Guest User
November 25, 2021
After more than 10 years as a frequent user of Tripadvisor, my conclusion is that it's not a credible platform any more. Here's my story: I stayed two nights at this hotel on August 9-11 with my wife and daughter, as they were then number 3 out of 171 hotels in Sarandë (now even number 2 out of 174, compliments!). After our stay my wife wrote a detailed review with photos, giving the hotel a well deserved 1 out of 5 (I'm generous giving it a 2). A couple of days later she told me her review had been removed. She wrote a new review of which I took a copy and a screenshot, but again it was removed. As I said, I've followed Tripadvisor's ratings for years, ignoring people and business owners claiming Tripadvisor isn't reliable. Apparently I have to admit I was wrong and stop using Tripadvisor. In substance, here's our experience from our stay: 1. Very dirty and untidy: the reception looks like a shabby camping site and unused stuff are piled around and also on the 6th floor (where the best rooms were). 2. No English speakers: majority of the staff doesn't speak/understand English, including in the restaurant, where it would have been mostly important. 3. Terrible breakfast: hardly edible + non-existent service to clean/refill the breakfast board. 4. Lousy service: you'll find yourself waiting for the receptionist to show up, and if you ask around they tell you to sit and wait. Swimming pool is great, but then again, the path to go to the beach (running below the swimming pool) is poorly maintained and dirty. Same goes for the deckchairs around the swimming pool area. As if all this wasn't enough, I was billed twice, not once, first 330€ for the two days on the day of check-in and then again 330€ on the day of check-out. I contacted the hotel afterwards, and this was their answer, with their spelling errors: “As far as we know we haven't charge your card manually at all. Anyway, please sent us the document that verifies the transaction and we will verify it in our system”. I sent a bank extract as evidence but received the same reply again. Had I not then contacted both my card issuer and *********** (where you can find reliable reviews about the hotel, N.B.!) I would probably never have got my money back. The most disappointing thing in all this isn't the bad experience of the hotel (unless my review is removed, I'm sure the hotel will refute everything I write, I've seen this with other critical comments, they can't accept any criticism) but the fact that my wife's reviews were removed not once but twice. This cannot have been done by the hotel but by Tripadvisor, without first contacting my wife, nor informing her of the reasons. Because of this, I haven't used Tripadvisor any more during my trips during the past three months. If this review is withdrawn as well, then I just can say goodbye Tripadvisor, you lost my confidence completely.