Room 256
I arrive in a very hot room, about 30 degrees, radiator off, portable air con (ineffective). This is January in UK and I’m in a room warmer than the one I had in Darwin three weeks ago, what is going on, exactly.
Its too hot to sleep, I request a different room. Hotel full. I persuade the manager to visit the room. He is surprised at the heat and suggests that it might be from….wait for it….”The sun heating up the brickwork”!! ……bearing in mind it was now 10pm and frosty outside. The best alternative he could offer was keeping my window open – all night, on the ground floor! He promises to “sort something out with the bill”. At this point I give up.
I sleep very little, kept awake not just by the heat but also by the rumbling of huge fans underneath the room. I discover that my room is above the main hotel heating ore cooling plant room. Its chucking loads of heat out to the outside through a 6 foot high vent, as well as upwards into my room. In the morning they try to charge me full price. I tell them I will pay only £30 after my appalling night. They then say – Oh but it doesn’t matter as the cost is going back to the company so you won’t have to pay it anyway. I tell them that is even worse, making someone else pay for service that has not actually been delivered. I say I will pay £30 and that’s what they charge.
But the real question is…….
That overheated room was a known problem as evidenced by the air con machine. Its been too hot in that room since the wing was built. So why wasn’t I told about it at check-in? Why was it apparently a surprise to the manager? What sort of establishment knows its accommodation that badly? Would you stay there again? I can almost hear the hotel staff laughing behind their hands – yes 256, good room, it’s a chilly night. And I won’t even start to tell you about the breakfast……
The next night I arrive at my hotel, different town, believing that it must be better. And, hooray, I am given a suite, a separate lounge, comfy sofa, two toilets, flat screen telly, coffee table, king size bed, two entrances. And its a good temperature. So its great to show that when you have hit rock bottom it can get better. Keep believing it! It can happen to you! But I am never going back to the other place. And a letter to their customer care director will follow shortly. But it may be a lost cause.
Saturday: Have written to their HR director and await a reply….