Pukaki Holiday Apartments — Hotel in North Island

TERRIBLE SERVICE We were booked to stay here for the weekend of the Rotorua marathon in Sept 22, and unfortunately 3 out of 4 of us ended up getting COVID the week we were to travel, so to remain in isolation at home during this time was the only option. After pleading to request a partial cancellation fee, we were charged the full stay amount of $758 and to add to that, Pukaki Apartments also added on a debit card merchant fee of 3% (YES, DEBIT CARD FEE!) without even advising prior to this, that this charge would be incurred as well (Consumer law NZ states that this needs to be advised prior to any payments being taken from debit cards!) When we enquired about this extra debit card charge, the reply was because we were not physically there with the debit card to process the cancellation transaction. After emails back and forth with the hotel management (Matthew) requesting to reschedule so we could at least utilise the accommodation that we had been fully charged for, we were given an option of re-booking with a window of 2 months, which of course offered limited availability as to when we could all travel. After many years of booking accommodation, never have I ever experienced such poor service and lack of empathy when groups simply cannot travel, especially the group cannot travel due to COVID related illness. To add to our terrible customer service experience, we have been advised that the alternative weekend that they have offered us will however incur an additional $160 for 2nights which has just added more insult to...

Very central location and easy stroll to everything. But there's a catch. The apartment is very clearly mouldy (spotted mould on every window of the apartment extending to the kitchen sill, bathroom, living room). It is bad to such an extent that the living, kitchen, and one of the bedrooms constantly smelt of mould, no matter how much we tried to air the place leaving windows open during the day (of course after cleaning the window openings with wet wipes to first get rid of the accumulated mould). For the first two days I wore a mask inside the place, no.. not for Covid. Reason was the constant mouldy air, that you couldn't ignore. The bathroom doesn't even have a fan. The apartment is old and tired, but that doesn't mean you can let out a mouldy building to innocent travellers and benefit from the earnings. I highly doubt the place has any insulation, since it was very very cold. The only existing heat pump was in one rear end of the apartment, which was cleverly regulated to NOT heat up beyond a point..leaving you cold and miserable. There are clear signs of weather-tighness issues as can be seen on kitchen sill corner and window sill above the stairs. Ours was a first floor apartment... I feel sorry for the ground floor apartments, they will obviously be worse off, inadequate ventilation, cold, damp, mouldy place to spend your holidays in. I hope future travellers can read my comment and make an informed decision before booking Pukaki Holiday Apartment. Save yourself an...

The place is in a handy location walking distance to city etc. Self check in which was great for us travellers. The only thing is we were on ground floor in the corner with very little natural light so had a dungeon feel, the people above us were partying until 5am, stomping around , yelling and dropping things right above our room so unfortunately we got absolutely no sleep.

We asked to have second night refunded as we wanted out! Owner said no of course and referred to cancellation policy (30 days!!!) Then there’s signs around about noise policy and that you’d be charged $200 to compensate for other guests, when I asked about this the owner replied “not in all cases, and for me to stop being offensive”? I’m sure none of the other tenants would see this $200 either. You’ll also be charged $50 for leaving dishes behind, they also put 3% charge on the card you use so the price went from $769 to $800 for 2 nights.

The advertisement said ‘elegant room’ which was far from, was pretty tired looking and balconies a mess. State of bathroom pretty grotty with mould in the creases. There’s just a hand soap pump available in shower. It’s false advertising! If your going to book here then at least get an apartment up top where your not going to be stomped on all night and maybe just book for 1 night because you probably...