Premier Inn - do we HAVE to get two rooms?

[poggleton]

I’m thinking the answer is sadly yes, but want to make sure I’m not missing something.

Me, DH and DCs 15 and 17.

The DCs are too old for is all to be allowed to stay in one family room, aren’t they?

We did this until Ds1 was almost 19 because in all honesty year 11s aged 15 can look exactly the same as kids going off to uni. We used airport PIs and there is no way I am paying for 2 rooms.

Lots of PI have kiosk check ins, they don't take the ages of the room's occupants just book into one family room and prepare to lie about their ages. How would they check the age of a child anyway? They don't usually carry their passports.

Honestly, we just prepped ours to say that they were both 15 until the youngest got to 16 or so and we thought we couldn’t keep it up any more. No one’s checking IDs. By the end we were keeping the eldest away from check-in! We’d only do it if it were a quick one night stay rather than a longer break.

We managed to squeeze ours in beyond the age limit (just made sure they were out of the way during check-in), but to be honest, by the time they were big teens we realised there just wasn't room!

Beds too small, no floor space for all the cases, queues outside the bathroom door, night-time snoring.....absolutely nobody was enjoying the situation, so regrettably we concluded it was time to start shelling out for two rooms.

I have 2 teens we use premier inn maybe once a year and usually do book 2 rooms. I share with DD, DH shares with DS.

However it is a bit of a sticking point when you need an over 18 in a room....but "children" have to be under 15....If we had 2 girls i think it would be more of a problem.

Premier inn themselves seem to be on a massive cost cutting drive by having almost no staff available for customers, so im not sure i blame others for trying to save money....

It’s over £150 more for the location I want. We don’t care about sharing. We a big campers and are used to being bunked up together.

Reading the thread I think the tiny beds will be a sticking point as no one is small!

Ive found a Leonardo hotel that has a room with two doubles and allows two adults and two older teens so will likely go with that instead.

How are ww shafting them? My DCs will not use up any extra resources than they would have done if they were 13 and 15. We won’t have breakfast there.

Reading the thread I think the tiny beds will be a sticking point as no one is small!

That’s a pity. I’m bang in 5’ and one of my (adult) kids is shorter than me. The others are all over 6’. This made it easy when we travelled as a family when they were younger as there were two of us who could always fit on small pull outs, plus I could get a good nights sleep on a potato sack over a bunch of rocks so even easier with uncomfy pull outs! Saved us a lot of $$ over the years.

I often book a PI family room when I go away with my two sisters. We book for two adults and a 15 year old and draw straws for the camp bed.

The two adults check in and the 15 year old (ie my 28 year old youngest sister) joins us after 5 minutes 😂

This. You can say 1 adult is sharing with one child. But don't be cheapskate. Similar to people taking food off breakfast buffets (usually bread rolls) to make something later. Give the children their own room.

We stayed in a Premier Inn family room with my 16 and 18yo for 2 nights this summer. Checked in at a screen, no one commented or asked age at any point. It was fine!

We’re a family who camp, stay in private rooms in YHA’s, share a big room when we visit relatives. It’s absolutely fine for one night.
Two rooms instead of one means two times the price. Then the Premier Inn isn’t so good value anymore. In fact it makes it quite pricey! Never mind the fact that if we are going to follow the rules to the letter, we’d need to have one adult and one child in each room so the teens wouldnt get their own room anyway.

We’ve stayed in PIs since the DCs were toddlers.
Stayed in a family room this summer and it was a good size and I think it’s the last time we’ll be able to as the put up bed wasn’t great for DS12 and he’s not huge. Me and DD15 share and then DH has the single. I think we’ll have to have two rooms next time or look for an air bnb.

Yes! The rooms are way too small for 4 adult sized people. The extra bed things they use are not suitable for teen boys.

When go to premier inn with ds 12 and 15 we book 2 rooms and then phone up and request for them to be interconnected rooms.

2 rooms not because it's "wrong" to be in one, but because a family room will most likely be a double, a single, then a pull out which fits under the single and therefore is significantly shorter than a normal bed!

Yes but as it has been pointed out a 17 year old wouldn't be able to book a room by themselves yet under this policy Premier Inn say they need a separate room.
The cut off should be 18 for family room if a family is happy to share.

Our kids are 18 and 20 and I expect to share a premier inn room with them for many more years:)

My 18 year old twins are still 15 for premier inn purposes. No problem with space. We don’t take the mick and have the free breakfast though.

I have two dc aged 19 and 17 and we still book a family room. I now book as two adults and 2 teenagers to ensure we get 3 beds and when ds1 was younger I just lied about ages. Never had an issue and feel no guilt as they aren't using more resources by going in one room rather than 2, and since 15 -17 year olds aren't working adults I see no reason why as a family with one (working) adult I have to pay double. Different if it's a resort with lots of resources being used, but PI is not that.

I certainly don't try and get the free breakfast though- they have been checking dc's ages since they were around 14 whereas they barely look at us when we check in. It makes sense they are careful about the breakfasts as that would be CF territory and would cost them.

We only go 2/3 times per year for one night at a time and boys have never moaned about the beds but if they did I'd be happy in the small one. Also, rooms vary in size. Some are quite big but all fine for one night.

Lol. Premier inn don't even bother to check you in anymore, it's a self service machine. You'll be fine.

If they wanted people to stick to the rules so badly then maybe they should give a crap about customer service.

This exactly. DD is 18 (but looks a lot younger). We don't scam them for a free breakfast. It makes no odds to them if the small bed is made up for an eight year old or an eighteen year old. Same amount of work and washing.

I'm 5'10 and found sleeping on the smaller pull out bed in the Premier Inn perfectly long enough and comfortable. It's slightly narrower than normal, but most definitely not a "child size" bed.

And like the OP we are a camping family, so am laughing at pp saying a Premier Inn family room "not big enough for 4 adults". When you all comfortably fit in a tent, a room like that seems palatial!

It will be absolutely fine OP. We only ever stay in Premier Inn and find them to be consistently good.

Another who books a family room with an older teen. We don’t have the breakfast and it’s usually only for a night or so. I think it’s ridiculous that they have the age limit at 15, but don’t let 16/17 year olds have their own room. And I normally play by the rules in life.

We use Holiday Inn Express instead as you can have a third person up to age 17.

Officially yes they count kids as 15 and under. Unofficially I would book one room because you will get a double and 2 singles (one is small but my tall DD managed fine in it), put the DCs ages down as 14 & 15, they’ll never know.

What a ridiculous defence. "What difference does it make?" is BS. The difference is that they have an adult price and a child price like thousands of services we all use all the time.

At least people should have the courage of their convictions and admit to shafting the company.