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Hello customer service,

I would like to make a complaint  about a specific hotel, booked
through your service.

Manly Seaview Motel
19 Pacific Street
Manly 2095 NSW

http://www.wotif.com/hotel/View?hotel=41135

I am sure you would agree that based on this description, they claim
to offer broadband internet access:

  STANDARD ROOM
  Book & Pay Securely
  (Minimum 2 nights stay) Rates are for 2 Persons - 1 bed.
  Maximum occupancy 2 Persons. MINIMUM STAY OF 2 NIGHTS ON WEEKENDS

    * Air conditioning
    * Balcony
    * Broadband Internet access    <<<< look !!
    * Fax/modem telephone line     <<< clearly not the same
    * Ironing equipment
    * Opening windows
    * Tea/coffee making
http://www.wotif.com/hotel/View?hotel=41135

I made the booking on that basis, relying on being able to work from
my room during the week and a half that i would be staying there.

On arrival, I was told that there was no broadband access. They then
told me that there was dial-up access (I live in France. I'm going to
call an ISP in France from Australia, to get 56k access??), then
stated that dial-up and broadband were the same. Then, changing their
sroty, they tried to claim that 'broadband' and 'dialup' were
identical. After that, they put the blame on Wotif, saying that you
told them to say they had broadband (I suspect this is not the case).
Lastly, they invited me to steal some wifi access from any domestic
hotspots that might be in range. (Several were in range, clearly not
associated with the hotel, and also wisely protected by passwords).

I feel that this misrepresentation of their facilities is
unacceptable. Since the entire booking was already prepaid through
your site, there was little I could do on checkin; and after a 21
hour flight, I was not in the best shape to argue my position or to
start looking for an alternative.

Please let me know how you intend to deal with this situation. I am
visiting Australia on business, and I depend on broadband access to do
my work.

Sincerely,

-- 
 Chris Lilley                    mailto:chris@w3.org
 Interaction Domain Leader
 Co-Chair, W3C SVG Working Group
 W3C Graphics Activity Lead
 Co-Chair, W3C Hypertext CG

Received on Sunday, 4 March 2007 23:51:19 UTC