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I've tonight returned from a great honeymoon in Italy, we had a lovely time but I can't help but feel slightly irritated that I fell for 'one of the oldest tricks in the book' when I booked our hotel.
I spent a lot of time looking and planning the trip, I wanted to make it as special a time as possible, especially as pressure of work meant that my wife and I couldn't take the 2 weeks we had hoped for and so just spent a week away. Italy is expensive, and with the current Euro rate I was struggling to afford the 'best of everything' that I had hoped we could share. Then someone recommended I look at the offers on the Citalia website, and there I found they were offering a 'complimentary room upgrade to Junior Suite' for honeymooners. It had 'subject to availability' in brackets after the offer (which is still there). However as I'd already investigated the hotel I was pretty sure they would have availability when we were staying (in fact I was certain).
Low and behold when we arrived we were shown to a room, not a suite, and it was a bit of a dingy room. We didn't unpack and I went back to the reception and explained that we had been expecting a 'Junior Suite'. Needless to say the hotel knew nothing about this, and they showed me their booking form which made no mention of the upgrade nor that we were on honeymoon. I showed them my invoice from Citalia, which states in the notes section : Complimentary room upgrade to Junior Suite( Subject to avalability) [sic]
Of course then I was informed that there was 'no availability' of 'Junior Suites on that offer' ... I couldn't make too much of a fuss about it, my new wife and I were quite tired after a 24 hr train journey, had just arrived and had not yet found our bearings, and I really didn't want to start our honeymoon with any sort of disagreement with the hotel. Therefore I asked what other rooms were available, and of course we were shown a Junior suite that was available as well as another more expensive suite that had a better view etc. I then negotiated with the manager and he offered us the suite at a slightly reduced rate.
We had a nice stay, but it was quite over-budget, and I am now wondering if I have 'a leg to stand on' with Citalia. There was availability, we know that because we stayed in one of the suites, but basically the hotel implied that they didn't honour these upgrades - or maybe they had a quota of them. The net result is that we paid I think around double (more probably) the amount - once to Citalia, and once to the hotel directly for the upgrade.
Sorry for my long post, there are details I have left out - I paid on debit card not credit card (I don't have one), but if there is anything else I will try and check this thread regularly for sage advice.
MTIA
Irksome
I spent a lot of time looking and planning the trip, I wanted to make it as special a time as possible, especially as pressure of work meant that my wife and I couldn't take the 2 weeks we had hoped for and so just spent a week away. Italy is expensive, and with the current Euro rate I was struggling to afford the 'best of everything' that I had hoped we could share. Then someone recommended I look at the offers on the Citalia website, and there I found they were offering a 'complimentary room upgrade to Junior Suite' for honeymooners. It had 'subject to availability' in brackets after the offer (which is still there). However as I'd already investigated the hotel I was pretty sure they would have availability when we were staying (in fact I was certain).
Low and behold when we arrived we were shown to a room, not a suite, and it was a bit of a dingy room. We didn't unpack and I went back to the reception and explained that we had been expecting a 'Junior Suite'. Needless to say the hotel knew nothing about this, and they showed me their booking form which made no mention of the upgrade nor that we were on honeymoon. I showed them my invoice from Citalia, which states in the notes section : Complimentary room upgrade to Junior Suite( Subject to avalability) [sic]
Of course then I was informed that there was 'no availability' of 'Junior Suites on that offer' ... I couldn't make too much of a fuss about it, my new wife and I were quite tired after a 24 hr train journey, had just arrived and had not yet found our bearings, and I really didn't want to start our honeymoon with any sort of disagreement with the hotel. Therefore I asked what other rooms were available, and of course we were shown a Junior suite that was available as well as another more expensive suite that had a better view etc. I then negotiated with the manager and he offered us the suite at a slightly reduced rate.
We had a nice stay, but it was quite over-budget, and I am now wondering if I have 'a leg to stand on' with Citalia. There was availability, we know that because we stayed in one of the suites, but basically the hotel implied that they didn't honour these upgrades - or maybe they had a quota of them. The net result is that we paid I think around double (more probably) the amount - once to Citalia, and once to the hotel directly for the upgrade.
Sorry for my long post, there are details I have left out - I paid on debit card not credit card (I don't have one), but if there is anything else I will try and check this thread regularly for sage advice.
MTIA
Irksome
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