Booking a hotel room for 1 adult, 2 children...

bylromarha

CupOfChai wrote: »

OP -is this Travelodge?

No. I've just got back from travelling round Cambodia and Vietnam with my kids. When in Cambodia, I booked several hotels for Vietnam via hotels.com and I'm now putting a complaint through as we constantly were given 1 double bed for our bookings. Despite booking for 3 people, 1 double bed room was offered as apparently that's all we paid for.

The descriptions were not at all clear whether they could fit a rollaway bed in the room or not, sometimes they could and we paid the extra, sometimes the couldn't and we had to pay to upgrade the room. Sometimes we just had to grin and bear it and be grumpy with each other as no one could sleep well. 1 time, there was a double and a single (YAY!) Either way, by the time we turned up, we'd had to pay for our booking already, so it was too late to walk away.

I began emailing ahead to hotels, and found they were not able to accomodate a rollaway, so we frantically scrabbled for a twin room pre arrival so the kids could top and tail at least or upgrade to a family room if they had one.

hotels.com think I'm the one with the problem as I don't think 1 adult = 2 children. 3 people need 3 bed positions when they're all over the age of 6. Just wondered if it was me who had the problem as Expedia (who own hotels.com) are much bigger than lil ol me!

bylromarha

Just checked on the UK site as wondered if the problem was because I booked in Asia.

The room we upgraded to in 1 hotel is being offered by hotels.com as holding 2 adults and 2 children. The room has 2 "slightly bigger than single" beds in it (my description from experience, not theirs on the website). No room for a rollaway in the room. How are these good descriptions?!

fabforty

Isn't it just a case of the person booking specifying what they need instead of expecting a computerised booking system to work it out for them? My understanding of it is that a double room is a double room i.e. a double bed or two singles - anything more is a bonus. If you need additional space you ask for a roll out bed, king size bed or a family room. For many parents in this situation two rooms would be a no-no, as they wouldn't want children that age alone in a hotel room. Whereas there may well be some people who would be content with one room and a double bed, especially if it kept the costs down.

balletshoes

fabforty wrote: »

Isn't it just a case of the person booking specifying what they need instead of expecting a computerised booking system to work it out for them? My understanding of it is that a double room is a double room i.e. a double bed or two singles - anything more is a bonus. If you need additional space you ask for a roll out bed, king size bed or a family room. For many parents in this situation two rooms would be a no-no, as they wouldn't want children that age alone in a hotel room.
Whereas there may well be some people who would be content with one room and a double bed, especially if it kept the costs down.

i'm surprised anyone would want that, one double room for one adult and 2 children aged 8 and 10 - no-one would get a decent sleep, would they?

Spendless

When we booked a hotel room in the UK recently, although we put in 2 adults, 2 children the website didn't de-fault to us needing a family room (even though 4 people mean 4 bed spaces in my eyes). This is even with the kids ages being in put. We needed to further select that we needed a family room.

According to hubby who books hotel rooms a lot with work, this is common. This is unlike if you book a holiday with say centre parcs or Butlins where their system automatically tells you how many beds/bedrooms you will require.

Is this what hotels.com is saying, that you needed to further specify how big a room you needed?

fabforty

balletshoes wrote: »

i'm surprised anyone would want that, one double room for one adult and 2 children aged 8 and 10 - no-one would get a decent sleep, would they?

They may or may not. If it was for one or two nights, they might think it was doable (not ideal but manageable) , especially if it was a lot cheaper. I'm not saying that they would, but my point was that it should be up to the person booking to specify what they want/need especially when booking online.

missbiggles1

I think the basic question is, did you book a double room or a family room? If you booked a double then you were given what you asked for.

*Robin*

Vietnam? Ah, expectation of guests' size might be the issue. A Vietnamese lady, travelling with her children aged eight and ten, in all likelihood would fit easily into one double bed.

One of my lads worked there last year. In his 'photos, he's taller than most of his male colleagues, while his GF is the about same height as the female teachers. He's 5'5", she's 5'0". In one picture DS is surrounded by his class of Vietnamese ten-year-olds - who aren't much taller than his Caucasian nephew (age four).

Maybe book three adult beds next time?

duchy

If you booked a double room -that's what you got. A double and a double/double is not the same thing.

Very deceptive poll IMO -I did wonder why it was so short on detail -it's clear why now. OP wanted people to ignore cultural differences.

bylromarha

One of the many rooms I booked, and checked back on now in UK was a "superior room". There is no detail of the beds in it, but there are icons next to the room of 1adult, 2 children. The picture shows 1 double bed, which would have been fine had a rollaway fitted. This is not clear from the picture.

The hotel also says you can hire rollaway beds for 317000 per night. The room does not say whether it can hold a rollaway bed or not.

The room we upgraded to was a "deluxe room". Again, no details of the beds, but icons of 2 adults, 2 children next to it. Again, no details of whether it can hold a rollaway. The room was a twin room holding slightly larger than single beds. The deluxe room could not hold 1 rollaway, let alone 2.

I've stayed in the deluxe room and know the beds are about 10cm wider than a UK single. Looking on hotels.com, and inputting 3 adults, apparently the deluxe room is suitable for 4 adults.

I've input 1 adult, and 1 child and a double room is offered, so the superior was an upgrade from the standard double.

I'm not sure cultural differences come into it...if it's a double room, it's for 2 people, no question I thought whether you're in Asia, America or UK. Hotels.com probably would say it was for 4 though. If it's a superior room and rollaways are mentioned in the hotel description, but not for specific rooms, then people are booking blind.