The Spanish Suite - Campo de 'Fiori — Hotel in Rome

DO NOT STAY HERE. The rooms are nothing like they are advertised on the website. This very much felt like a bait and switch. My wife and I were on our honeymoon. We had to book this last minute due some difficulties with our travel plans, and we're incredibly disappointed with what we found.

The lobby is the most attractive part of the building. We checked in, and then we're taken out the front door down and down an incredibly dirty alley way and lead into a first floor room that immediately smelled of mildew. It was not decorated at all, and it appeared as if they were still painting. We were beyond disappointed, but we figured it was fine because there was no way we could know that this would happen.

Being excited to be in Rome, we dropped our things off and immediately headed out. Upon our return we learned that the front door that was supposedly locked with a code, would open with a gentle push. It did not lock at all. Our room was on the first floor. So that got my hackles up, but then we discovered that the bathroom window would not complete seal, and ALL of the street noise filtered in. After this discovery we contacted the front desk.

They offered us a second room. It was on the fifth floor and was very secure. We took a look around and found black mold EVERYWHERE. The front desk tried to explain it away but the windows would not open and there was no circulation in the room either. Neither of us have health problems, but there was no way we would be staying in that room. It looked nice until you looked a little closer.

We ended up staying in the original. It was a place to sleep. I'm writing this to warn others. I know that this review might seem a little biased, as we were on the last remaining days of our honeymoon, exhausted and quite honestly, just expecting more. The website is not to be trusted and if our room DID look like the pictures online, it wouldn't have been so bad. Long story short, this is not a hotel. This is more of a hostel adjacent domicile. I've stayed in more comfortable, safer and cleaner road side motels.

My poor wife. She wanted a luxurious end to our honeymoon (which we already had but we were unable to adjust our stay at the original hotel) instead she got a basement room that smelled like mold. She's a trooper though and despite it all she still says...

We booked flights (Perth, Western Australia) at the start of Jan 2020 (pre-COVID official pandemic announcement). We went through Booking.com and booked a non-refundable reservation on 25/01/2020 for our trip during August (Europe trip - stay in Rome mid-August).

After the COVID19 pandemic announcement was made, we touched base & got told that cancellations weren't accepted as the lockdown period for Italy did not currently extend to August. All fine.

We received notification around 8/6/2020 that our flights were cancelled (at time of writing this, Australia still has no intention of lifting travel restrictions for leisure travel). We then proceeded to contact each reservation to see what options were available to us.

The photos shows the correspondence between myself & The Spanish Suites. The purpose of this review is to warn potential other customers that the way they conduct business is highly unethical. Long story short, they had not charged my reservation during our early June correspondence. I had notified of them of this during discussions about what options would be available to us. Immediately after receiving my message to them that no charge had been made as of yet, they immediately charged my card the full amount of the reservation and cheekily extended their 50% voucher to the end of August 2021.

I'm not disputing that they had a no right to take money from my card. I did book a non-refundable reservation. I'm disputing the fact that money was taken before a resolution was found - we were in the middle of conversation. This has shot all confidence & trust I had in this company to do the right thing by the customer. I also don't believe that after the correspondence that I entered in to with Spanish Suites, that if I was to accept the credit voucher & re-book, we would receive good customer service. I never got to correspond (directly) with any Manager following the charge made to my card; customer service staff are not to blame, they were only following directives made by the management and after no apologies for the actions they took, I wouldn't put it past this company to not muck us around if we were to ever stay with them.

Book with...

A building site with no staff at reception!!

This place is a real disappointment, I can see now why it is 50% off (still over €100 a night - we stayed for 4 hours and left)

The rooms in this place are actually quite nice and the location is ideal which is the only reason it didn’t get fewer stars from me.

This place is a building site spread over at least 3 different buildings across the piazza. The floors and walls are covered in cardboard and sheets while the walls and fixtures are actively being renovated and painted. The whole place stank of fresh paint and our items were covered in dust from dragging our stuff down corridors barely wide enough for a suitcase. The elevator is like something out of Final Destination barely fits two people and feels like it could drop at any moment with glass walls showing the sharp tools and workers working as it crawls up floor by floor.

The worst part - the reception is in a separate building behind a glass security door that YOU CANNOT ACCESS FROM THE OUTSIDE without being left in by reception. Which would be fine… if the staff were ever there!! We arrived to find a group of four guests already had been waiting in frustration calling and knocking for an unknown length of time before us and my poor wife was sick and desperate for the toilet. Nobody answered the phone, nobody answered the bell, I had to EMAIL the gmail address (dodgy?) provided in my booking confirmation before someone came to open the door. Sadly the chap was very nice and friendly, checked us in promptly, and was good vibes but the damage was done.

Little did I know that process would repeat itself when we tried to check out on our way to the airport, we waited outside with all our bags for 10 minutes while our taxi arrived and waited for us. Nobody showed, nobody answered the knocking, nobody answered the email, and with no alternative way to checkout I had no choice but to post the room key through a letter box back in the other building and take a photo.

Don’t forget to add on the local tax when you look at the prices of this place like I did - it’s not as cheap as it seems and WAY worse than...