Civitatis: the Spanish guided-visit marketplace, read from Naples

In one line: what it is and why you run into it

Civitatis is a Spanish marketplace for activities, excursions and guided visits. It is not a partner of ours and we do not verify its prices: you find it here because a search for “Naples guided tour” brings it up among the first results, and because it sells a great many guided walks around the city with someone who speaks your language.

There is one point to grasp: the site takes the payment, but the service belongs to somebody else, and the rules of your day are that somebody else’s rules.

Who the seller is

In its general terms the company identifies itself as CIVITATIS TOURS, S.L., Spanish VAT number B-86899440, registered office at Calle Gran Vía 39, third floor, 28013 Madrid, with customer support through reservas@civitatis.com. The founder named on the company pages is Alberto Gutiérrez and the chief executive is Andrés Spitzer. The “About us” page introduces the team person by person, with role and department, rather than the company history: about the founding of the business it says nothing, and neither do the general terms.

The site is available in Italian, English, Spanish with Argentine and Mexican variants, French and Brazilian and European Portuguese, with nine currencies to choose from and support stated as round the clock. In its supplier section it talks about more than 30 million reachable customers; in the footer it publishes an internal rating of 9.1 out of 10 from more than five million opinions. On Trustpilot the score is 4.5 out of 5 from more than 193,000 reviews.

The model: a self-declared intermediary

This is the part that changes something for you, and the general terms put it explicitly: the moment you book, the contractual relationship is formed directly with the supplier of the activity, and the platform acts solely as an intermediary, passing on the booking data and sending the confirmation on the supplier’s behalf. How the booking is to be redeemed is set out on the voucher.

On cancellation, each service follows a specific policy, which you can read on the activity page and in the confirmation email; cancellations are handled according to that policy. The terms further provide that if the supplier has no availability on the date you booked, you are offered an alternative and, if you do not reply or you turn it down, the booking is cancelled with an immediate refund.

Translated into practice: the line to read is not the name of the site, it is the cancellation policy of the individual activity plus the name of the supplier.

In Naples the supplier is often the site itself

On three heavily sold Naples visits the supplier is not an agency but whoever runs the place, and it has a ticket office of its own with published fares.

For Napoli Sotterranea the official ticket office writes that the online ticket is neither refundable nor changeable: if you need to be able to cancel, a platform can make sense; if you only need to get in, it does not. The full comparison of the underground routes is in Naples underground.

How to read a listing before you pay

Four lines, in this order. First the cancellation policy, because it belongs to the activity. Then the language of the visit: on a walk advertised “in Italian”, ask for confirmation that the guide speaks Italian on that day and not only in season. Then the meeting point, which stays on the voucher. Last, who runs it, because that is the party you have the contract with.

On the format, add one question specific to Naples: if the visit goes inside an archaeological site or a museum, who guides you in there. A tour leader is not a licensed guide, and you feel the difference for two hours. The formats side by side are in walking tours in Naples, and whoever puts the guides out in the city is in the profiles in operators and platforms.

What changes compared with the partner platforms

Against GetYourGuide, support in Italian and Spanish is the stated strength, and the catalogue of walking tours in those languages is wide. Against Tiqets, the logic of the bare ticket on instant confirmation is missing. And against both, here we have no verified prices to set alongside: which is why we compare only what we read ourselves.

What to keep in mind

It is an intermediary that says so in black and white, with good outside ratings and language coverage that counts if you want a guide in Italian or Spanish. Before booking, look at the activity’s cancellation policy, the supplier’s name and the language the guide will actually work in; if the place has a ticket office of its own, compare with that.

To build the day rather than the single ticket, start from things to do in Naples and tickets and passes.