English Heritage Reviews 2,997

I called EH's national telephone helpline on Saturday teatime about a shirt lost at Brodsworth Hall that day. By the following Saturday morning my shirt arrived home at no cost to me. Excellent and caring service beyond my expectations!! A donation is on its way.

Excellent customer service from English Heritage. I had an issue with a booking, and the team handled it with genuine kindness and efficiency. They provided a full refund as a gesture of goodwill, which I truly appreciate.

A quick response to my query with very helpful outcomes. Delighted

Very easy to request a replacement card.

There was an error on my ticket regarding the date of my visit. I emailed customer service and they promptly corrected it by issuing a new ticket. Thank you so much for your help

I liked the fact that I was able to speak to someone in person on the phone when having problems booking an educational visit for our u3a archaeology group. Both the people I spoke to were pleasant and helpful, particularly as I was finding the online process difficult as there seemed to be no free self led educational visit option for Brougham Castle and the only booking possible seemed to involve the need to pay. I am a retired GP not unused to technology but was quickly loosing the will to live - a pity, as though I have lived beyond my 3 score years and ten, I have managed to survive both cancer and a TIA and am physically fit and compos mentis! I had to make 2 phone calls: the first was less productive - they ascertained that I had registered our group in mid April - in good time etc. and I eventually ascertained that the "re-seller's" 36 or so character long reference in tiny writing at the top of my original confirmation e-mail, alongside a similarly long one for the agent, did in fact refer to our u3a group and me as leader respectively! Who would have thought?! I was told that it wasn't possible for them to make a booking for me but could alter one if set up so I went to try again & re-read the "handy training guide" for navigating the new booking portal (a clue there perhaps that it isn't straight forward?). I had read it in mid April and looked at the products for Brougham Castle but couldn't seem to find what I wanted. There didn't seem to be the link they mentioned: in my second e-mail inviting bookings - there was just a red re-set button that I think possibly sent me an e-mail asking me to re-set my password when I clicked it - I didn't think I'd set a password up earlier, so rather than a possible scam I went onto the EH website education visits page & as if trying to make a booking, requested a reset there.
The red re-set button on that earlier email when clicked I think subsequently took me to a list of the various properties but didn't seem to show what I wanted so back to the EH website educational visits page, but I was still unable to find a self-led educational visit product for Brougham Castle. The only option were tickets under "all products" and there was a charge. Even entering my seller's reference as educational made no difference. My second call was therefore to ask if they could confirm that Brougham Castle DIDN'T offer free educational visits (despite saying they did on the website & the suggestion that I registered our group for such a visit when I had originally phoned the Castle!) I explained that I couldn't find this product on offer on the booking portal. The response was swift as there had been some other problems with educational visits that day & I later received an e-mail of apology etc. In the meantime I had continued to experiment and lo & behold the option that I wanted (self led educational visit) suddenly appeared under Brougham Castle. Not only that, the red re-set button on that earlier email when clicked said " this link has expired". I quickly booked the now correct option, which clearly hadn't been available earlier. I am gad that someone was able to add this option particularly as my last call was about 4.50pm on a Friday before a bank holiday weekend! I later read in my email that "My team has looked at you account and discovered that it was accidentally set up incorrectly. I do apologise etc". It may well have been that there was an error with the the link e-mail I was sent, but it is also clear that previously there wasn't the option of a self led educational visit to Brougham Castle as an option on the booking portal as you can access this WITHOUT using your account from the link on the EH website education page under "making a booking" and clicking on the red words: new booking portal. Indeed it was this way I eventually made my booking.
Clearly there were errors. I hope no one else has a similar experience. I have given an overall 3 stars because of the helpful attitude of the 2 people I spoke to: the on line experience of booking before my second call was abominable - I'm sure many people would have difficulty knowing what or who re-sellers and agents applied to, but as one gets older one is more likely to blame oneself for an inability to do something technological (there could be a bias too in those answering our calls), rather than the error being in how a system has been set up. As I said to the first person I spoke to - I felt a failure at not being able to make the booking and thus save some of our older members on limited income the cost of entry: the alternative was to abandon my attempt, speak directly with Brougham Castle & have free entry for those of us who are members & a concessionary rate for others.
Thank you to whoever fixed the problem.

Bonnie from English Heritage, was so helpfull, friendly and a pleasure to talk to, apologies for our late reply, after our trip to Stonehenge from Salisbury.

People, especially pensioners and families, need to be made aware there is a public bus the x10 I think! Which you can board in Salsbury direct to the Stonehenge visitor centre, the bus is free if you have your oap bus pass, or £3 one way, £6 return, be aware the last public bus back from Stonehenge to Salisbury is at 2.00.

If you pay the £30 per person which we were quoted on the tour bus, it included Stonehenge and Salisbury cathedral tour, but if you are mildly mobile you can find Salisbury cathedral easily for free, and it is beautiful, an outstanding building, Salisbury and Bath are lovely places to visit, but take your bigger wallet to Bath, it seemed extremely expensive, I got charged £7 for two sausage rolls, I nearly framed them.

We also visited Minehead on our travels, big shout out to the guys who man this so very important life saving organisation, a damming shame of our country, like the hospices and all life saving boats, they survive on donations and charity, without them many lives would be lost.

Kev Holmes Kingston upon Hull

We have been very happy with English Heritage and the abundance of locations we have visited but this year when we renewed our membership we switched to monthly payments and was surprised when they took the full annual payment along with our new monthly payment. I contacted English Heritage who thanked me for reaching out and said i would be refunded in the next 28 working days. I am not happy with this response, firstly because we received no apology for their admin mix-up and I don't see why I should have to wait up to 28 working days to get my money back.

As Australians travelling in the UK we were upset to find we had left our member cards behind.
An email request was promptly responded to, we have the necessary member numbers and can visit EH sites to our hearts content.
Thanks folks. Very efficiently and promptly done.
Ian and Barbara

I liked the many sites, and ease of use, and actually everything. If I lived in England, I would have made a lifetime membership.

I made an email enquiry about replacing my membership card which was in my wallet,recently stolen on the London underground. I was not able to provide a membership number.
I received a nicely worded email the next day to a replacement card be sent out to me.

Excellent - my email was replied and acted on within 3 hours. Fantastic, polite and efficient staff.

Quick response to an email sent to customer service admin staff.

A very nice lady couldn't help us enough, searched until she found us nothing was to much trouble

Given that my communication was related to a complaint, must say was a tad disappointed to not have received a more detailed/comprehensive response.

Regards

Jay

Sent an email enquiry & got a very pleasant reply within a couple of hours. Excellent customer service & communication, thank you

Really poor customer experience from start to finish.
I was incorrectly charged twice—once via my monthly direct debit and then again for the full amount. When I called, I was told this was due to an “admin error.” While they did not remove the extra charge immediately, I’ve now been told it could take up to 28 days to get the money back, which is unacceptable given it was their mistake.
To make matters worse, I travelled a fair distance to visit a monument only to be told my cards (the brand new ones just issued) were “out of date” and wouldn’t work. No explanation, no immediate solution—just more inconvenience.
The website is also extremely unreliable—frequently down or showing technical errors—making it difficult to manage anything online.
Overall, a very frustrating experience with poor systems, lack of accountability, and no sense of urgency when things go wrong. Definitely needs serious improvement.

I had a quick reply and everything has been sorted out, I have been a member of English heritage for many years and it’s a great cause

DO NOT get a membership with them. You will use it once and then it will be impossible to cancel.

I emailed them saying I couldn’t afford paying the membership anymore and they said I wasn’t allowed and if I already cancelled my direct debit now I had to pay the months I have left in my membership. I’ve been paying for two years and only used it twice.

It is unacceptable that when you tell someone you are not allowed to pay £12 anymore because you just lost your job, for them to ask you to pay £50 in one go.

If I’m able to pay for another membership again I’ll definitely go for a National Trust one that I’ve heard is so much better. My bad for not listening in the first place.

We were not able to visit Dover Castle due to our ship having to divert Dover due to high winds. We had already purchased tickets to the Castle and our tickets were graciously refunded by the English Heritage Foundation. This was above and beyond our expectations. We fully support the English Heritage Foundation and Dover Castle for their understanding.
Please visit Dover Castle if you’re ever in Dover.