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What our customers have to say...
The most important thing we can do to improve our service is listen to what our customers have to say, which is why you can now read their comments unedited on our website.
Upon returning from Japan all our clients are sent a review form and this is where you can see what they are saying about their experience of Japan and of our service.
Search the reviews, check the image gallery and see for yourself how our clients rate the InsideJapan experience.
How are we doing? (3 year average rating)
4.85/5 calculated from 2898 reviews submitted in the last 3 years
Peter (United States) - Independent Travel, Mar 2026
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1. How would you describe your overall level of satisfaction with us as your tour operator?
The itinerary planned for us did a decent job of balancing our objective of seeing cherry blossoms by visiting cities from Fukuoka to Tokyo against time and energy spent traveling any more traveling would have been too much. Overall, the itinerary unfolded without any hitches, even in the face of uncertain springtime weather conditions.
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2. Consultant name and satisfaction rating:
The departure of our initial travel consultant, Elisabeth, just before our trip, created some complications that Xinmei did a good job recovering from. Specifically, only a brief summary of Karin's food allergies were stored in our customer profile, and the more detailed list of allergies was lost in the transfer. Xinmei successfully incorporated the additional information in the limited time available, even if it required modifications to our itinerary.
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3. How would you rate your package in terms of value for money?
Good
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4. How would you rate the accommodation against your expectations?
No Answer Given
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5. Please give us your comments on the transport included in your package.
Taking trains in Japan is easy and convenient. One piece of information that would be beneficial is more detailed advice on how to manage tickets when multiple train modes are used. Although there is advice in tapping out when using the IC card, it would have been beneficial to better understand how to combine local and Shinkansen tickets in large stations when passing through gates. In particular, it is hard to know when a single gate serves as an exit for one system and an entrance for another. On more than one occasion, we ran afoul of the ticket gates and never knew for sure when to insert different ticket types. The Green Tomato trip from Narita was a bit frustrating. The car that drove us picked up 3 other passengers in one group at Terminal 1 before retrieving us at Terminal 3. Unfortunately the Green Tomato rep was unable to give us accurate information about when the car would arrive, and a half hour elapsed between the driver meeting the Term 1 guests and leaving Term 1. The Term 3 rep kept telling us they were on their way so we stood at the outdoor island rather than finding a more comfortable place to wait, which would have been a benefit after a long day of travel.
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6. Please comment on any professional guiding included in your package?
Ms. Shimizu, our first guide, was wonderful. She was sensitive to and flexible about our wishes, and her depth of knowledge was tremendous. We thoroughly enjoyed our time with her. Our second guide, Ms. Jansen, was also a delight and adept at choosing dishes that were both novel and satisfied food restrictions. It turned out that we had points of overlap through our Dutch heritage, and this contributed to our enjoyment. We ended the evening with Marijke very happy. Ms. Kaio, our guide in Okayama, was less enjoyable by comparison. When she first met us, she told us that the tour would be shorter than the scheduled time. She took us by taxi to the Korakuen Gardens and told us that it wasn't worth going into the castle. When Karin asked about visiting temples or shrines, Ms. Kaio declined by saying they were only for Japanese people. The information she provided lacked personality and was little better than reading a travel book.
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7. How do you rate the usefulness and standard of information in the Info-Pack?
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8. Would you consider travelling to Japan again?
Maybe
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9. Would you travel again with InsideJapan Tours?
Maybe
See comments above about dated information in Destination Guides, which provide important supporting information to Info-Pack. Because we have been to Japan several times in the past, it is hard to predict whether another trip is possible, but customized travel itinerary, like the one we traveled on, is helpful for us.
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