First Choice Travel Agent which in recent years has earned itself an unflattering saying from some unhappy customers, First Choice Travel Agents should be your last choice, are being sued by an unhappy family who said their holiday of a lifetime was turned into a holiday from hell after booking a Caribbean Holiday with First Choice travel agents.

The Doyles family which were looking forward to their dream Caribbean holiday where they were expecting a relaxing week in the lap of luxury but instead find themselves in a nightmare where they could not wait to get home from their holiday from hell.

Instead of an exciting luxury holiday the Doyles instead became ill with crippling bouts of diarrhoea and sickness and also claimed their accommodation was dirty and found cockroaches in their fridge and under their beds in their four star resort. The family also claim their buffet was picked over by birds leaving the family avoiding the food.

TUI UK which runs First Choice are being sued by Paul Doyle, 40 and his family after their holiday from hell at the Behia Principe Hotel in San Juan, Dominican Republic at the end of July 2007.

Paul told the Herald newspaper: “We decided ‘here we are, we’ve never been to the Caribbean before, we can fit a five or six day holiday in’. For a six day holiday it was a bit of a distance but we just wanted to get away.”

But Mr Doyle, who works for Shop Direct as an administrator, added: “We were all quite ill.

“The place looked like it did in the brochure. But it was dirty.

“We had cockroaches in the fridge. My wife hates cockroaches. These were in the fridge, a couple of them at the bottom.

“We went into our room and saw them there. We had ants outside as well. The staff ended up leaving a spray in our room and we had to sort it out ourselves.”

Paul Doyle who went away with his wife Dorothy, 41, son Paul Jnr, 11, and brother Gerard, 42, said he could not believe that the resort’s electricity used to cut out periodically.

According to Paul, the family became ill after just two days at the four star all-inclusive resort.

“I think the bug that we all got must have come from where we all ate. It was all open and had birds flying round it.

“When I think about it the birds were eating everything.”

According to reports it is not only Mr Doyle and his family who are suing TUI, well-known law firm Irwin Mitchell have a total of 44 holidaymakers who are suing the popular travel agents.

In a writ lodged with the High Court, barrister David Allan QC said: “In the summer of 2007 the hotel was subject to repeated and/or prolonged episodes of gastric illness amongst guests.

“None of the claimants ate outside the hotel prior to falling ill and it will be alleged that the majority of their infections were bacterial and caused by poor standards of hygiene and food handling.”

The writ also alleges there were mice and rats in the hotel and it smelled of sewage and urine. The swimming pool is also described as “murky” and some hotel guest’s say they saw vomit and bird droppings in the pool.

A TUI spokeswoman said: “First Choice can confirm that the allegation of illness surrounding the Gran Bahia Principe in Dominican Republic is currently subject to a legal process.

“The claims made by the Doyle family currently remain outstanding and no liability has been admitted by First Choice.

“Therefore, it would be inappropriate of us to comment any further at this time so as not to prejudice future court proceedings.”