I wish these people would just never go on holiday!!

[Brightlightmoon]

This is just a rant. I'm so sick of people!

I work in tourism (holiday rentals) and I'm sick of (unfortunately, mainly Brits) threatening legal action for absolutely EVERYTHING!

They book a property without aircon, it doesn't say anywhere on the listing that there's aircon nor have they mentioned any desire for aircon. They arrive, notice there's no air con and go fucking ape shit, threatening us in emails and text messages and phone calls, demanding all of their money back immediately or they're going to drag us through the courts. Same situation for anything else you can imagine - a washing machine breaks during their holiday (it happens, they don't break down on a schedule!), so they deem the property to be unfit for rental and not in line with the advertisement. We try and arrange for it to be fixed or for a new one to be fitted as soon as possible, but if we can't have it all done and dusted within half a day of their complaint, in come the threats and demands for full repayment.

I love my job, I love it so much, but fucking hell this type of shit gets to me.

Sorry but these owners seem to want all the upside (£££££) and none of the down 🙄. If I’m paying a fortune and someone simpers that I should have a glass of wine in the garden I wouldn’t be happy.

Because France is a whole other kettle of fish. I have handymen who I call for any issue because I trust them, they're reliable and they do fantastic work, so that means they're busy. Yes, I could find someone to be on call for us for the entire summer, but in order for them to commit to that, it means they don't have any other work - why block off a summer for us when they could rake it in doing a thousand jobs for other people. I only work with people I trust and those people are busy for a very good reason, because they're fantastic.

Yeah a lot of owners do, which is what makes my life so difficult. I can't do anything without the owners permission, but they (some) can't be arsed because they're far away and don't care. So that leaves renters displeased and me in the middle, I can't foot the bill and the owners will refuse to pay. The best I can do sometimes is bring over a bottle a wine.

We were staying somewhere where we couldn't lock the front door to our apartment. That was annoying. Luckily we could lock the front door of the block and there was only us and the owners in there at the time. A locking door is important

Your owners are to blame. They should hire someone and pay them to be on call for their guests. They charge enough. They just don’t want to dent their profit.

"come September, all of the holiday makers have gone home and we all breathe a sigh of relief"

Don't these holiday makers effectively pay your salary and generate income for the area? Am I missing something or did you not really mean that?

I am in a rental and have been jolly nice. There is minor flooding doesn’t bother us but would worry me if it were my house so I told the owner and let in the plumber. There was an issue on the road so I moved her moped so it wouldn’t get towed. The house is rather ramshackle but in such a fab location we are loving it other guests have moaned but we haven’t. I should get a good guest award!

I work with some great people and some not so great ones, all of whom contribute to my salary.

As much as I love some of them, I’m still happy when I close up on Saturday night and don’t have to see their faces for a couple of days.

Have you really never used a bit of irony when talking about the people who pay your salary?

@GrandSlamFinalee - I have indeed!
It just seems all a bit much for the OP, but maybe they're venting.
It increasingly seems like an area to avoid unless you're very laid back or a plumber 😉

I agree. On our recent holiday there weren't many British people there, but the ones I came across were giving the resort staff agro about ridiculous trivial things. My dd got extra time on one of the activities she did because I was "smiley" . I think he was just relived to talk to a Brit that wasn't complaining!!

I'm normally quite chilled and can put up with a lot but I do recall the nightmare place in the Charente where the British owners decided they no longer gave a shit. We'd booked for 3 weeks and one of the reviews mentioned issues with the WIFI. As it was needed for work, I had a conversation with the owner who said that the WIFI was fine and the complainer was one of "those" people. I believed him. When we arrived and I asked about the WIFI, the guy pulled a router out of a Quality Street tin in a shed and said " put it back when you finished with it". We plugged it in and it wouldn't work at all. I got shrugs in response, that it was normally "fine". We managed to get a signal by sitting right outside their house, until there was a massive storm and even that stopped working. More shrugs. The following week a new family arrived where the MAN was in IT (I worked in IT) who complained vociferously until something was done and a new router was put in place. I actually wanted to murder Mr Shrug, who just spent his entire time trying to persuade us to buy scuba lessons in the pool.

Just venting, it does get a bit much at some point in the summer. You tend to hit a wall when you get one too many unreasonable people. You rant a bit, and then get back on your horse :) One of my favourite parts of the job is meeting the guests, but after 4 months of masses of work with barely a day off, the sigh of relief is needed 😂 (and you can finally get a spot on the beach that isn't 1km away from the water)

@Brightlightmoon your explanation makes me wonder more and more what is the point of you? I can find a laundrette and lots of other things by myself. But if you can't organise a swift solution to a genuine problem or partial reimbursement when the goods are not as advertised what are you being paid for?

It's not an excuse to blame the villa owners. If they are cheap bastards who don't pay to keep their properties to a decent standard then tell them you won't represent them any more. Or add another tick box to your website where it tells people about the facilities saying: Do you object to staying in a place where the owners and their agent take your money and ignore you Y/N?

If I phoned you on my holiday it wouldn't be to have a go at you as you said. it wouldn't even be to have a chat, charming though I imagine you can be. It would be to report a problem with my holiday that I wanted you to deal with. That's why you give paying customers your number, isn't it?

I would phone at a reasonable time and if 8am was too early for you i would understand if you switched your phone to voicemail and left a message to call between 10am and 5pm. Those hours are reasonable, aren't they? You are working and I am the one on holiday after all.

I would expect you to triage problems so there not being the full complement of saucepans listed on the itinerary would take a back seat to someone whose toilet had exploded. But I would expect you to get round to me because that is your job.

I wouldn't be surprised if you stuck your fingers up and did a rude dance while soothing me on the phone if I had a trivial complaint. I wouldn't phone you with a trivial complaint btw because it is my ambition to have better things to do on holiday but I expect some people do. It's the job, isn't it? I would not expect you to go above and beyond as you said or give me a bottle of wine if I was a good little girl. I would simply expect you to do the job you were being paid to do.

I'm not interested in hearing about the working practices of local tradesmen, the vagaries of washing machine deliveries or how unreasonable your clients might be. You chose to work with them. For two weeks every summer I choose to pay to have a nice holiday. I don't think this is too much to ask but it seems you think it is.

@limitedperiodonly You can find those things yourself, plenty of other people can't. I would explain to you exactly what the "point of me" is but sadly I don't think you actually care, which is by the by as I didn't start this thread to say exactly what the point of me is, but to have a vent during the busiest season of the year for me. Based on your post, I'm thinking more and more that you're the type of client who brings me to my wit's end and I've unfortunately had to deal with someone like that all day today, so don't particularly want to in my free time.

I'd say I hope you give rural France a chance but this area is small and chances are you'd end up being one of my clients, so I'd rather not 😂

Oooh wifi was a big one here for a while! Loads of places barely had any connection up to a few years ago, whereas the UK had already had fab connection for donkeys. What most owners (who live here) considered to be great wifi was actually terrible in comparison to what British clients were used to. I used to go over and measure the internet speed for clients before they booked so they didn't get a nasty surprise 😂Loads better now and we always tell people if a property has a poor internet connection before they book, but overall it's still slower than most of the UK I think. Only some areas have fibre over here. Slow progress, but progress!

The area you work in sounds lovely @Brightlightmoon fancy messaging me details ?, a gecko would be a highlight for me

@Brightlightmoon the water in the pool is way too cold, our child could get hyperthermia" (water is 26 degrees yeah that's far too cold!

@Brightlightmoon I'm a delight. As long as you tell me I might not get what I paid for and can whistle for any kind of refund I won't trouble you with a booking.

Do you tell people that?

@MissAmbrosia don't mention the WiFi ! my children still talk about the week they couldn't access the interent because the owners of the cottage we rented, were wholesome sorts who probably thought the breathtaking scenery and myriad of opportunities to get outdoors and do stuff, more than made up for it. That and I am a terrible Mother for not checking before booking, the longest hour of my life was spent looking for that non existent router

Christ no wifi no booking with teens. No washing machine or dishwasher we can live with but no wifi eek.

This is why I prefer house swap to self catering. Firstly it’s free (bar having to get my own house up to standard no such thing as a free lunch) but secondary because everything is decent because it’s someone’s actual home rather than a shonky second home half arsed money making venture which pretty much all self catering places are.

@BirmaBrite I'm not sure I know how to, but will give it a go 😄

LilacPoppy It's usually optimum temperature, certainly when it's very hot outside. My pool went up to 30 degrees a couple of weeks ago and it was awful, not refreshing in the slightest! 27 degrees and I'm happy.

everything is decent because it’s someone’s actual home rather than a shonky second home half arsed money making venture which pretty much all self catering places are.
MrsTSwift I agree with you there, our villas that have the best reviews and are booked year after year are the ones where the owners actually live in it during the rest of the year. It makes such a difference. Thankfully the majority of owners who don't live in it have had it for many years and have spent a long time there and the ones who haven't are very open to advice on how to make it better. There are just a few shoddy owners that we're weeding out!

There is a lot of content on the internet about how to save money and secure a partial or full refund. Part of that ploy is to make as much noise and fuss as possible in an attempt to prompt the vendor to offer something just to defuse the situation or as an offer of goodwill. But this can border on bullying and intimidation, especially if you refuse their kind offer of a free holiday.

I came across this when I used to rent out a property I inherited from my grandparents on the Dorset coast. In the end, the whole holiday thing just wasn't worth the shit and hassle. At the moment I have a young mother, her mother and two kids from Ukraine living in there, and working part-time in one of the local hotels. They keep the place immaculately clean and are super friendly. My contribution to world peace.

I feel your pain OP.

I spent 10 years working in tourism around the Med and by the end of August most of the staff were exhausted and hanging on to their sanity by the skin of their teeth. September the first was like Christmas for us!

@Brightlightmoon maybe for you as an adult but for children 30/32 is the optimum temperature.