned for this spring. The company offered families a $250 refund of the trip or the option of a voucher equal to the cost of the trip that can be used within two years.
Parents have been vocal that they believe EF Explore America’s policies are unjust.
“She feels like someone stole from her and I can’t try to rationalize with her because I feel the same way,” LaCroix said of her daughter’s lost money.
Although the trip is not a school-sponsored event, Interim Superintendent Frank Bass said he has tried to reach out to EF Explore America to see if they will bend on their policy, to no avail.
Early last week, Bass told the Monitor that the district was toying with the idea of asking parents to accept the vouchers and purchasing the vouchers from them to sell to eighth-grade families next year. On Thursday, however, Bass said the district will not buy the vouchers from families because of the financial risk of losing taxpayer money.
Families are still welcome to sell their vouchers to other families independently, or students can attend the trip next year as ninth graders with the eighth-grade class.
Rundlett Middle School Principal Paulette Fitzgerald sent out a letter to parents last week saying the school will continue to use EF Explore America if enough parents opt for the vouchers.
LaCroix said she is torn on what to do. If her daughter isn’t able to sell her voucher to another Rundlett family, the voucher is no use to her family. She doesn’t have the resources to buy herself a ticket to travel with Spruell and she isn’t going to send her daughter on a trip with a group of strangers alone.
Further, parents have said they feel uncomfortable with the idea of future families working with the company.
Heather Walker-White is a parent of twins that were signed up for the trip. If she doesn’t accept the refund, she is poised to lose around $2,000.
“That might be in our best interest, but my gut tells me its not the right thing to do to encourage the school to use EF again,” she said of accepting the voucher. “I don’t want to say goodbye to all that money, but ethically I don’t know that I could encourage the school to use them again.”
It’s a difficult decision without a good answer, she said.
“I’ve paid $1,998, and I’m looking, if I take the refund, at only getting $498 back, and that makes me sick, literally. It pains me in my stomach,” she said. “If I take the voucher, that’s a gamble because I don’t want to send my children on a trip with this company.”
With schools closed and travel halted throughout the globe due to COVID-19, parents in other states are finding themselves in similar situations. More than 8,000 people have signed an online petition requesting a full refund from EF Explore America and its international division, EF Educational Tours, accusing the business of taking advantage of families during an international health crisis.
There is momentum building among parents nationwide to file a class-action lawsuit against the travel company, according to Rundlett parents.
The Consumer Protection Bureau of the attorney general’s office has received several complaints in recent weeks against the tour company from New Hampshire school districts, said Associate Attorney General James Boffetti. However, a review did not find that the consumer complaints rise to a level of “unfair or deceptive business practices,” Boffetti said
Meanwhile, EF Explore America said they have tried to be as flexible as possible with customers. In mid-March, when the federal government imposed travel restrictions and states issued stay-at-home orders, they were forced to postpone or cancel trips just weeks away, according to the company’s website.
The tour company said it starts planning tours as soon as participants enroll and enter into contracts with suppliers, including airlines and hotels. The closer they cancel to a trip’s start date, the more money they owe under those contracts.
EF Explore America hasn’t said publicly which airlines and hotels it typically books with.
Rundlett parent Jess Thompson said the logic the company has presented doesn’t make sense to her.
“Airlines are refunding, hotels are refunding. To keep $700, $800 out of $1,000 just does not add up,” she said.
Thompson started a Facebook group for Rundlett parents to update each other and connect.
“We’re all very upset. We’re all very angry that, some of our kids earned this money on their own, some of the money came from friends and relatives so these kids could have this opportunity, and we’re not getting much back,” she said.
She said for a normal vacation, vouchers might seem like a reasonable option for refunds. However, vouchers just aren’t worth it in their case because their sons and daughters are moving on to a new school next year.
Although the school organizers have said this year’s eighth-graders can attend with next year’s class if they choose, Thompson said there is a developmental difference between eighth- and ninth-grade students, and that the trip might require more chaperones.
“What if travel can’t happen next year because there’s another outbreak? We just can’t have that guarantee,” she said. “Seventh-graders going into eighth grade, they’re seeing what’s going on – they’re not going to be okay with the school using this company again, because they could be put in the same situation. And now you are going to be double the families who are going to be out money.”
After giving the situation a lot of thought, Thompson said she decided take the $250 refund. She said another major concern she had was that the company would go under and she wouldn’t see any money back at all.
Parent Tara Mason said she also decided to take the refund after weeks of consideration.
Her husband has been out of work for medical reasons for a few months, and Mason stays home to take care of her kids. It wasn’t easy for her family to pull together the $1,000 for her son, Teigan, to go on the trip. They did an online fundraiser where a neighbor, friends and family contributed $150.
She said Teigan has been looking forward to the trip for months. His aunt is a history teacher and has been telling him about all of the museums and monuments. It would have been Teigan’s first time on a plane since he was 3 years old.
Meanwhile, Mason said her family could really use the money they put into the trip for her husband’s medical bills, or to pay utilities or car payments.
“We all could use the money right now. It’s not like something happened that we’re fibbing about or that isn’t real or isn’t happening,” she said. “The pandemic is serious.”
LaCroix said she still hasn’t decided whether to take the refund or the voucher.
“We purchased something that was not given to us and we would have gotten our money back. It isn’t like we cancelled it, or we changed our minds, it was shut down by the travel company because of the (COVID-19) situation,” she said. “Basically, they are saying the cost of business is coming out of our pockets.”