What's the worst thing a hotel has got wrong for you?

[Serendipetty]

I've been quite lucky I think.

I once had booked a late check-out and the staff knocker and woke me up. I was so annoyed as I don't sleep well anyway and had been to a festival that didn't end until about 02:00 the previous night hence paying for the late check-out in the first place!

Another time went away with a new ish partner and the loo didn't flush. Rather embarrassing. It did after several attempts but not great.

I was staying in a hotel in Lytham St annes with my dh and 2 ds. Dh dropped the boys off at Blackpool Pleasure Beach while I waited alone in the room. Suddenly, the locked door was opened and 2 men entered the room. They obviously expected the room to be empty and when I asked them who they were, they said they worked for the hotel and the room occupant had reported a faulty phone and they'd come to fix it. I told them the phone was fine (we hadn't reported it) and asked them to leave the room. They both proceeded to come further into the room, now blocking the door. I had to ask them again to leave but one of them insisted he needed to look at the phone, the other one then said "she's getting scared now, we'd better just go". The minute they left I grabbed my handbag and ran out of the room to Reception. I was in a right state when they checked and agreed no fault had been reported on the phone and that no maintenance staff had been sent to the room. It was only when I said I was reporting it to the police that they got hold of the maintenance manager who said the men were genuine and they'd just made a mistake. The staff on reception looked at me like I was making a fuss about nothing but I'd felt really vulnerable and scared.

We have a DC (adult) with learning difficulties. We try and get interconnecting rooms or a toom for 3.
Got to Brighton Hotel, having discussed on phone snd followed up by email. Yes our rooms 'sort of connected' They were above each

Years ago woke to find two guy in our room. Apologised as they were going to the girls next door!
They had climbed up and came in the balcony.
We were kept away everyday and night eith the groaning and headboard banging!
Different blokes each time.
It was my first holiday away with my boyfriend. We were very shy and embarrassed. Didn't fit into our romantic idea.

Have had a rat in my room in India. Bats in Nethetlands. Found somebody knickers in bed in a 5 star hotel in London.

Booking a specific double-bedded room at YHA with a new partner and getting bunk beds instead

Not awful really, but at the time I was really angry - I booked a hotel for me and baby DD; they said they could provide a cot so I asked for one in the comments. Got there, no cot, so I went to ask. The teenage girl on reception said, completely uncomprehendingly 'but the baby will sleep with you'. I explained no, I needed a cot; we didn't co-sleep. She went and got her mum who was the owner and her mum said 'but babies sleep with their mums in the same bed,' as if I were being deeply stupid by not getting this. I pointed out they said they could provide cots and I'd asked for one and she looked totally mystified and just kept repeating 'but she will sleep with you'.

I wouldn't be fussed about it now, but at the time my head was full of all the stuff about not co-sleeping with a baby unless you're very sure you're ok to do it (and I wasn't!), and it made me really cross!

Like many on this thread I was given an electronic key card and opened my room to find a couple in there. IN BED. I went down to reception and reception told me this was impossible. Said I must have gone to the wrong room. I said that didnt make sense as my key card shouldn’t open anyone else’s door. I had a full stand off with the manager who was insistent it was my mistake!

In reverse order:

Being given the key, as per a PP, to an occupied room
Getting into bed on the first night and discovering the sheets were wet
Arriving with my then-wife on our honeymoon to find they'd assumed we were sisters and given us a twin despite booking a king!

Checked into a Premier Inn once, for a gig. Walked into the room, and it absolutely stunk of stale pee. It smelt like previous occupants had used it as a urinal.

Needless to say, we marched straight down to reception, and informed them that we wouldn’t be staying in that room, and they needed to provide us with another one. They didn’t argue at all, and didn’t even bother to go and have a look, which makes me wonder if they already knew about the stench in that particular room.

I saw an episode of four in the bed where they had, I assume jokingly put chamberpots in every room and one of the guests had a wee in it.

Not making up the sofa bed for a 2 adults 2 children booking, arrived late and got to the room then had to go back and wait in reception while they did it, went back to the room and the guy who has made the beds up had extremely strong BO so then had to air the room out to get rid of the smell 🤢

At 3am a drunk man let himself into my room with a key. Turned out they’d given me his room by mistake- he’d checked in earlier than me. I’d arrived late so didn’t look around much- he’d done the same so both of our suitcases were on opposite sides of the wardrobe, unpacked.

Also had a 5-star hotel make me a cocktail with salt instead of sugar. Brought it back up to the bar and the barman actually argued with me! I insisted he tasted it- one sip and he spat it out. Got a fresh drink but no apology or embarrassment for basically accusing me of lying.

Nothing major but stayed in a hotel for two nights for a friends wedding.
The first morning, we were enjoying a nice lie in and someone knocked on the door at 8.15am and woke us up, saying they’d come to fix the internet/WiFi. We hadn’t reported any issues, it was fine.
Then the second morning, the day after the wedding, we were sleeping off a hangover and housekeeping knocked on at 9am as they thought we’d already checked out. Checkout wasn’t until 11am. So both mornings we were woken early by staff who had got things wrong.
I emailed to complain and got sent a £50 voucher to spend in their restaurant , it’s a chain hotel with a branch in my city, so at least we got a free lunch out if it a few weeks later!

Not having shower that I can use despite careful checking. Various levels of danger in terms of using them (cerebral palsy).

DH on a work trip. Booked two night. Came back after a full day in the foreign office to discover they had mixed him up with another guest with a similar name and had checked him out, the other guy was given the second night (despite not being there). The cleaning staff had been to the room and chucked all his stuff out including a laptop and (long story) our cats ashes.

The staff has to dive into the bins to find everything again. They apologised the following morning with a free chocolate chip cookie...he's allergic to cocoa.

We were in Australia and very jet lagged, it was about 3/4pm and a cleaner let herself in to clean! My husband was naked on top of the sheets as it was so hot, we were both asleep and it woke us up! Tbh I think the cleaner got a bigger shock seeing my husbands naked bum!

I was a bit annoyed though as we specify didn’t put the “please clean our room” sign on the door handle.

Arrived at a spa hotel outside of Liverpool planning to treat myself, booked and paid for early check in, had tickets to a show, was going to get an early room service dinner, then have a swim and massage treatment the following day, which I’d already paid for. Arrived after a hellish journey through random sudden sleet and snow (middle of winter) and standstill motorway etc. Checked in, but was told no room service available due to a big event that night, no apology from the surly receptionist. Ok fine, I thought, no point fussing, I’ll go into the town and get a pre-theatre dinner somewhere. I found my room which was freezing, and put the heater on waiting for the room to heat up. It didn’t. Rang reception. ‘Oh yeah heating isn’t working in the hotel, it’s not been on since yesterday. Oh and the pool is shut. And there’s no hot water. We’ve got maintenance on the way.’ So you’ve let me drive all the way here without calling to cancel or at least let me know that the main basics of a hotel aren’t functioning? You’ve let me check in without mentioning this at all? I asked if it was likely to be fixed soon, as I could see my breath in the room and was shivering even with my hat and coat still on. ‘The maintenance team probably won’t be here till Monday’. It was Saturday afternoon. I said I was coming back down to return my key and for a refund. They agreed to refund the room, but I had a battle getting the pre paid massage refunded as it was ‘less than 24 hours cancellation’. I did get it back, but again no apology, and all the staff just standing around seemed to think I was the one making a mountain out of a molehill. I was so pissed off I just drove back home and missed the show.

Worst things? I suppose if we were the kind of people to get worked up about things, we could've gotten worked up about these..as it was, we laughed and got on with it:
Checked into a hotel in Armenia, we had checked it out online and had brought our swimmers in anticipation of a senior in the hotel pool., but knowing how these things go we asked at reception when we checked in... Is there a gym, yes said the receptionist proudly but it's being renovated at the moment so you won't be able to use it. No problem we said, but you do have a pool?? Oh yes said the receptionist, but we don't fill it until may (we were there in April). We just went back to our rooms and had a good 😂

Even better was our wedding hotel... As we had the reception there, and a few guests had chosen to stay the night, we had a block of rooms booked on the same floor. Made our way to bed after a wonderful day and night of dancing, only to find we had been given twin beds. We were so exhausted, we just laughed, pushed then together and made do. At breakfast the next morning, we recounted the story to our guests and came to find out that my teenage brother had been given the only double bed on the floor! That one certainly made us laugh!

A couple of Thomson holidays!

One was to a 5* hotel in Kenya where Thomson had used lovely pictures of the interiors of newly refurbished rooms in their brochure, but in reality Thomson guests were in the older, not refurbished block, with threadbare carpets and towels, constant water supply problems so it was a lottery whether we could flush the loo and most days we couldn't shower. The Kuoni guests were in the newly refurbished block and they had plenty of water, plush towels, etc! We'd barricade ourselves into the toilets by the pool so we could shower every day! Took them to court for that and got a couple of K in compensation!

Second, also Thomson, was in The Gambia. Hotel was three wings and we were in the "newly refurbished" wing. What a joke! There was literally a coating of dust everywhere, on the surfaces, beds, etc. There was loose sockets, switches on the walls that hadn't been screwed in. When we opened the balcony door, it fell out as it hadn't been hung properly. The people in the next room slammed their door and the whole door frame fell out! The carpets on the corridor and stairway were threadbare and a major trip hazard. The corridors were full of dust as the workers were refurbishing another wing and the dust blew down the corridors to ours! Had to take Thomson to court for compensation for that one too - another could of thousand!!

Twice bitten. Never used Thomson again in all the years since, nor the firm who bought them, Tui!

Travel lodge in London had my wedding rings and a necklace stolen. Staff didn’t care heartbreaking

The Capital in Knightsbridge. Room was next to the lift motor. Motor started, lift raised or lowered and the brakes applied when it stopped. Brakes off as the lift resumed. WIRRRRH/CLUNK/PSSSSH (Doors opening and closing. Rinse and repeat seemingly all night. I didn't get refunded.

In Paris, housekeeper had left the door of our room open (pushed to but with the lock keeping it open) so anyone could have walked in all day!

when I complained at reception, they just smirked and thought it was funny

Definitely nowhere near my 90s but this was in West Wales in the early 1980s. I guess they were intended to give off an old fashioned/vintage feel to the room. Not so sure they were supposed to be put to use!

Viewing houses on two consecutive days, so we booked a hotel through booking.com or similar. Husband started feeling ill and running a temperature toward the end of the first day, so we were looking forward to being able to rest somewhere comfortable. We turned up, said we’d booked a room and they looked at us blankly- we don’t remember speaking to you and it’s not on the list. I said we’d booked it online through xyz site.

They said ‘oh, we haven’t had a booking through there in ages so we don’t check, unfortunately we have no rooms free’ as if we should have somehow known this. I asked why they hadn’t removed the listing if they’re not actually checking to see if they have any reservations and they looked at me as though I was barking. In the end, they offered us a room that they only normally let out to tradespeople (didn’t know this was a thing) and it was absolutely filthy, stank and black mould all up the walls. We took it as husband was the only driver at the time and was too ill to drive home, but the smell was enough to make you gag and the sheets were slightly moist with damp.

Turned up to a sign in the door saying reception closed for the day as well as cocktail bar and restaurant no way to check in. Luckily has booked online so they tried contacting manager and we decided we wanted to just go home. Got refund and received text from manager about 4pm asking if we were still coming. Well no as there was no one there. He apologised and said he had sent text that morning nope never received

Someone stole my wedding shoes from our suite. They were the only shoes I had with me so I had to walk into town in the hotel slippers to buy some trainers. Never got my shoes back.

Someone stole my wedding shoes from our suite. They were the only shoes I had with me so I had to walk into town in the hotel slippers to buy some trainers. Never got my shoes back.