Will Marsden said he and his friend’s hearts sank after they found the hotel they booked in Greece was “scruffy” and “smelled” with a swimming pool that was covered with algae
A Brit holidaymaker was left furious after arriving at an apparent four-star hotel to find it was an “ant-infested hellhole.”
Will Marsden says he and a friend paid £1,000 in total for five nights in Corfu, Greece. But the 30-year-old claims when they got to the resort they found a dated, scruffy bedroom that smelled, a bathroom covered in limescale and a swimming pool green with algae.
“We looked around and our hearts literally sank,” Will, founder of online art business Mawgo, from Chester, told Luxury Travel Daily. “The photos of the pool area compared to what we saw are worlds apart, the whole place was a complete dump, the pool was green with algae, and dirt and grime.
“Not one person was in there. “There were mismatched broken sun loungers about – completely different to the luxury ones depicted in the online photos.
“There was spilt drinks and dirt everywhere, and all the grass was just dried brown mud. The bar was so dirty, covered in flies with one really rude grumpy staff member with a cigarette in his hand.
“We tried out all the cocktails and every single one was just spirit with soda water and grenadine even though the menu ingredients said they had all sorts of fresh juices in.” Will, a vegetarian, said the snacks on offer included ham sandwiches and stale biscuits wrapped in clingfilm.
He said he booked the stay at Porto Demo Boutique Hotel via easyJet holidays. “Well me and my friend have been well and truly catfished by this ’boutique’ hotel in Greece”
He said: “We paid close to £1,000 for both of us for five nights. But when we arrived and first walked into reception we just both went ‘oh’ – it was dated and absolutely stank of damp.
“It was not what was depicted in the photos online. There was a couple at the front desk complaining of how dirty their room was.
“They said they had an ant infestation and a broken shower. So you can imagine that didn’t fill us with much hope waiting to check in.
“We checked in and had to climb up a mountain of stairs to get to our room, carrying our 23kg each of bags. Looking around at the tired, dirty state of the place, we just thought ‘what have we done?’
“We opened the door to our room and our jaws just dropped. It smelled and it was so dated with marks everywhere.
“The bathroom was so tiny you could only open the door halfway before it hit the toilet. Everything was covered in limescale and the shower was flooded with dirty water.
“The rooms look so much nicer on the website – they obviously have a lot of old, dated rooms they don’t show.” Will said he and his friend got in touch with easyJet and were asked to send over some photos.
He said; “They took a whole day to get back to us. I had to call late in the evening to ask for an update and explain all the issues and how it’s completely different to the photos, how it’s false advertisement.
“The case handler’s explanation was unfortunately we had to kind of expect bad drinks at an all inclusive. Also she said the state of the grass was normal because it had been a hot summer.
“She also said I should have let easyJet know in advance of my vegetarian dietary requirements, even though I checked the website of Port Demo where it said it was vegetarian friendly.
“I was offered a £50 refund on the £1,000 holiday. I got back to them saying it’s not good enough, we need to be moved.
“We were absolutely devastated by this place it was truly awful. They said leave it with us, we had to wait and stay the night even though we didn’t want to.
“I called first thing in the morning and they made us wait until midday to tell us they could go up to £75 but no more. So we decided to sort ourselves out and paid £500 for another place on top of what we paid for the easyJet holiday.
“We were there less than 24 hours.” Will said the hotel they moved to was “much nicer” but he claims he has since been contacted by people who have had the same issue.
He said: “We’re just absolutely gutted as we were so looking forward to it and we’re so upset when we saw the place. We would have got out of there straight away if we weren’t waiting on easyJet to sort it.”
An easyJet holidays spokesperson said: “We’re really sorry to hear that Mr Marsden is unhappy with his hotel experience. We regularly review the content provided by our hotel partners to ensure it is an accurate reflection, and we’re looking into this case.
“There’s nothing more important to us than providing brilliant holidays for our customers, so we’ve reached out to Mr Marsden to offer a gesture of goodwill.”
