Who doesn’t know this situation: You know, you didn’t book a luxury hotel. Nevertheless you expect certain standards when it comes to cleanliness, location and comfort.
When we book an accommodation at booking.com and the hotel is rated ‘good’, we expect it to be good.
Key moment in Dubrovnik
Last summer, we booked a room in a guesthouse and made the experience, that it was not at all like it was described (not for the first time, though). In this case it was during our stay in Dubrovnik.
In general, the city is expensive and it’s hard to find a not so pricey room there. Therefore any reasonable price is tempting. Plus, the guesthouse offered parking lots. We had a rental car and Dubrovnik doesn’t have much space for cars. While booking, the guesthouses seemed like the ideal solution.
Taking ratings seriously
Nowadays everyone can inform online and find ratings for almost any hotel or guesthouse. You should look a bit closer on them. Of course, they’re not totally reliable, but they give you a glimpse of what to expect.
In our case, it was really astonishing to experience, no one wrote something about the disgustingness, we were going to expect.
The bedclothes were dirty. There was trash all around the room and the bath room was dirty as well. Not to mention the not so little bugs coming out at night. We spent two nights in hell.
Insist on the service
Unfortunately the owner of the guesthouse was really friendly and had two adorable toddlers, so we just didn’t have the courage to complain. It would have been much easier, if she was impolite.
Please, don’t be like us: We really don’t want to know, how many people were continuing their way silently and in disgust. If the bedclothes are dirty, tell them to change them. If the bath room is dirty, tell them you want it to be cleaned. We just paid too much not to expect hygiene standards.
By the way: She definitely knew it. She put in new toilet paper everyday and she’s seen everything. She just didn’t care.
It felt really horrible for us as we were otherwise only making good experiences in the Balkan region. All hotels and guesthouses were super clean!
Rating hotels
Take the chance and rate your hotels. It helps others and applies peaceful pleasure at the owners. On the other side, a good rating will make everybody happy. At least regarding our experiences. We really regretted saying nothing. This won’t happen twice.
Hotels with a rating less than ‘Very good’ won’t be taken in consideration any more. On principle.
Did you make similar experiences? How did you react?