Safestay London Elephant & Castle — Hotel in London

Subject: Complaint

Dear Mrs,Mr

Thank you for your detailed response and for taking the time to address my concerns. However, I would like to clarify some key points regarding my stay, as it seems my overall experience was not fully acknowledged.

Upon my arrival at around 4:45 AM, after a long and exhausting flight delay, I was extremely surprised to find that the room assigned to me was already occupied. The room contained another guest’s personal belongings, and they had slept in the bed that was supposed to be mine. When I returned to reception to request a cancellation or refund, my request was denied. Exhausted and left with no other options, I accepted a different room.

Unfortunately, this new room did not resolve the situation. The poor hygiene and uncleanliness of the facilities made it impossible for me to rest or even use the shower. The conditions were far below what I expected, and this greatly affected my stay. To make matters worse, I was forced to stand in the hallway for two hours, waiting for breakfast at 7:00 AM, which I had paid for, in the hope that it would help me forget this nightmare. After paying £8 for breakfast, one receptionist was understanding of my complaints, while another was quite rude, adding to my frustration.

While I understand that refunds may not typically be offered in such situations, I must emphasize how significantly this experience impacted my stay. The failure to provide a properly assigned and clean room, combined with the rudeness I encountered, does not reflect the level of service I would expect from Safestay.

I kindly ask that you reconsider my request for a refund, given the circumstances. I sincerely hope that steps are taken to prevent other guests from experiencing similar issues in the future.

Thank you again for your time and consideration. I look forward to your response.

Sincerely,

Subject: Complaint

Dear Mr. RESPONSABLE CUSTOMERS SERVICE

Thank you for your detailed response and for taking the time to address my concerns. However, I would like to clarify some key points regarding my stay, as it seems my overall experience was not fully acknowledged.

Upon my arrival at around 4:45 AM, after a long and exhausting flight delay, I was extremely surprised to find that the room assigned to me was already occupied. The room contained another guest’s personal belongings, and they had slept in the bed that was supposed to be mine. When I returned to reception to request a cancellation or refund, my request was denied. Exhausted and left with no other options, I accepted a different room.

Unfortunately, this new room did not resolve the situation. The poor hygiene and uncleanliness of the facilities made it impossible for me to rest or even use the shower. The conditions were far below what I expected, and this greatly affected my stay. To make matters worse, I was forced to stand in the hallway for two hours, waiting for breakfast at 7:00 AM, which I had paid for, in the hope that it would help me forget this nightmare. After paying £8 for breakfast, one receptionist was understanding of my complaints, while another was quite rude, adding to my frustration.

While I understand that refunds may not typically be offered in such situations, I must emphasize how significantly this experience impacted my stay. The failure to provide a properly assigned and clean room, combined with the rudeness I encountered, does not reflect the level of service I would expect from Safestay.

I kindly ask that you reconsider my request for a refund, given the circumstances. I sincerely hope that steps are taken to prevent other guests from experiencing similar issues in the future.

Thank you again for your time and consideration. I look forward to your...

I'm not a natural fit for hostels, but from time to time London's high accommodation prices force me to look at options I wouldn't consider otherwise.

The Safestay in Elephant and Castle was one of them.

It's cheaper to book from their website directly, and so that's what I usually did when I stayed there.

There's always something happening in the Walworth, Camberwell and Elephant and Castle areas which surround the hostel. It was a privilege to explore them.

I stayed at the hostel during a abnormally colder springtime. So it was satisfying to arrive at the heated hostel after a night out.

There are privacy curtains on every bed at the hostel. This made a real difference in terms of how comfortable I felt there. It's the main reason I would stay there again.

There are many shower rooms on site. While I was there some of the showers worked, and some of them didn't. Some provided hot water, others didn't. They all used a stop / start push button system, which was not always comfortable to use.

The hostel provides free linens and storage lockers (guests have to buy their own padlocks for them). They don't provide free towels though, which is a shame. That said, I imagine this makes keeping the hostel clean much easier.

The housekeeping staff at the hostel were notably upbrupt.

If I was ever at the hostel at the same time that they were, they'd bring a brash, jarring energy with them.

At some point, I think they decided to drop all pleasantries and start barging into rooms on the site in order to keep the place tidy.

Having said that, the toilets were admittedly routinely decimated by the guests at the hostel - and yet the building was often made clean rather quickly afterwards. I have certainty stayed in dirtier accommodation than the Elephant and Castle Safestay.

The hostel's interior is minimal, and so when it was cleaned it made a huge difference. It wasn't too hard to feel at ease there in regards to cleanliness post-COVID.

The desk staff at the hostel were sometimes personable and attentive - and sometimes they were a completely embarrassing, amaturish mess.

Members of staff would occasionally tell you different and contrasting things about the hostel's policies.

The check-in line at the hostel was often long and unmoving. I was held up during check in at the front desk repeatedly - even when I had checked in online prior to arriving.

Once I arrived at the hostel to find out that the establishment had no record of my latest booking. It took over 20 mins of protesting for me to set them straight. It was astonishing.

One time I came back to the hostel to find another man in my assigned bed. Apparently, he was the victim of an administrative error.

It's basically a lottery in regards to who you are allocated a shared dorm with. Some of the other guests I was automatically grouped with at the hostel made my stay hellish.

One guest I got bunked with was offended everytime I turned in my bed. Another took my charger and hid it without telling me, in order to "protect" me from theft. Another would cough loudly anytime anyone in the room made a move across the dorm.

Still, the disruptive behaviours of the other guests didn't seem to be a priority for the hostel. There was no one to go to if any guests started to act out.

On the other hand, the bar on the ground floor of the building introduced a lighter, jovial vibe which helped balance out the hostel's...

-EDIT2: - They edited their review to make it look like they hadn't called me a liar. Awesome job team! -EDIT: I have now essentially also been called a liar for expressing my opinion by whomever responded to this review at SafeStay. I'm going to go ahead and knock off the additional stars I actually gave the company. You'll see in the response the referred to "it's in the small print." Instead of being like every decent hostel around the world they throw the unexpected inconveniences at you with the excuse "it's in the small print." Still no explaination as to why we weren't informed the moment we were split up (if it was fully booked 2.5-3 WEEKS before the date, why weren't we informed at that point?), given any other options or apologies, or why the front desk area was so dirty. My guess is as originally pointed to: poor organisation and because of their "it's in the small print" fall back, they can be lazy with their management and use that as an excuse.

We were split up last minute, when we specifically paid extra to both we booked into a 4-bed dorm, to increase chance to share room together with less people. We should have been informed the moment the decision was made and offered an alternative or given enough time to book elsewhere. We booked almost 3 weeks before our stay. This is extremely unprofessional and disorganised service, Staff at front desk seemingly couldn't care less, all the supervisor had to say was "it's in the small print you might get split up." No apology or empathy. Having worked in hostels and travelled to 40-50+ hostels this is extremely rare. When I got home I confirmed my suspicious and asked all my buddies who worked on reception in hostels and they said they never had to split up people, UNLESS the hostel is poorly organised and managed - this appears to be the case with SafeStay, The carpet in the reception area was covered in trash, most of the tables were covered in empty cups, spilt drinks, and they were left for hours without being cleared/wiped down, The hostel charges for everythings, things you'd usually expect to get for free: towels, to store luggage in a locker before check-in time, £5 fee if you lose the plastic key card. Considering the price of a single bed in a dorm room this seems very stingy, Drinks at bar are comparative to pubs around London, whereas usually you'd expect for hostel prices to be more affordable, No public fridges/kitchen facilities, so people had to leave food laying around the room, Advised to AVOID drinking water in bathrooms, only one place to fill up water bottles on the ground floor from a canteen, My friends key card randomly stopped working and he was trapped in the stairwell, For positives the bed was clean, and so was the bathroom. Location is ok, Overall disappointed, and wishing we went with the other options for hostels in London we had...