Hotel Alcala del Rio in Santiago

First of all, I don’t know why they won’t let me review this hotel after I made a booking on booking.com . Pretty unusual?

First of all, the hotel is actually great and pretty decent for the price. The payment is where the problems start.

When you book, they say if you pay in dollars you won’t have to pay the local tax. What they don’t tell you is that they won’t take payment from a debit card, forcing you to either pay in cash (I’m from Ireland, we use euros), or pay in the local currency and pay the tax. Unfortunately, I had to pay the tax, but would have appreciated if anywhere on booking.com it was stated that their card terminals don’t accept debit cards for payments in dollars. Was pretty stressful and annoying.

Other than that, staff were friendly, I felt safe and secure, room was cleaned and left spotless every day, breakfast was okay, but they were very slow to replace anything that ran out, so if there was something you wanted to eat for breakfast, you had to wait half an hour for it, even for certain cutlery or bowls too.

I wanted to give 4/5 stars and if they actually specifically state which payment methods are accepted, it would be great. In saying that, it was hot when I arrived and I was a bit agitated, but the hotel didn’t help. Also, if you’re the manager of the hotel, please unblock me so I can review you on booking? Thank you.

The location is good, rooms are decent but very basic, breakfast also is basic and they didn’t allow me to refill my water bottle. My main issue was the wi fi, terrible connection

Lots of women's hair in the room and bed linen
24-hour reception - ok
Breakfast without variation - ok
I didn't use the pool - it seemed ok
Room - ok
Cleanliness, I didn't like it, there was a lot of women's hair in my room (1st night), then I found women's hair on the bed linen. On the 3rd day I asked for the room to be cleaned, and they didn't vacuum it, the bathroom and bedroom floors still had a lot of women's hair. Note: I'm a man, I was alone and my head is shaved!

Theft by Maids.

The hotel was super clean. I was surprised. The room was comfortable. The staff were very polite and attentive. The hotel met my expectations. Unfortunately, my room was robbed on a day when I did not authorize cleaning. I was surprised when I arrived in my room and realized that my perfume was gone. I immediately spoke to the management, who were very helpful and apologized profusely. They agreed to deduct some of my daily rates. The next day, when I arrived at the hotel at the end of the day, I was surprised to find that my perfume had been returned. The maid told me that the perfume had mysteriously fallen into her cart. I was very upset and disappointed with this situation!

It was very uncomfortable for me as a customer.

Other than this, the hotel met my expectations.