Mama Shelter Belgrade — Hotel in City of Belgrade

Hi, this is the email I sent 4 days ago without a response, hopefully I might get at least an acknowledgement now

To the attention of the reception management,

I hope this email finds you well.

Allow me to reach out to you as I have been informed that you will reach out following my 1 night stay on the 2nd November 2024, without any contact other than your automated survey email.

Allow me to begin by thanking the reception team on the evening of the 2nd and the morning of the 3rd for taking the time to listen to me, visit my room to see the issues I found and hopefully share them with you in detail as your team has taken pictures on the evening of the 2nd.

I write to you as I am a fellow hospitality professional working and would rather contact you directly and give you another chance at recovery in order to have a proper review of your business. For the sake of clarity, my goal is to be reimbursed for the majority of the amount spend for the room rate.

This request comes from the disappointment of my overall stay mainly about the cleanliness of the room. As a fellow hospitality professional, these are the things that I noticed, your carpets are heavily stained, your caulking around the bathroom floor, under the sink in my room and the shower area show signs of beginning of mould or deep soap residue, all metal parts are uncleaned and have heavy liquid stains in the bathroom, the toilet seat is either very chipped or not cleaned and to top it all, there was fabric and dust hanging from the shower head. This made me stop wanting to understand further how the state of the room was, thinking that this room was dirty.

After seeing this, I met your reception team who listened to me and offered to show me two rooms and after seeing the first one, I informed that the issues seem systemic and do not show any signs of improvement. I followed up by inviting your receptioninst to see the issues of my room and I will let you discuss with her on what she also noticed so you can best understand her point of view although I explained all these issues mentionned above. She kindly informed me that you only have house attendants at that time who could not clean the room as requested as your HSK team left at 5 PM. In my opinion, this is your business decision not to staff your hotel with HSK past that time and it shows that you are unable to recover a situation as I am describing.

The recovery offered on the evening was to send HSK in the morning although i was checking out and needless to say did not allow me to have a feeling of comfort in my room. If I can add, I did not feel at ease to shower and left without doing so althoh i had just driven from thessaloniki and was taking the road to Verona region.

In the morning, I checked out asking if the team had any information about my feedback which they hadn't and promised to have a manager contact me after I shared that the rate does not compare at all to the service offered and would like a refund.

If I may further add the following points that challenged my short stay:

Parking access was unclear and could have a specific Mama shelter zone. I didn't know if I needed to take the ticket although it was part of my rate

Check-in was far too long and regretfully awkward due to the system issue and unwilligness to let us go through to the room and come back to finish

I received an email after my booking that I had nothing left to pay at the hotel and was informed I had to pay 'again' on site

The lift system is a real maze

Finding the entrance to the hotel after midnight is very confusing.

Please do get back to me withing 24h, I hope you can appreciate my detail of explanation and would like to finally be reached out after having been told twice that a manager will get back to me.

Wishing you a great remainder...

Disappointing Service and Unreliable Experience

My stay at Mama Shelter Belgrade was deeply disappointing, marked by poor service, inexperienced staff, and underwhelming room quality for the price.

Airport Transfer Issue I booked and paid for a taxi transfer through the hotel's website and received written confirmation. However, upon arrival at the airport, no driver was present. When I called the hotel, the receptionist was dismissive and unhelpful, initially accusing me of not making an official request. She then abruptly hung up, claiming she was too busy because another client had arrived at the desk.

After two more calls, she finally located my reservation and admitted they had forgotten to arrange the transfer. Her “solution” was to offer me the return transfer—something I had already paid for. Why call it an "offer" if it’s simply fulfilling what was promised? This felt disingenuous and unprofessional.

I took a cab on my own and discovered the flat-rate fare to the city was €10 cheaper than the hotel’s transfer fee. It left me feeling overcharged and misled.

Check-In Disaster When I arrived at the hotel, I explained the situation and showed proof of payment, which included confirmation that my booking was fully prepaid. The receptionist, Evica, seemed confused and couldn’t find my reservation in their system. Instead of resolving the issue, she criticized me for booking through Accor Hotels, not directly with them—even though their website routes reservations through Accor, the parent compagny! Does she even know that Accor is the parent compagny?! And if their booking system is “wrong,” why is it active?

After much back and forth, Evica begrudgingly located my booking. She informed me my room wouldn’t be ready until 3 PM (it was noon) and told me to return later. Exhausted, I asked if I could at least complete the check-in formalities and store my luggage while I explored the city. Thankfully, her colleague stepped in and arranged this—something she should have done without hesitation.

Payment Problems Evica then claimed the hotel never received my payment, despite my written confirmation. As the payment was made via my employer’s credit card and it was a Sunday, I couldn’t verify the transaction immediately. To proceed, I had to use my personal card, and she blocked the reservation amount temporarily. When I asked for a transaction copy, she rolled her eyes, made a snide remark in Serbian (which I understood), and continued to treat me with disdain.

Her unprofessionalism was shocking and left a sour impression of the hotel.

Checkout Disappointment At checkout, I informed the young, polite receptionist that I had only consumed one breakfast instead of two. He explained he couldn’t adjust the bill since it had already been paid but assured me he would pass the request to accounting. Over a month later, I still haven’t received the refund. This lack of follow-through is unacceptable.

Conclusion Mama Shelter Belgrade failed on every level—from unprofessional staff to unreliable services. While one or two employees showed basic customer care, the overall experience was tarnished by disorganization, a lack of accountability, and a complete disregard for guest satisfaction.

Would I stay here again? Definitely not. Mama Shelter Belgrade needs serious improvements to match the reputation of the...

As a Serbian native living abroad, I was very disappointed with almost every aspect of my stay at Mama Shelter Belgrade.

The only two positive points I can highlight are: • The exceptional location in the very center of the city. • The support of the reception team, especially Aleksandar, who genuinely tried to assist us during our stay — we are thankful for that.

Unfortunately, the rest was far below expectations: • Infrastructure: The hotel layout is confusing and inconvenient. Reaching some rooms requires a long walk and sometimes even two elevators. It feels like a labyrinth.

• Rooms: While acceptable at first glance, the details are troubling — moisture stains on the walls, dirty windows, and unclean bathroom joints.

• Restaurant & rooftop: The design is nice and the food is decent, but the prices are unreasonably high for Serbia, and the quality does not match the cost. You can easily find far better food at local restaurants for much less.

• Service incident: One of the restaurant hostesses spoke to me in Serbian in an unprofessional, almost hysterical tone when informing me that the rooftop was closed. This happened even though I explained I wasn’t going to order anything and was simply waiting for friends.

• Basic amenities: We requested an iron upon arrival and never received one during our three-day stay. Additionally, you will only get a tiny soap in the bathroom that serves like a shower gel, shampoo and facial cleaner. We were expecting an easy to use pump, which is standard in the hospitality industry.

• Taxi service: The receptionist offered to arrange a taxi to the airport, quoting around 4,000 RSD (€35). Knowing local prices, I booked a Pink Taxi myself and paid 1,800 RSD (€16).

Given all of this, I truly don’t understand the overly positive reviews. To me, it feels like foreigners are being overcharged and misled.

Absolutely not...