City Apartments Edinburgh — Local services in City of Edinburgh

Reviews

Queen St Apartments TLDR; A bit grim. No wifi. Did not receive what I paid for. Awful customer service. Zero frills. Misleading pictures on booking.com. Clean. 1 star.

If you are the kind of person who prides themselves on not complaining no matter how bad the service, then this is the place for you. When you begin your journey with Queen Street Apartments (QSA) you receive a flurry of emails with a list of disclaimers prepping you for disappointment. Since my booking was non-refundable, this felt very much like a “gotcha!” moment, but I remained hopeful.

Unfortunately, these hopes were as well-placed as a toaster in a bath. QSA have taken the concept of “this’ll do” to new lows as I discovered from the discomfort of my basement “Queen Deluxe Apartment”.

Both the building and rooms operate with a code-lock. This means you can enter your room without picking up keys from the non-existent reception. It’s a brilliant coup from QSA: remove the reception to 1) cut operating costs 2) make it difficult to ask questions about your stay.

The entrance to the building was as inviting as a public toilet. The apartment I entered was much worse than the one I had booked. I had paid for a room with a sofa which was missing (more on this later), and a room with wifi (also missing). My first reaction was “Hmmm, this doesn’t seem right, let me double check the booking…”

“Oh wait, there’s no wifi! Well, at least I have mobile data to check the details.” No, no, that would have been too easy. My room was in a basement (converted dungeon?) with zero phone signal. At this point, I could feel my cheeks flushing with frustration. It was a real-life riddle: in order to check my booking and contact QSA, I had to physically leave QSA.

I found a nearby bench and was grateful for a break in the rain. With my 4G restored, I found a contact number and called it. It rang. It was answered. Not by a human however, but a recorded message: an American voice saying “you will now hear six options”.

Only two options were semi-relevant. I followed the first of those and a robotic voice said “Please send a text message to this number. Please send a text message to this number. Please send a text message to this number.”

You’ll be surprised to learn that the idea of initiating a text conversation which would necessarily have taken place outside the room in question, was not appealing to me. I dialled the number again and chose the second semi-relevant option. This time, a different message told me to send an email.

At this point, I realised I was being mugged off, and boy did they know it. It’s an old trick: sell a service that is barely passable then make it difficult for the customer to challenge.

I decided to find another hotel where I’d have means of communicating with the world outside my basement. I found a cheap and comfy room which – and this is the best bit –had phone signal and wifi. Luxuriating in all the radiowaves, I called the QSA number again and chose another “emergency” option which put me through to a human. Whether it really was an emergency is up for debate, but if that’s what it takes to talk to someone (anyone!) from QSA then I’ll happily cry wolf.

I explained to the woman on the phone that I was mis-sold the room and that there should have been a sofa. Her response to this was combative and accusatory: “But you are just one man. Why do you need a sofa bed?”

Before I answer this question, I would like to flag one thing. The question “Why do you need [X]?” is not something you want to hear after you’ve just bought [X]. Imagine you’ve just paid for two mugs and the shop assistant only hands you one of them and says “But you are just one person. Why do you need two mugs?” You’d probably say something along the lines of “please give me my mugs so I can leave this shop and never come back.”

I have exceeded the google review character limit, but QSA have not responded to my emails and and text messages. Save yourself some hassle and stay...

We stayed on one of the ground floor rooms, we payed for a double bed and a sofa bed, we wanted the sofa to be able to relax on it when we pleased but there what no sofa bed or sofa in our room, when i contacted julia to query this the immediate response was if you dont like it you can leave, i mean i paid extra for a sofa for a reason so i wanted it but that response was nothing but poor customer service, as it happened i was on a tour in the Highlands so my signal was in and out, the call ended and next thing you know i had a notification from booking. Com saying the property has cancelled your booking for the second night this really upset my partner as all our stuff was in there and the was nothing we could do, they later called and said it was thier mistake on our original booking offered me 20% back that imstill waiting on, an i asked why we have been cancelled i was told i thought it was what you wanted, Ridiculous and ruined our day that we paid alot of money for worrying for the most part if our stuff will be on the street when we get back, then went to have dinner there was one fork for an apartment who in thier right mind gives ypu one fork for a room that is supposed to sleep 4, then the walls are that thin and rubbish we was woken up at 3 am from the people upstairs until 4.30 and we could hear every word, they wernt particularly load it was just the poor renovation job done in these apartments, lastly done expect a lie in at all you up at 6 with and army of pigeons that live down the side of the building banging on the windows from 6am, no instructions on where is best to park cost me £44 on top, i would avoid this place...

Terrible. We were meant to stay there for 3 nights, but we checked out after the first night because we couldn't stand it. The room looked like a hospital, or a prison, the carpet on the floor looked like it hadn't been vacuumed in years and the bathroom was just as disgusting and filthy. Also, there were no cupboards or closets in the room, so we had no place to put our things, let alone to have a lock on the cupboards to feel like my belongings are safe. Hostels have those things because strangers end up in rooms together. I couldn't fall asleep all night long because I was traumatised, there was some guy smoking pot in the bathroom, and in the morning there was a complete stranger sleeping on the couch in our room, covered with a jacket. So security is just horrible. To sum it, if you want to get a disease, or get robbed or whatever in your sleep by strangers who just enter your room, come to this place. I will...