WWYD - Butlins - no accommodation for disabled parents so they had to come home

[JellyStarb]

I've just discovered that my parents have arrived home after setting off at 12pm to go to Butlins for the week.

On arrival, they were given keys to a third floor apartment. My Mum uses a mobility scooter and absolutely cannot do stairs. She was told if she wanted ground floor she needed to have paid for it. No ground floor apartments were available and so my parents returned home, a very long 9 hour round trip in the car in total.

They have said they would refund but were very blasè.

I dont agree that they should have paid more for ground floor accommodation as thats discrimination as its a need so yhe person who said that is likely ill-informed.

I've looked online to go through the booking process as my Mum and Dad have gone for years without issue and never had this. The website has a small link for accessibility accommodation but at 73 my Mum wouldn't have seen that when booking amongst such a busy page and trying to navigate the tech. My Dad is in his eighties.

AIBU to think they could have done more? But what? I don't want to be unrealistic but how can they just allow people who have travelled so far to have to leave?!

Is this tiny link on such a visually busy page really sufficient?! Its not at all inclusive or user friendly for older generations trying to live in a modern world, surely a page as part of the booking process to register any needs would make more sense and be a catch-all?!

My mum is 83 and is perfectly capable of knowing that if you have additional mobility needs you make sure you notify places in advance and make sure you have booked the accessible option, rather than travelling for hours on the assumption that it can all be sorted out with zero notice when you arrive. Does your mum have also have special/additional needs when it comes to comprehension and planning? In which case there should be a carer appointed to make sure that her decisions aren't doomed to disaster in this way.

The point is that it's possible that people in their 70s and 80s are less cognitively sharp than younger people, and might not think to specifically request accessible accommodation if they've had it in the past and assumed they'd always get it.

I don't know whether the OP's parents have declining cognitive abilities or not. Some people of that age are very sharp, others aren't.

We're missing the OP. So many valid points she hasn't bothered returning to

I'm more concerned that someone booking who couldn't see a very clear link is still driving, especially with impaired mobility. It's why I firmly believe once a driver reaches 65 they should be retested at least every 5 years, and then every 2 years from 75.

Why "especially with impaired mobility" (assuming much that the driver is the one with impaired mobility anyway). My mobility is rubbish, my eyesight is perfect, and in nearly 50 years of driving I have never had an at fault accident, a parking ticket or a speeding ticket, I have never driven under the influence or done anything else that I shouldn't. So I am not sure what my impaired mobility has to do with anything. Nor, given the driving that I regularly see on our roads from people under the age of 65, do I see why you make assumptions that older drivers are bad drivers. I am gobsmacked that some have actually ever passed a test. As for their eyesight, a fairly substantial number appear to be totally incapable of spotting a pedestrian crossing or red lights. Far from your ableist, ageist assumptions, perhaps everyone should be retested regularly? Although given that people appear to need a year to get a driving test now, I am not sure how that would work - ten years waiting list for driving retests would certainly cut pollution levels.

I don't know if the receptionist really was too busy too deal with this. but my point was that somebody at Butlins could have taken the initiative and tried to find alternative accommodation for them. It would have been easy to find the phone numbers of some hotels and make a few phone calls, instead of turning away a couple in their 70s and 80s who had travelled a long distance.

Yes, of course they were at fault for not explicitly requesting accessible accommodation, and Butlins couldn't magic that up for them. But they probably could have done more to help them - at the very least they could have printed off a list of local hotels the couple could have phoned themselves.

Butlins don’t offer a concierge service like that. Do you know what the general public are like? If you decide to go above and beyond to help them sort accommodation somewhere else (after their own mistake) and something goes wrong at that new place… who do you think they blame? It’s just aggro you don’t need when working with the public. You do something extra as a favour and it always comes back to bite you. Not worth it, not for minimum wage.

I'm talking about simple human decency. Would it have killed someone at Butlins to print off a list of local hotels from TripAdvisor and give it to the couple?

@JellyStarb i don't think they mean paid more. They mean that you need to book and pay for accommodation that meets their requirements. They should have called or emailed to make Butlins aware of their needs.

Wouldn’t have killed them, but if it didn’t work out or they couldn’t find decent accommodation then it would have resulted in a complaint because Butlins gave them wrong information/didn’t help them enough.

The OP’s mum literally had to click, “No, I don’t want to choose accommodation, the site can choose for me,” and the OP is trying to make it Butlins fault and is planning her complaint. Butlins did nothing wrong; they put the accommodation choice right in front of her mum’s face and mum clicked no. But Butlins are getting a complaint. And you think there would be no danger in helping them by printing out other accommodation? The danger is another complaint against you when her mum couldn’t figure out how to phone another hotel.

Exactly this, people don't like to give extra help as it can come back to bite them. Like the OP who has created this thread even though her parents had multiple opportunities to get the right room and were entirely at fault, she's still trying to blame the venue as so far as to use some crap from AI to try and help her prove her (non existant) point.

YANBU in that imo it’s annoying that virtually everything needs to be done online now (if not often using a blimmin app to boot too) -which I think is often unfair to the very elderly or those with some disabilities unless they’ve got someone to help (Can you help them with booking next time?).

However YABU to single out Butlins in this instance- the link you showed might not meet specific requirements but doesn’t seem especially hidden away to me compared to similar websites; and apart from giving a full refund (which they did), I can’t see what else Butlins could do if all the other suitable accommodation was full. Rightly or wrongly, it’s normal to pay extra to choose your specific accommodation in these places - usually you are paying to choose a specific room rather than just ground floor afaik.

But they are charging EVERYONE extra to book a specific accommodation and then refunding those with an access need

Not penalising those who have an access need

I’m sorry OP you’re being a bit ridiculous. Your parents, elderly or not, were able to book using a website, pack their own things, drive their themselves yet didn’t think to book ground floor accommodation and now you are mad as Butlins didn’t do what? Shove someone out of their room to accommodate your parents? You’re being totally unreasonable

They have no requirement to go to such lengths and may even not be allowed to recommend other local places

The only place I would expect to get a printed list of accommodations these days would be a tourist office.
As for going into tripadvisor and printing out lists when pretty much everyone has a smart phone these days , well why would the receptionist have to do that ?

I agree she could have expressed disappointment and concern for the DPs but who knows how they were expressing themselves, possibly shouting about being Gold customers and expecting Butlins to know their requirements without stating them.

Not weird at all. We too come to Butlins and are here now.

Not only is the Accessible Accomodation tab very visible on the booking page, there is also a phone number that you are asked to use if you have specific needs. Your claim that their age makes it difficult for them to use the online form is ridiculous. I'm 69, my husband is 77 - we have no issues booking/buying online, nor do any of our friends and relatives of similar age (and older). If you really believe they are not up to doing it themselves, perhaps you should offer to do it for them. The responsibility for ensuring the accomodation would be suitable for your mother's needs lies entirely with her, not Butlins.

They didn't book an accessible accommodation.
There wasn't one available.
I'm not sure what they could do to help your parents

I’ve been bitten too many times to go ‘above and beyond’ for people now, you can guarantee if they’d given them details of a hotel then some people would say ‘and are Butlin’s paying for my hotel bill for the week then?’ Or something would go wrong at the hotel and that would be Butlin’s fault, Butlin’s is a budget, high volume holiday destination, not The Ritz.

My dh isn’t disabled but also doesn’t like lifts. Therefore, if he saw you can select ground floor rooms, he would choose that option, even if it incurred extra costs (although wouldn’t choose a disabled room).

I guess it’s a bit like airlines charging for extra legroom seats. The offer is open to all, not just tall people.

😂Sympathies with your DH ... my holiday from hell when I clearly booked a disabled accessible room, started out with the hotel putting me on the fourth floor of the hotel with BOTH the guest lifts not working, and suggesting I use the service lift that was filthy, had bare electric wires hanging down, and was either full of kitchen waste or room service waste. When it was pointed out that in no interpretation of the word "accessible" was this reasonable, and after the intervention of the local rep, they moved me to a sister hotel which had a disabled accessible room.... on the third floor, the level access guest lift was not working, and the other guest lift required one to go up several steps, along a corridor and then down several steps. Putting disabled rooms on the ground floor seems to have been a concept too far for them!

I'm jealous! We're not back there until September now :) Have a good time :)

They charge £20 for ground floor whether you have disabilities or not. I have 3 children, 1 in a pushchair and I have paid for ground floor accommodation. Difference being with disabilities you get the money back!

Absolute bargain this midweek..£39 for a comfort room for 4. Then £25 onsite vouchers and a bottle of prosecco. Cheaper than living at home

Nice one!! We're normally good at getting the bargains, but's that's a very good one! Ah, you can't beat the vouchers, can you?! :)