We booked a 2 bed apartment, for ourselves our 6 month old baby and 5 year old daughter. We hired a car and arrived at the airport at 5 am and had to wake up the night porter to check in. We checked into a ground floor room where a cat came running out and to our shock, cat mess on the bed. Back to reception, again woke up the night porter and checked into a room above.
The following evening after returning from a meal we found our daughters bed covered in ants and our babies travel cot. We rang reception and they sent a manager to the room. He shook the travel cot outside the apartment and asked 'ok' to which we pointed out the bed (concrete base with wooden slats) - he said 'i have no more rooms, i ring ***** (rep) and you must move hotel i have no more rooms.
Rep arrives 10 mins later and refuses to move us. (At this point i was breastfeeding my baby, my daughter was in our bed and my partner sat in the only chair in the apartment). According to her she said that First Choice were too big and she could not do anything about it. We would have to pay to move hotel (the hotel is 4* Exclusive to first choice, not independent). I asked her to call her Manager and see what else she would be permitted to do, as the children had nowhere to sleep (apartment did not have a lounge area - couch/settee etc). She refused became irate and then shouted, 'have a bloody fantastic holiday, waved her hands in the air saying 'whatever - bothered' and left us stranded. I called the UK helpline to log an official complaint about the rep and also the situation with the room. The agent i spoke to apologised 'logged' the complaint and said first and foremost they would address a hotel change, but i would have to pay a £50 admin fee (i was not impressed but thought i could note this as a quibble and sort it on our return). A return phone call was promised - but never came. I ended up ringing them back and they then refused to 'help' saying i had to pay 150 euros to move and that the rep had called saying i was aggressive and out of control and there were not ants in the apartment.
Long and short is - in the morning after several unreturned calls they were telling us we would have to pay in excess of 900 euros to move hotels. We went out for breakfast as had been promised another call before 10am which never came - the children where hungry and needed to eat. Upon our return the room phone rang and it was a receptionist telling us - you must leave hotel now, you cause us trouble, leave now leave now, a manager on way to room! I was flabbergasted. I asked her what we had done wrong to which she replied 'i not know - you just have LEAVE NOW and hung up.
Our phone was blocked so we could not phone out and our mobile did not have signal. We were stranded
My partner went out to phone them (the UK Helpline) and they refused to speak to us as said Thomson's were calling us with an 'offer of accommodation'. I started packing as was scared what the manager and receptionist were about to do! They kept marching across the car park shouting to our apartment to get out.
We loaded the hire car and as i was coming back from the apartment a receptionist and a manager chased after me trying to grab keys from my hands. I threw the key back to them and the manager chased us through the village on a scooter swearing and shouting at us! We got to a phone box and rang our Travel Agents back at home, they were shocked and said they were ringing the hotel. We phoned back after finding somewhere else to stay at our own cost )750 euros. The travel agent actually knew myself as her sister is an employee of mine, she apologised profusely and passed us to her manager who said not to worry and to send our letter of complaint to them on our return.
On our return we sent out letter to the agents office and they forwarded it, after 28 days we had no reply. She then chased them on our behalf. We were told it hadn't even been looked at yet. Two weeks later we phoned the agents again, as we still had no reply. the agents chased them and called us back to say it had been sent to another office with a cheque for signing.
We received a letter the following week, saying that the standards we received were not indicative of their usual service with a £50 holiday voucher
So i phoned them asking how on earth they thought our complaint only deserved a £50 voucher, to which the snotty guy on the phone informed me 'that as you were rude abusive and aggressive to resort staff, reps and the manager' and looking at the detailed report of a sensitive nature YOU do not deserve a refund and he then laughed
Apparently according to resort staff i went to the reception to complain - refused to let anyone come to the room and see, made a receptionist cry, threatened a manager. They offered us room changes that night, room changes the following day (as changeover day) and none of it was good enough for me!!!!!!!i sent another letter of complaint in December and have not had a reply at all.
We have requested all the information under the Data Protection act and received some, but alot was missing. (We could see through pieces of paper that thinks such as Statement of Witness Reports filled in by the Rep were missing etc) They sent us this when asked for, BUT these were nothing to do with us - they were with regard to someone else.
Today we received the one belonging to us - however it appears to be a forgery, as the one we can see through another piece of paper has different writing and writing in areas there is no writing in out 'copy'.
Basically they have conjured up a story that i was a mad woman threatening and raging in reception, when this did not happen at all i purely phoned reception who sent a manager, who called a rep who swore at us and lost her temper. We were thrown out the next morning, they refused to help and have said in their 'logs' that we ran away and hid :think. They had their number plate of our hire vehicle and we were driving around in the village for two weeks, we told the guy in the village who we rent our vehicle from where we were now staying, and the owner of the apartment we stayed in rang the hotel manager to ask if we could go back and get my sons teddy, (to which they refused) - hardy in hiding were we?
We have this morning rang a solicitor and will now be taking it from here.
Please let us know how you get on with your solicitor.
, silly me!
