Coulsdon Homestays

Arrived today at the hotel at 1500 to check in having booked disabled room plus one other almost three months ago. The receptionist apologised to me and said lift wasn’t working, but an engineer was currently at Rotherhithr and would be there in two hours. As my 89 yo mother uses a wheelchair and we had travelled five hours to get there that was a bit irksome, but I arranged for us to do something else until lift was ready. The said they would call when it was working. At 1800 I had heard nothing so called and was told engineer had four hours to attend and would be there soon. 1900 called again, no engineer and Sharon reiterated the four hour slot and there wasn’t anything she could do. I told her that my my mother wanted her room as she was very tired and she made some calls. She reiterated the four hour rule, I reminded her that at had arrived at the hotel at 1430 and it wasn’t working then either. She chose to be one defensive mentioning I didn’t check in until 1500. That is correct but I was with family there earlier and it had already failed before I checked in. I asked her to make alternative arrangements for us for the night and she said she would try. What that actually transpired was she said there was no hotel nearby with rooms and she couldn’t help and I could have a refund. Hardly helpful, and she didn’t seem to realise the gravity of an 89 year old lady needing a lift to get to a pre booked room and that a refund was not the answer, but good customer service was needed. I asked her to contact her management to arrange something. She tried but to no avail. I called advise her that within ten minutes I had found hotels nearby (and trust me at this point I’m stressed and getting irritated that she seemingly had no intention of helping. She couldn’t have tried hard as the local premier inn had availability (I told her first it was a travelodge but she chose to patronize me that there wasn’t one on the Purley way - and anyway the room was a available. Thatnlast statement is correct but without throwing Ann elderly lady over my shoulders it was inaccessible. I went to the hotel alone to retrieve bags dropped earlier and still she argued that the room was available and that the lift engineer was there! The lift still didn’t work and rather than argue with this woman kept repeating she could do NOTHING And that the room was available I chose instead to deal with another member of staff - retrieved bags to go and collect my mother and stay elsewhere. We will return tomorrow for the remainder of the stay and I will raise in person with the general manager. My family is spending around £1000 at this place for a special event this weekend. Some empathy would have been in order, and there is the issue of breach of contract i intend to raise with the general manager on this occasion. I appreciate things do go wrong but it seems there is no plan to deal with an event such as this. I feel the woman was possibly willi