What little things annoy you in a holiday home?

[Callistone]

We're in a lovely holiday home at the moment, really nice decor, plenty of crockery and cutlery, a food cupboard of cool bags and beach rugs to help yourself too, definitely one to visit again.

However they have provided three dishwasher tablets and no spare bin bags. Hardly the end of the world but for the price of the rental I always get mildly irritated when they are so stingy with something inexpensive like dishwasher tablets. If it was me I'd just have them in stock like washing up liquid.

Anything irritate you?

Blunt knives, cheap mattresses, thin curtains.

No pizza tray! Pizza is a pretty standard food to eat on holiday (and, let's face it, all the time) but so often there is no pizza tray. I take my own now, as well as my giant Sports Direct mug as no other mugs compare.

I agree with all of the above but no one has mentioned the absence of a bin in the loo. This is especially tricky on a shared holiday. I really don't want to have to take my used, wrapped san pro, ear buds or hair balls out to the kitchen (or all the way downstairs in some cases) at any time, but especially not in front of people who are not my immediate family!

Also on the subject of holiday house loos. Please just install an old fashioned bog, not a fancy one which has just a tiny amount of water at the back of the bowl where the drain is. Waste then accumulates on the 'shelf' of the bowl and no amount of flushing can get rid of the mess. I banned the family from pooing in the upstairs loo at one cottage because it needed to be scraped down and cleaned every time.

brie assuming we're talking about ready made pizza surely no-one makes pizza from scratch on holiday even on Mumsnet, I just put the pizza straight on the oven shelf, like it says in the instructions. That's whether home or away. No pizza tray required.

I know what I don't want as they just fill up a cupboard and get in the way.....egg cups, a butter dish, a toast rack.

No hooks esp. on bathroom doors
No foil

The no cleaning equipment/washing up liquid etc is especially annoying if you have to buy a whole full size amount of it for a few days and youre abroad so cant bring it back on the plane. Things like that should be part of it, as surely they want you to clean THEIR things. I mean, toiletries is one thing, as its no bother for them if you dont wash your hair, but to wash the dishes and surfaces is pretty important

Yes to blunt knives. We're going away on Friday and I'm making a list of things to
take with us off the back of this thread.

Self catering places that don’t provide any oil for cooking. I’ve bought and left so much oil,washing up liquid and salt/pepper over the year. Very frustrating

Holiday cottage owner here too. Think I'm also 99% fine according to this thread, with the exception of pint glasses. I don't have any (just hi-balls, tumblers, wine glasses, champagne glasses). Will buy pint glasses!

As an air bnb host thank you for this thread. Getting on to read in full latet

I’m surprised by the number of people complaining about a lack of toilet paper and dishwasher tablets.
I always stay in a self catering cottage/apartment and find that there is normally a couple of toilet rolls and 2/3 dishwasher tablets.
I have no problem purchasing more myself as that is all part of self catering.
In a hotel then I would expect all toilet paper to be provided but in self catering accommodation then no.

If accommodation providers bought oil, many people wouldn't use it unless it was presented to them new and sealed, so a lot would get wasted.

We usually buy a small pack of butter and use that for frying as well as spreading and generally get through just about all of it in a week, or if in Spain DP likes a certain type of streaky bacon so once a few rashers of that's been fried we've enough frying fat for any other frying needs.

Or we may buy a very small bottle of oil that costs around a euro/pound and leave it in the accomodation - the cost is negligible within the cost of the holiday.

Oil lasts 3 months to a year depending on quality the countries I was in don't make butter or mini bottles of oil it’s really all or nothing. One place came with nothing I think it was to encourage us to pay for the cook.

Throws on sofas ( not decoratively) the type that cover the whole thing because the sofa underneath is awful, mismatched and a relic.

I don't book if the photo shows such a thing.

Rubbish beds. No one sleeps in a double anymore so please don't put them in holiday lets.

Rubbish curtains

Last one we stayed in it was impossible to close the kid's bedroom door without moving all the furniture around. The bed was in the way.

I never cook in the kitchens. Can't be arsed to try with substandard equipment. I'll go camping for that pleasure.

Lots of people still sleep in doubles, I find anything bigger really odd StateofIndependance.

Oh, while we're on matttresses, I hate hate hate rock hard beds.

I've had a few of those and just cannot sleep. The property owners probably think they'll last longer or something, but I really think that if you're renting out holiday accommodation, you should be providing a decent mattress that you'd be willing to sleep in yourself.

They don't have to be expensive, and the cost per night will be pennies.

Not enough loo roll for the week, no kitchen roll and no dishwasher tablets piss me off.

No one sleeps in a double anymore? Pretty much everyone I know does.

Any 'bed decoration' crap like pillows and that strip of decorative material. I'm no clean freak, but I know that it's not been washed and it's been touched by Other People.
My pet hate too, little scatter cushions which are unlikely to have been washed resting on the clean pillowcases.
Also the lack of cupboard space for food.

Most of the places I've stayed in have been really good. But there was one with no socket near a mirror anywhere in the house for hair drying, no chair in the bedroom, the tiniest fridge, not even a normal under the counter size, even though there had clearly been a space left for a proper fridge freezer, and the kettle really far from the sink and no other socket nearer.
The bathroom layout was awful too, in a fairly large bathroom where there should have been plenty of room, but there wasn't much they could do about that without replacing the whole thing.

The only other disappointing one had a terrible old lumpy mattress and the only cleaning material was an inch of washing-up liquid.

When they say sleeps 6-10 but only have enough seating/crockery/dining chairs for 6.

Things like a nespresso machine that's just listed as a coffee machine so you can't actually use it. I'd buy the pods as an extra if it was an option.

Lack of cleaning products and bin bags.

Tiny towels.

Random pointless kitchen equipment particularly annoying if they don't have useful equipment. Our last rental had a beautiful antique coffee set and two broken blenders but the frying pan had no handle.

Owners who won't leave you alone. We rented an amazing villa almost perfect but the owners were a PITA. Far too present and told off for wanting to use the air conditioning as 'it wasn't hot enough' maybe not for them living in Greece for 20 years but for us from soggy Wales it was bloody boiling on the first night.

The worst place we’ve stayed the bed was so uncomfortable I didn’t sleep the whole time! The mattress may as well have been made of concrete, and the pillows were wafer thin.
Other than that, poorly stocked kitchens are annoying.

"Lots of people still sleep in doubles, I find anything bigger really odd StateofIndependance."

It isn't odd. I like my space when I want to sleep. I can't sleep all cuddled up to someone. We are both tall, and a double bed isn't long enough for us.

Hotels these days tend to do king or superking instead of double beds, even places like Premier Inn. You might find a double bed in a cheap B and B in Blackpool though.

Soft mattresses.

The one where they didn't provide sheets and towels, so we either had to pay something extortionate for them to be provided locally or bring out own down. Which meant that our first task on arrival was making the beds up.

And, not exactly a gripe, but I like a large mug for my tea and most places supply rather small ones.