Guest User
March 6, 2024
Stay away from this hotel! This is without doubt the worst hotel experience that I ever had. Receptionist Yousuf has no idea how to talk to customers in a respectful manner and do honest business. He made us prepay the price of 3 airport transfers (1000 lira each). We were picking up an elderly relative from the airport who was coming into Istanbul for the first time. He had no sim to be contacted on. We booked the taxi one day prior to the pickup time and prepaid the whole sum in cash. We explained to Yousuf that we must make sure to be at arrivals when my uncle arrived there. He confirmed that everything will be done accordingly, and even asked us for the person's name, passport number, flight number, etc. He informed us that the driver will track the flight to make sure that he takes us to the airport on time. We were ready around 1 hour prior to the scheduled time, but had to wait more than 1 hour to be picked up by the taxi. Eventually he informed us that the taxi will not come and decided to put us in a yellow taxi and paid for it. The yellow taxi cost around 350 lira, but he was happy to charge us the full amount for the more expensive taxi. We eventually arrived at the airport more than an hour late. Luckily, my elderly uncle had the good sense to stay put and was easily found.
Once he got there, my uncle said he wanted to visit the Blue Mosque. We spoke to Yousuf and told him to get our taxi to take us there and then back to the hotel. He had the audacity to ask us for 4000 liras in addition to the amount we had already paid for the taxi (1000 of which was to take us back to the hotel from the airport). I told him that it was only fair that he charged us the extra 2000 liras as we had already paid for 2 transfers (to and from the airport) keeping in mind the long delays and the measly amount he had to spend on the yellow taxi that got us to the airport. He flat out refused and threatened to take us back to the hotel (when we were heading to the Blue Mosque) unless we paid the extra 4000 liras. I pointed out to him that this was very clearly extortion and that he was basically threatening to kidnap us. Eventually, as the rest of my travel party did not want to deal with any further unpleasantness, we caved and decided to pay him the amount (which he reduced by a very small amount). He was very rude to me and my family and resorted to shouting at us. I pointed out to him that this was no way to talk to any customer, especially when he was fully in the wrong.
On the first day we stayed, the room we got had a very cold bathroom with n o heating, which had a broken shower which made it impossible for us to shower. The water did not go down the drain properly and made the water that stayed on the floor cold. Yousuf told us that he was unable to do anything not hat day (we informed him about this in the afternoon) and that he will have it fixed the following day. he did not do this either, and forced us to switch rooms the following day. He did not even offer to help us make the switch and we had to take all our bags up ourselves. We once called him and informed him that we were unable to heat any water as our electric kettle was not working. He told us that he will send someone over, but never did. We had to find a passing member of staff and had to get her to change our electric kettle.
