Travelodge not responding to emails

Adrian613

I had a very upsetting incident with Travelodge. Below is the copy of the email sent to their 'customer services':


1. My wife and myself booked and paid for a room in a Travelodge near Manchester 4 months in advance, for a business trip.
2. On our way up from London, we were called at midnight, on our landline, (waking up our children) while we were already 100 miles down the motorway, to tell us that we were bumped off. I booked and PAID for this hotel 4 months earlier - you had NO BUSINESS to give away our room, even if it is your policy - you had already taken money for it and the sale was agreed. We book early when we travel for business to ensure we are not driving around in the middle of the night!
3. You didn't call my mobile, you called my landline - at MIDNIGHT - and you woke up my baby sitter and small children (who were already unsettled as their parents were away!)
4. We were told to find our own replacement hotel (we could not turn around and go home, we were on a business trip). We had to call several hotels, at our expense and all whilst driving up the motorway!
5. We dealt with Pam at the hotel, who fobbed us off and made us call her duty manager. WHY DID WE HAVE TO SORT OUT THE MESS YOU CREATED FOR US?
6 Mohamed, the duty manager, told us 'I'll call you right back". An hour later, after around 80 logged calls to Mohamed, he still didn't call us back. We were so tired and frustrated at this point.
7. When we eventually found a hotel, and eventually got hold of Mohamed, we spent another hour waiting for him to confirm that he would be paying the bill - again, after twice he told us "I'll call you right back". Remember, we have call logs on our mobiles from both my wife and myself as proof.
8. The hotel we had found was half an hour away from our original destination. We were promised to be compensated for our petrol expenses.
9. By the time we got to the hotel, we had to wait around half an hour more for Mohamed to confirm. He eventually called back at 2.30am. His excuse "I'm driving down the motorway". WHY COULDN'T HE TELL US THAT IN THE FIRST PLACE????????
10. We were told unequivocally that this would be dealt with a week ago, by the same lying Mohamed (I have already emailed you the recording of that phone call). You left me fuming for two weeks.

They refunded our room (eventually, but as compensation, they offered us a £25 Travelodge voucher (limited for six months)

I want to take these people to the cleaners. Any ideas?

hansi

[EMAIL="guy.parsons@travelodge.co.uk"]guy.parsons@travelodge.co.uk[/EMAIL]

He's the CEO

hansi

Incidentally, how did you answer a cal on your landline when you were on your way from London?

nutty1

hansi wrote: »

Full marks to Travelodge Customer Services:beer:

Instant reply, apology, refund of early check in charge, and a £25 voucher against a future booking.

Top marks:j

did you ring or email

hansi

I emailed and got an instant reply.

katerinasol

hansi wrote: »

Incidentally, how did you answer a cal on your landline when you were on your way from London?

I'm guessing the babysitter told them.

MothballsWallet

Call redirect?

KeithFox

Last Monday I booked and paid for two rooms at a Plymouth Travelodge for the night of 23 July. When the invoices were printed they were for the night of 13 June. I found a telephone number for customer services who insisted I could only communicate with them by email. I have sent two emails and have not received the courtesy of a reply except for two useless autoreply messages which do not address my problem. To add insult to injury I have now received a request to answer a survey as to how I enjoyed my stay!
All I want to do is talk to a human in their customer services department. I am rapidly reaching the conclusion that there are no humans in their customer service depart.

hansi

KeithFox wrote: »

Last Monday I booked and paid for two rooms at a Plymouth Travelodge for the night of 23 July. When the invoices were printed they were for the night of 13 June. I found a telephone number for customer services who insisted I could only communicate with them by email. I have sent two emails and have not received the courtesy of a reply except for two useless autoreply messages which do not address my problem. To add insult to injury I have now received a request to answer a survey as to how I enjoyed my stay!
All I want to do is talk to a human in their customer services department. I am rapidly reaching the conclusion that there are no humans in their customer service depart.

Try [EMAIL="mguy.parsons@travelodge.co.uk"]guy.parsons@travelodge.co.uk[/EMAIL]

Lolaliesl

Thanks to some great advice in this forum, we skipped just filling out a form on the complaints site and emailed the CEO addresses that some kind people on this thread posted. Within a matter of days they replied to us.
We were staying at the Travelodge in Watford centre (I remember this opening when I lived in the town and I can remember how nice it once was and we have stayed there a few times before) We were on the 3rd floor and were there booked for 3 nights. We were put in a room that Travelodge now inform us was supposed to be 'off-line', with flooding outside the room, an awful smell -because of the flooding, one curtain in the room (which should have been the blackout curtain) vomit stains up the side of the bed and on the carpet, mould around the bath, a faulty tv remote (insignificant, I know.. but if we're being nitpicking...)
The room was close to flooding, causing the ceiling to collapse, housekeeping had placed a towel underneath but it wasn't having any effect. The soaked floor and collapsing ceiling were also by the main door to the stairs and lift, so they couldn't be avoided.

As you can expect, we asked to move and were told they were fully booked. So later I asked somebody else, who was a great deal friendlier (and honest) and they moved us to top floor and directly next to the source of the flooding and we had to wade to our room (at this point we had the key but hadn't moved our stuff) so we went back to the reception and asked to be placed in yet another room and even though they had claimed to be overbooked they (surprisingly) found us a room on the ground floor, without a major water source close by. That room was not good either, a hole in the wall that had been filled in badly (fist shaped), only one curtain again (an austerity measure?), a hideous tiny old travel kettle -that I swapped with previous room's kettle- and a filthy carpet. By now we were just relieved not to be by a river.

In the ground floor room (and final room) the mattress was completely shot and my mum was bitten a few times which got infected, from what she believes may have been an infestation of bed bugs (this has since been reported to the local council- who were also über-helpful)

Travelodge got back to us within days, completely refunded the price of the stay, were very apologetic and explained what measures they had taken since we lodged our complaint (not saying that I am naïve enough to believe it all, though). We did send photos of everything through to them too.

I know not everybody has had this experience, having read through all the threads I can see the variety of responses (if they were lucky enough to get one). Reading the threads certainly helped us to know who to email and how to approach the complaint. I know some say you get what you pay for but we were paying a reasonable amount and even if we paid £10 a night it wouldn't matter- customer service should be a basic courtesy, if noone fights against bad treatment it only gets worse.