To have made my partner switch hotels in London?

[LondonWoes]

My partner surprised me with a long weekend in London, for my birthday. He got us theatre tickets and told me he had sorted the hotel out.

We got on the train today and he started bragging it was £30 a night. That immediately set alarm bells ringing. We arrive and it’s a dump. It’s not even a hotel, but someone’s house with a load of converted rooms. There’s no reception, just a living room, and every door has the same key. That same key also opened the front door. We had been put in a downstairs room, with no window. It was boiling hot.

I told him I wasn’t staying in that hotel. It didn’t feel safe and the vibes were off. He has begrudgingly moved but made me pay, so now im £500 down for my birthday weekend. Was I being unreasonable?

There isn't going to be much change from £500 for 3 nights in a Travelodge in central London, if any.

He sounds really tight. A lifetime of this will
be a misery. I’d trade him in tbh.

😂😂😂

Unless he’s really skint and this is a huge stretch on the finances I’d be ditching him for making you pay for the new hotel.
The not booking a restaurant and ordering fucking Five Guys is just the cherry on the shit cake.

Sorry, I’m by no means a princess but that’s not a treat.
I’ve got a couple of friends who are happy with some pretty ropey accommodation so I always make sure I’m involved in booking stuff. 😄

So his birthday treat to you - "a few days in London, nice hotel, lovely evening meal, theatre tickets" actually translates to a room in a HMO, burger and chips and the cheapest tickets possible.

Wow - you must feel so wined and dined there @LondonWoes 😂

Op what the actual hell!

Go out, dump the dead weight and thank your lucky stars you saw this now and not two dc and a house later.

So it’s a £30 dump of a room in an air bnb and not a hotel and birthday weekend away in London at all. He then compounds it by ordering a take away to eat in a premier inn…it’s spectacular alright but for all of the wrong reasons op.

You have different values. I personally think it's stupid to waste money on hotels on city breaks, when all you are doing is sleeping there. Better to book somewhere value and have more money for exploring the city surely. I'd rather have several trips in a cheap Airbnb than one that costs over a grand.

And lucky you gets to the foot the bill??? I would be skinning him alive so you are being very restrained op 😂

He had that planned all along.

I don't like spending on hotels and have stayed in hostels with my husband but this is a whole different level.

Not at the last minute there aren't unless you're extremely lucky! Anyway who wants to fuck around calling lots of hotels on a weekend away. Op got a room at a good price. Now she just needs to swap the guy for a decent one!

I've no doubt he's not skimping on the ski holiday for himself with friends. But you? Get an unsafe, scuzzy room in someone's random home. And fast food delivered for dinner.

I'd sent him back the scuzzy room and bin him.

you’ve just chucked it back at him and told him it’s not good enough and he should have spent more on you because you’re worth it. Well £200 is quite a lot to spend on a non significant birthday for someone you don’t even live with and I think you’re coming across a bit like a spoiled brat. I’m not surprised he’s feeling hurt.

Oh come on. I know exactly the kind of halfway house grot hole place she means, and you just woulnd't do that to someone. It's insulting.

And there's cheap food places for the same or not much more than Five Guys if you make the effort - it's hardly special to eat lukewarm chain takeaway at 4.30pm in a grotty hotel room!

Are you sure it isn't £30 per hour?

OMG OP, I'm so sorry for you.

It's like he's done this the cheapest possible way (I honestly don't think it could have been cheaper at any given point? Is McDonalds cheaper than Five Guys?), but dressed it up to be something fancy.

Weekend in London! Tickets to Hamilton! Dinner reservation!

30 quid a night in a hostel room, nosebleed seats and Five Guys is something else. I'd rather have stayed at home. And he says HE needed to cool off!

I agree with you to a point. I can’t begin to imagine what a £30 a night room looks like. I’d rather sit in a 24 hour cafe. And yes, he doesn’t sound particularly sensible; he absolutely should have used his budget better and not tried to do as much.

But the fact remains that he’s tried to give her a nice experience, and that £200 is a lot to spend on a non significant birthday. And she’s just chucked it all back at him and told him that none of it is good enough. I’m not surprised he’s feeling a bit upset.

They’ve obviously got very different expectations. He clearly sees the weekend as a chance to stretch the budget as far as possible so they can cram in as much as possible where she sees it as her birthday weekend where she should be spoiled all weekend in nice surroundings. This is not a recipe for a long and happy relationship and I suspect that this weekend will highlight that to both of them. I just don’t think he deserves the contempt he’s getting on here, especially when the OP is making herself sound like Verucca Salt.

Have you been on the AI again?

Can say I've stayed in cheap hotels in London, but never that cheap and I learned very quickly that less than £100 a night for a double room is a mistake.

£30 a night in such a dump is a total waste of that £30!!! Better to stay at home with a nice bottle of wine and an M&S ready meal!! And let’s not even talk about the takeaway burger 🤦‍♀️. If he was on a super tight budget then that would be slightly more understandable but in behaving in such a crass and thoughtless manner when he has literally just booked a ski weekend says it all, I’m afraid. Throw this one back OP!

I agree. Also, how do we know that he wasn’t fooled by the online pictures? He might have genuinely thought he was getting a megadeal. He might have thought it was more about the occasion and events than the hotel, like the ski trip might be.

Oh, come on! £30 for a hotel in London?? Of course it’s a shithole.

Sorry but £30 was never going to be a megadeal in London, it falls firmly in if it's too to be true, it probably is. You'd have to be very naive to think otherwise.

No I don’t think you’re sounding naive at all.

I’m sorry it’s all been a bit shit and he hasn’t met expectations.

What’s his salary? If he’s spending cheaply on a shared AirBnB, FiveGuys and the cheapest theatre tickets - he doesn’t sound the type of guy who can afford a treat weekend in London.

Is he normally so fucking stupid?

Throw him into the Thames.