EF Go Ahead Tours Class Action Lawsuit Over COVID Refunds

If you’re looking for an EF Go Ahead Tours class action lawsuit tied to COVID-19 refunds, the honest answer is that the class litigation was directed at EF’s student-travel companies rather than at the Go Ahead Tours adult brand, and those cases have not delivered class-wide relief. A Massachusetts federal case lost class certification in June 2024, the First Circuit refused to take up the appeal that December, and a parallel California case never reached certification. The one program that actually paid consumers back came from the Massachusetts Attorney General, and it was limited to Massachusetts residents.

Who Was Actually Sued

The two federal class actions filed in 2020 named EF Institute for Cultural Exchange and related entities, including EF Explore America. These are the corporate entities behind EF’s high school student tours, not the EF Go Ahead Tours adult travel brand. All of these brands sit under the same EF Education First corporate umbrella and use similar contractual frameworks for cancellations, which is why complaints about Go Ahead Tours’ refund practices often get lumped in with the student-tour litigation, but Go Ahead Tours itself was not a named defendant in the class actions.¹²

What the Lawsuits Claimed

After the World Health Organization declared a public health emergency on January 30, 2020, EF began canceling, postponing, or rescheduling tours. Instead of full cash refunds, the company offered travel vouchers or partial refunds that withheld cancellation fees of $500 to $1,000 per ticket depending on the departure date and tour type.³ EF’s booking contract contained a clause letting the company substitute vouchers for cash whenever a tour was canceled due to “public health issues or quarantine.”⁴

Court filings estimated that roughly 283,000 students had been scheduled to depart on EF tours between March 2020 and December 2021.⁵ Many families who had purchased travel insurance also discovered their policies didn’t cover pandemic cancellations, and EF told customers it had “no insurance to cover COVID-19-related losses.”³

The California Case: Grabovsky

Grabovsky v. EF Institute for Cultural Exchange, Inc. et al. (Case No. 3:20-cv-00508-GPC-BLM) was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California. It sought to represent U.S. citizens who signed an EF 2019–2020 high school tour contract for a trip scheduled after January 31, 2020 that was canceled due to the pandemic and for which a full refund was refused. The complaint alleged that EF’s “No Public Health Emergency Cash Refund Clause” was an unlawful business practice under California law, that the booking contracts were adhesion contracts imposed on a “take it or leave it” basis, and that EF owed at least $5 million in restitution.⁶

As of the most recent available reporting, Grabovsky remained a proposed class action with no class certification ruling and no reported settlement.

The Massachusetts Case: Douglas

The more heavily litigated case was Douglas et al. v. EF Institute for Cultural Exchange, Inc. et al. (Case No. 20-cv-11740-DJC) in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts. Named plaintiffs Melissa Douglas, Thomas Aikins, and Sara Kahl alleged violations of Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 93A, the state’s consumer protection statute.⁵

The core theory relied on 940 CMR § 15.06, a Massachusetts regulation that requires tour operators who fail to deliver purchased travel services to offer consumers a choice among three options: a full cash refund, a substitute trip of equal or greater value, or a lower-value substitute trip plus a cash refund for the difference.⁷ Under Massachusetts law, a violation is an unfair or deceptive trade practice, and consumers cannot waive those rights by contract.

Why Class Certification Was Denied

On June 20, 2024, Judge Denise Casper denied class certification. The plaintiffs had sought to certify a class of all EF travel purchasers whose trips, scheduled to depart between March 12, 2020 and December 31, 2021, did not depart as planned and who received less than a full refund.⁵

The court found a mismatch between the original complaint, which was built around the specific tour-operator refund regulation, and the broader class definition the plaintiffs later proposed, which appeared to rest on a more general consumer protection theory. Allowing that shift after more than three years of litigation would be “unduly prejudicial and unfair” to the defendants. The court also held that the proposed class failed the predominance requirement of Rule 23(b)(3), because individual questions about each consumer’s circumstances would overwhelm the common legal issues.⁵

The Appeal

The plaintiffs petitioned the First Circuit Court of Appeals for permission to challenge the denial. On December 13, 2024, the First Circuit denied the petition and the stay on district court proceedings was lifted.⁸ The case is still pending as to the individual claims of the three named plaintiffs, but the class-wide effort is effectively over.

The Massachusetts Attorney General Settlement

The refunds that consumers actually received came from a separate track. After more than 600 consumer complaints reached the Massachusetts Attorney General’s office between March 11 and May 14, 2020, then-Attorney General Maura Healey secured an assurance of discontinuance filed in Suffolk Superior Court on May 21, 2020.⁹

Under the agreement, EF Institute for Cultural Exchange and EF Explore America agreed to provide more than $1.4 million in additional refunds to nearly 4,200 Massachusetts consumers. Per-consumer amounts were $435 for international travel, $300 for domestic air travel, and $100 for domestic bus travel. Eligible consumers had until September 30, 2022 to request their refund.⁹ That deadline has now passed, and the program covered only Massachusetts residents.

Go Ahead Tours Cancellation Terms Today

For anyone booking Go Ahead Tours now, the cancellation framework that drove much of the consumer frustration is still in place. The company charges a non-refundable reservation fee of $300 to $450 per person, and cancellation fees escalate as the departure date approaches, reaching 100 percent of the tour cost for cancellations within seven days of departure.¹⁰ In force majeure events such as pandemics, the terms specify that travelers receive future travel vouchers rather than cash.²

The optional “AnyReason Protection” costs $75 and allows cancellation up to 24 hours before departure, but compensation is a travel voucher that expires after one year and cannot be transferred or redeemed for cash.¹¹ Separate travel insurance, underwritten by United States Fire Insurance Company and administered by a third party, covers cancellation only for specific qualifying reasons. Go Ahead Tours states in its terms that it is not an insurer and has no authority over coverage or claim decisions.²

Where Consumers Stand

The pathway to a class-wide recovery over COVID-era EF tour cancellations has narrowed almost to nothing. Grabovsky has produced no reported certification or settlement. Douglas is proceeding only as an individual case for its three named plaintiffs, with no class of similarly situated travelers behind them. The Massachusetts AG program that did pay out was capped at Massachusetts residents, covered only a portion of what many families were charged, and closed its claim window on September 30, 2022. If you’re a Go Ahead Tours customer with a current dispute over cancellation fees or a denied insurance claim, the class action route is not currently a live option for you; individual remedies, such as a Chapter 93A demand letter for Massachusetts consumers, a complaint to your state attorney general, or a claim through the third-party insurance administrator, are what remain.

1
EF Go Ahead Tours. About Go Ahead Tours
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EF Go Ahead Tours. Terms and Conditions
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NBC 5 Dallas-Fort Worth. Travel Company Keeps Thousands in Cancellation Fees Despite Family’s Trip Insurance Purchase
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ClassAction.org. Education First Tour Companies Refuse to Issue Full Cash Refund for Tours Canceled Due to Coronavirus Outbreak
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GovInfo. Douglas v. EF Institute for Cultural Exchange, Memorandum and Order
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ClassAction.org. Grabovsky v. EF Institute for Cultural Exchange Complaint
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Nutter McClennen & Fish LLP. 940 CMR § 15.06 Analysis
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CaseMine. Douglas v. EF Institute for Cultural Exchange, First Circuit Order
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Massachusetts Attorney General. AG Healey Secures $1.4 Million in Additional Refunds From Cambridge Educational Travel Company
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EF Go Ahead Tours. Canceling your tour
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EF Go Ahead Tours. Travel Protection