To not leave holiday villa at designated time tomorrow?

[Nextphonewontbesamsung]

We are staying in a rural village in the south of France and are supposed to check out of our villa at 10.00 am. Howver, tonight there is a concert in the village square (our villa overlooks this square) and there is a band that have played a 7 hour set at FULL VOLUME. They have gone from Ed Sheeran and Coldplay covers to full on heavy metal and still going strong at 2.14am local time. Currently we're into about the 10th minute of their homage to Feels Like Teen Spirit. I have my alarm set for 8am so that we can be up early to finish packing and cleaning. Aibu to move my alarm back by at least an hour? We won't be ready to leave by 10 but I have a long drive tomorrow and it is not safe when so sleep deprived! Needless to say I am enormously fucked off!

I agree driving on so little sleep is dangerous. I would have let you check out late.

Driving when tired is a bad idea, sure. But if op had used the late night to pack, she could have set her alarm an hour and a half later and got at least 6 hours sleep. Coupled with having just been on holiday this is hardly dangerously sleep deprived.

Driving on little sleep is dangerous but it's not the fault of the owner or of the people who are presumably expecting to be able to check in later in the day. So you check out on time and when you feel tired later in the day, you stop somewhere and have a nap for ten minutes. Or go for a walk to wake up. Whatever works. But you can't expect everyone else to change to accommodate you.

And the moral of the story is "never travel without taking a good set of earplugs"

I didn't think the op was unreasonable to want to leave an hour later in the circumstances, but I was basing that on my own experiences of renting cottages/villas.

We're a large family so we haven't always made it out the door before the stroke of 10. Because it's not, as some people suggest, a simple matter of doing it all the night before and then throwing a few things in a bag the next morning. There's the tidying (replacing all those unnecessary cushions and ornaments which you've popped in a cupboard out of the way) cleaning, emptying bins, fridge etc most of which if you did the night before you'd have to do again the next morning when you have kids and dogs. We have however always brought everything down from the bedrooms so that the 1st floor is completely clear and ready for the cleaners to start on on time. I realise some of you think this is totally unreasonable, if not illegal, but we've never had anything other than smiles and pleasant chat from the cleaners.

Last year in Dorset we were packed up on time, cleaner arrived and then sat in the garden with us for about half an hour chatting 🤷‍♀️.

In Greece we've had the cleaner turn up early (horror!) and then following me round almost slapping my hands to stop me doing last minute cleaning because 'you're on holiday!).

So my own experiences are that the 10am deadline is a bit flexible (though as I say, we try our hardest to stick to it). We've also regularly turned up early at holiday cottages on the off chance that we can get in early, which we invariably can. So I've always had the impression that 10am to 4pm was more than enough time for turnaround and that the owners just erred on the safe side by allowing a bit extra.

But I am absolutely horrified by some of the accounts on here of the state people leave properties in. I had no idea so many guests could be so disgusting and thoughtless. Sounds truly grim. I'm horrified.

Also interested in the comment from HolidayLetter that it's annoying when people strip the beds and remove the mattress/pillow protectors. I always do that if asked to strip the beds before departure. Never occurred to me not to remove the protectors and that there wouldn't be clean ones put on for each new guest! They're only covered by thin linen which won't stop sweat and other bodily fluids soaking through ....

@Medievalist in my view it's your responsibility to make sure you are out in time.

You have to just make the time to do this, regardless of how hard it may be. If you can't get out in time, don't book that place or make an alternative arrangement with agreement from the owner at the time of booking.

Having a large family, or having lots to do isn't really any excuse. It doesn't mean your needs trump those of the people running a business and their team who have agreed with you to be out at a certain time.

You can't just decide that it's no problem for them if you're not out as agreed. The reasonable thing to do is to just stick to the agreement.

Peoplepleaser1 - you see, I've stayed in scores of cottages where the cleaners either haven't turned up at 10 or have and are totally relaxed about starting on the empty first floor while we take an extra 15-20 mins to clear out. So you and a few others on here demanding that if I can't be out at 10 I shouldn't make the booking is not going to trump that extensive experience.

@Medievalist fair enough but what about those set-ups where the time does matter? These may be in the minority (albeit it not in my experience), but it's not up to you to look at their T&C, decide they probably don't matter, and do your own thing.

My mum rents her cottage in Devon out via Airbnb. Check out is 10.30. The cleaners are contracted to arrive at 10.45 and leave 4 hours later. They have to leave 4 hours later to clean elsewhere. Their insurance covers them only to access the property once it's vacated. In the business we roll our eyes at people like you and our opinion of you is entitled and disrespectful of people running a business.

If you say so 🙄

Bunged up toilets and shower doors broken plus missing kitchen equipment also popular

I had one set of guests flush J cloths down our lavatories. Caused a complete blockage affecting both bathrooms which inconvenienced the next guests. I had to get a drainage contractor in to clear them as all our attempts failed. I couldn't believe it when they told me what had caused the blocked drains.

Of course we left on time. No sight of the cleaners who came from an English-run cleaning company in the next village and who we had met earlier in our stay. The owners had left a long list of strict instructions re. the cleaning we were expected to do before we left (so common in France and laughable when they leave one tiny second hand washing up sponge, a couple of inches of washing up liquid and a dribble of multi purpose cleaner in an ancient spray bottle) and also irritating in this particular case as the property had obviously not been let for a while and every single thing we used had to be washed up first. Corners, windows, ceilings, cupboard shelves had absolutely not been done on the day of our arrival, that's made me smile. On departure day we also had to empty the dishwasher (which we had set to run at about 10pm the night before) and get 4 adults up and showered and final bits of packing done, rubbish taken out etc. 90% of what needed doing had been done the night before and so of all the amusing things I've read on this thread my favourite by far has been the idea that I should have got up (at what time? midnight? 1am? 2am? and finished everyone's packing then and as soon as the concert had finished dropped contentedly off to sleep for a quality 5 hours). Ear plugs absolutely didn't touch the volume of this concert which was about 50m away. The drive the following day through rural France in 35 degree heat was as bad as anticipated but I got through it fuelled by coke and coffee. No motels to be found on our route to casually drop into for an impromptu nap! 😢. I'll be mentioning the exceptionally loud and late night for future guests on Trip Advisor and tell them Mumsnet suggests they pack until 2/3am, humming merrily to themselves perhaps, in order to stay sanguine on the night before check out. If I'm childish and entitled to be irritated by being kept awake by a full volume rock band until 2.30/3.00am then I'm ok with that.

I would have liked a warning about the concert when we booked as it has blighted a day of our short holiday

Oh give over. Everyone knows that during the summer rural French towns are packed with evening events. If you didn’t want any noise why did you book a villa looking over a square? Take some responsibility for yourself and be out at 10am. It’s not the cleaners’ fault and you’re going to screw their schedule. And no, they cannot start cleaning while you are still there.

Honestly, some people.

We own holiday rentals and our T&C’s set the leaving time of 10am on departure day. If the guests are still there after that time, they are automatically charged for an extra day. Our cleaners have a lot to do with tight turnarounds and we can’t cater to late leavers.

Don't go to Spain then in fiesta time. The concerts go on all night, every night, during fiesta.

Honestly, some people don't even have the cognitive ability to think "op posted well over 24 hours ago so whatever I say now is irrelevant". But to answer one of your points, I have holidayed in France perhaps 30 times, and have never had an experience like that before so I refute your "everyone knows" assertion. Also, the villa was advertised as being in a quiet village location. Which indeed it was apart from those 12 hours. It didn't say it overlooked the village square but I think you're just scrabbling around for the obscurist reason you can come up with to say yabu, for what reason I can't imagine. Perhaps not a lot else going on for you today?

"I've read on this thread my favourite by far has been the idea that I should have got up (at what time? midnight? 1am? 2am? and finished everyone's packing then"

What is laughable about the suggestion that you pack your things the night before, instead of in the morning?
And with 4 adults, you surely don't have to do everyone's packing, but only your own. Neither do you have to "get four adults up and showered", you only have to do it for yourself.
And unless you are the only one with a drivers licence, you can switch among yourselfs and the 3 people not driving at the moment can take a rest.

And since I assume that your car has AC, the heat outside of the car shouldn't have affected your driving.

You are blowing your "struggle" way out of proportion.

You sound like a really unpleasant person OP. That’s all I have to say.

If I'm childish and entitled to be irritated by being kept awake by a full volume rock band until 2.30/3.00am then I'm ok with that.

No-one has said you were not entitled to be angry to be kept awake. Simply that you were wrong to think you were entitled to leave the property later as a result.

If you arrived and things were not clean you had every right to complain and ask for it to be done again.

But either way your contract with the owners still ended at 10am on the day of departure.

No-one has said you were not entitled to be angry to be kept awake. Simply that you were wrong to think you were entitled to leave the property later as a result.

This. With bells on.

You sound like a really unpleasant person OP

That's exactly what I was thinking.....

I know you’ve left now, but I’ve often asked about the possibility of late checkout when we’ve had a later flight and wanted to leave our cases/freshen up later. I always offer to pay, but I’ve never been charged extra when it’s been possible.

You sound like a really unpleasant person OP. That’s all I have to say.

Oh wow that really adds something to the debate doesn't it? Bet it took you ages to think that up.

At the moment 87% of posters think YABU so I think that's a fairly conclusive response to your question.

We never book anywhere with a check-out time of earlier than noon for this reason, and we also look for the ability to pay extra for a late check-out of 2pm or later.

You have to anticipate thus kind of thing.

At the moment 87% of posters think YABU so I think that's a fairly conclusive response to your question.

I think that just proves the commonly held belief that a lot of posters go on AIBU for an argument, which generally means disagreeing with the op. As unpleasantly as possible.