This holiday cottage is rubbish

[champagnesocialist11]

Can anyone sympathise? I will be asking for a full refund.

We came here for our honeymoon 8 years ago, it was absolutely lovely.

Haven't been on holiday since 2017 for various reasons.

Anyway! We've booked the same 'lovely' cottage In Northumberland; when we booked it it was owned by the same owner who really cared for it, since then she's sold it and now it's honestly awful. ( we booked before Covid)

It has an Aga, no oven glove or tea towel to get anything out of the damn thing, we have an Aga and I'd have bloody brought our own if I'd known; the 'flat screen tv' doesn't have a picture; just sound so that's nice, the garden is sold as enclosed but the fence has fallen over so it's not at all.

The smoke alarm keeps beeping because it needs new batteries. If we'd known I'd have bought one before hand. There is 1 non cracked glass, so we're drinking champagne out of mugs. There is no kettle or toaster. We had a kettle in the car by a lucky accident because i bought a new one for our Aga and forgot to get it out of the car before coming away but wtf???

It's a first world issue I know that, but I just feel cheated. It cost us £300 to rent this for the weekend.

A friend of mine rented a cottage near us recently, the telly didnt work, the smoke alarm was out of batteries, the fuse went and the lights couldnt be turned on for a while. She complained and got a full refund, this was Sykes cottages

I own holiday rentals. You need to do the following to seek remedy to this. Contact the booking agent (whoever the contract is with) and detail the complaint in an email. Take photographs of the faults with the property. There should be a smoke alarm in working order on every floor. It is the law for holiday rentals and you can video it beeping. The TV aerial maybe slightly out at the back of the unit and in which case, the picture is usually the first to go. You could inspect the lead, and then retune the TV. Identify the lack of tea towels as a health and safety risk. Photograph the fence. Leave a bad review on tripadvisor and google to deter onward guests. If you stay for the whole weekend, it is not likely you will receive a full refund. You could try your credit card provider under 'not as described' section 75 protection, but you need to put in a complaint with the booking agent first. The new owner of the property maybe glad to be alerted to the faults if they have a cleaner or property manager who is supposed to be looking after the cottage.

Why?

Sorry, they booked a nice weekend away with no significant hassles or annoyances. They didn;t get that, so full refund seems appropriate.

If they'd turned up and everything was perfect except for no toilet roll then £30 compensation for the hour wasted driving to the nearest town and back might be OK. But there comes a point you;re just not getting what you paid for.

Can you say where you are OP? On the off chance you are near me, I'll lend you some oven gloves etc.

We paid £1800 for a week in March in St Agnes in Cornwall, it was about £500 more than similar lets as it had a hot tub. Only the hot tub wasn't working, and they were aware of this as the technician had reported the fault and ordered parts. We'd pushed the boat out and got a hot tub for days after long walks on the coastal path. We got a cheap hamper of tea/coffee as compensation

The company claims to be a "gem" but they're far from it.

There should be some sort of info pack there with emergency contact numbers.

She complained and got a full refund, this was Sykes cottages

Sounds like the enforcement action worked - it was Sykes who broke the law in outright refusing refunds during Covid: www.gov.uk/cma-cases/cancellations-holiday-accommodation

Personally I still wouldn't use them though; we all make mistakes, but I'd rather not go with a company who have to be forced to do the right thing

@Chevyimpala67 no! There is a whistling kettle but the bottom is dented so it doesn't sit properly on the hot plate of the Aga and doesn't boil. I can't find a toaster if there is one! I have found a toaster for the Aga after delving through the cupboards!

We booked an Airbnb at Christmas for family to sleep in only as we didn’t have enough accommodation for our big family party.

There was no heating (and various other issues which would have been difficult if people were going to be there all day).

We did get a partial refund but the frustrating thing was that the owner said ‘Oh yes, that was reported a few weeks ago…!’

So why not fix it?

@Ethelfromnumber73 we're near stocksfield close to Newcastle. If anyone wants the name of the cottage so you don't book it I'll say it!

The furnishings are lovely to be fair but there just isn't anything basic and essential in the kitchen and living room. There is a stove with no glove so you can't open it if you were to put it on!

In your email to the management company which includes pix and the alarm bleeping, I would also add that you don't appreciate spending the weekend gathering evidence about how sub standard (and dangerous) the cottage is.

I'm not too far away but sadly not close enough to pop over to lend. Get yourself to The Feathers at Hedley on the Hill and Wheelbirks for an ice cream. Corbridge prob nearest place to acquire an oven glove- just make sure you charge it to the holiday cottage !! The cook shop there is fab so you might even want to take it home anyway

Sykes are the worst 😡

• OP - You should have booked this cottage in Northumberland. Link

www.huntinghall.co.uk/stay

We went there this time last year, and it was properly perfect. Great price too.

@Ethelfromnumber73 sorry! Yes that's where we are, in Hedley on the hill! The feathers is lovely, we're going tonight. I'm about to head off to Tesco to get an oven glove 😂

@SomethingToldTheWildGeese ah that's lovely! Next time

Cottages are often so very overrated. I fail to see the charm of uneven walls with rising damp and rustic termite ridden exposed roof beams.

YANBU, but also well done for managing to shoehorn in the fact you own an Aga three times.

Wtf, what are you doing? Eating it?

I think most people use the term holiday cottage as a catch all (although this might be an actual cottage). I say a holiday cottage when I just mean a holiday rental. Not sure we've been in many actual 'cottages', but they tend to be marketed as such even if they're a little 1920s terrace.

We rented a cottage in Cornwall last year. It was damp, stank of dogs (despite saying it was no pets), mould on the bathroom walls, and the shower leaked through the ceiling onto the floor downstairs. We got nowhere with our complaint to the owners. I left a comprehensive review with a list of the issues, and found others had raised the same problems too.

@jetadore haha! You're welcome.. I hate it! It came with the house and we'd have to rip the kitchen out to get it out.

@CourtneeLuv no I've got crohns

We booked the National Trust Bunkhouse at Cwm Ivy for a long weekend in March. It was very cold, but the place had a heat pump and underfloor heating as well as a log burner. Got there to find it freezing and the heat pump not working. The NT had said they'd leave a load of logs but there was nothing there. One of our party was a heating engineer and got the heat pump going, but the pressure dropped every few hours and it was unreliable. We had to go and buy logs. The mattresses were dreadful: they were the cheapest kind available when they were bought 20 years ago and they'd had very heavy use. Otherwise it was lovely — excellent loos and kitchen — but heating and a halfway comfy mattress seemed like fundamentals they'd decided didn't matter. The NT just shrugged when we complained. Turns out the heat pump hasn't been working properly for a year or so.

@champagnesocialist11 massive tesco extra in Hexham which isn't too far away if that helps for tea towels etc

Well and you dont need to have any sort of disability to need more than 1 roll for a family for 4 days.

What are we on now, competitive under usage of toilet rolls?

The no kettle and toaster is the most bizarre thing. Do you think the previous guests could have stolen them ! ?