To think if your holiday rental doesn't start till Saturday then you can't expect to turn up on Friday.

[VivaLeBeaver]

Seriously, I think some people are slightly unhinged.

We had a last minute holiday rental in France last week, booked direct through the owner who lives in the UK.

Late Friday night a couple turned up and were suprised to find us there.

The deal with the keys were you went to a garage in the apartment block and got two sets of keys out a secure coded box on the wall. As we were leaving 6am on Saturday I'd put one of they keys in the box - they'd actually got the key and came into the apartment.

Apparantly they thought the apartment had been empty the week before their booking so thought they'd sneak in a day earlier. They then asked if they could stay in the apartment on the bed settee that night as it was late and they had no idea where else to go.

I feel a bit of a bitch now but I said no and took the key off them and practically frog marched them out! No idea where they went as we were off early the next day.

I have experienced this in reverse. We arrived in France to stay at a friend's holiday home. They were in the UK and had an arrangement with a locally based expat British couple to manage the place for them - not as a favour, on a commercial basis.

We arrived on the specified day only to be told by the woman that as the place "wasn't ready" we would have to stay at the hotel in the village . We made the point that we didn't mind if it wasn't ready, we would manage for the night and she could get everything done the next day - we didn't want to stay in a hotel and nor had we budgeted for it.

Cutting a long story short, it turned out that she had put some other people into the house, charging them the going rate and took the chance that we would go along with the hotel thing because we are close friends with the owners and wouldn't want to make a fuss.

We did wonder why she would think that, rather than the obvious response, which was for us to phone our friends and tell them that they were being ripped off.

We never did get entry to the house - she offered to let us have her letting bedroom at her own place - at the going rate - so she was effectively trying to earn money from both our friend's house and her own . She was pretty brazen about it.

I think kicking them out was the right thing to do if only because it means that they wont try to do that again. They have learnt a valuable lesson! I would let the landlord know in a "Was there a mix up with bookings? because a couple turned up on Friday night....." kind of way!

Carabos, that it outrageous! what happened? Did you end up having to go home?

What did your friends say?

It really is theft, you must absolutely tell the owners! I wonder if they were going to extend their stay by the same reasoning?!

I'd tell the owners. Cheeky feckers.

I suspect they have done it before and got away with it. She seemed very brazen for a 'first timer'. (I would have been a nervous wreck doing this, incase we were caught)

Please tell the owner!!! go on, today while the renters are still there. Say you were upset by it too - you might get some of your money back...

That is unbelievably cheeky! Wondering if I could get an extra night in the summer

Carabos that is outrageous!

OP I can't believe the cheek of some people.

bogey we spent a few days at the woman's "gite" being fobbed off every day that we could go to our friend's house "tomorrow". In the end we drove 1000 km to FiL and MiL's place in Spain and spent the rest of the holiday there. Our friends were mortified.

YANBU
Holiday lets are Sat pm to Sat am unless very clearly stated otherwise.
I have done an odd mid week one this time of year because the camp site had let the caravan Good Friday onwards and they let us have it for a few days to see family the week before.

I was going to say 'it depends on the situation' but only because I didn't read the title properly, we quite often ask if we can add days either end if there's no booking and so far we've only been turned down once, with one particular set of owners they don't charge us either (we always buy them flowers/gift etc).

YANBU and the situation you describe is absolutely outrageous!! You did the right thing but I understand why you worried.

Cheeky fuckers!

I take it that the woman was sacked Carabos? I would be fuming if I was them!