WORST HOTEL FOOD ON THE PLANET HOTEL BRITTANIA LAKE COMO

Click here if this is your business
Shearings Holidays
★★★☆☆
2.7
41.0% of users recommend this
  • Accommodation

  • Customer Service

  • Food

  • Facilities

  • Location

  • Value For Money

Click here if this is your business

maggieandpartner's review of Shearings Holidays

“WORST HOTEL FOOD ON THE PLANET HOTEL BRITTANIA LAKE COMO”

★☆☆☆☆

written by maggieandpartner on 14/05/2015

LOCATION-LOVELY IF YOU JUST WANT TO SIT AND DO NOTHING-OTHERWISE ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO DO-NO NICE WALKS ,NO SHOPS etc etc. Public areas of hotel quite nice but bedroom VERY basic. We decided to pay extra for a balcony and lake view room. Would not take a card payment-had to be cash. Lovely view from 'balcony'. Too small to actually sit on. Door would not close. Air conditioning did not work(engineer came twice but could not fix it).English tv advertised on sheet in room-not available in our room ever because no signal-again engineer could not sort it out.
Blood on all 4 pillows in our room.
Entertainment -horrendous -meant we were in our basic room every night from 9.00pm to get away from the awful organist who 'plays'the most awful'music' and apparently has done this at this hotel for at least the past 10 years!!! A bit of English tv would have been good each night but we had to read ,talk and go to sleep.(incidentally we are not great tv watchers when we are at home).
Now the worst thing about the holiday was the 'FOOD' served at this hotel.
Biggest lack of choice ever.Meats?I have no idea what we were eating-no flavour to anything.Some weird tasteless white meat every night.Lack of vegetables and lack of fresh fruit (and we were in Italy for heaven's sake!)One lunch time the only 'Vegetable' was heated pickled onions and I mean that no other vegetable whatsoever.another day we had beefburgers (at least these DID taste quite nice)but with chips and....wait for it....ARTICHOKES!!!!!!Dessert every night and lunch time was cake -the same cake in 2or3 different guises, oh and plenty of ice cream.
We arrived early Sunday morning(8.30 am-ish)and we were not allowed ANY food until dinner at night WHY???-no breakfast and no lunch.On return day we had to leave our room at 10.00am -we were allowed lunch but no dinner even though we didn't leave the hotel until 8.00pm -again why???
We have travelled worldwide staying in anything from 3* to 5*hotels always all inclusive at least twice a year and often 3 times a year and have NEVER EVER had to leave our room at 10.00am (mostly 12 midday which is so much more acceptable)sometimes 4.00pm.When I asked about this very early time I was given a mouthful of abuse by the most horrible Scottish woman on reception-be very wary of her.I could not get a word in whilst she shouted a torrent of abuse at me.All other staff were lovely.
WIFI was mostly impossible to get-but that really was the least of my worries.coach driver and his wife(also coach driver) were very good.We would never do a long coach journey like this again,I am still getting over it some 3-4 weeks later. Most people seem to be happy with this form of travelling.We can't wait for our next real holiday in a couple of months time-with fab food in a hotel we use regularly where we can stay in our room on departure day until at least midday.We can eat what we want right up to departure and then a FLIGHT home.
Trips were ok.St Moritz train -beautiful views all the way but then stuck there for 2 hours with nothing to do and nothing to see(everyone else felt the same way)and it was freezing!(Not worth the price paid) Gorgeous place right opposite our hotel Baraggio(I think was the name)-that IS worth visiting,very quaint cobbled streets and lots of lovely little shops.Free boat trip quite nice to see the villas of the rich and famous.
We had so looked forward to this holiday-especially to eating wonderful Italian food-what a disappointment.

  • lake como Italy

    Location of Hotel

  • April 2015

    Date of stay

  • All inclusive

    Board Basis

  • Accommodation

  • Customer Service

  • Food

  • Facilities

  • Location

  • Value For Money

If you are commenting on behalf of the company that has been reviewed, please consider upgrading to Official Business Response for higher impact replies.

Harrington-Hadleigh's Response to maggieandpartner's Review

Written on: 27/05/2015

My heart does really feel for you...The occasional report like this brings back awful memories of what we experienced with this outfit...Admittedly we have experienced one good break with this company but the other one we tried was a disaster from start to finish...The problem here is they rely on two things...1. The pile them high and sell them cheap, philosophy and 2. That very few people complain and just bury their heads in the sand because of the cheap price...If you ever dare to complain or take the to court part of the settlement is they ban you for life, especially if they know you are going to win...You can get lucky and get a reasonable cheap break for about £400 each, however if you buy any of the big ones, you are taking a serious risk...The Italians don't do hospitality I know my dad was one and was in the industry...You might think they are the most friendliest bunch in the world, but at the end of the day, they are out to take your money...I think the lady who runs this place is from Scotland who married an Italian or a second generation Scottish/Italian, if it is the same person, i have heard good things about them on other sites, this would indicate that they have their favorites, or regulars...Shearings is basically what it says and does on the tin...If you can get your head around the foibles then you are lucky, if not then there could be real big problems...

Reply to this comment
If you are commenting on behalf of the company that has been reviewed, please consider upgrading to Official Business Response for higher impact replies.

Jackedward's Response to maggieandpartner's Review

Written on: 28/07/2015

NATIONAL HOLIDAYS IS THEIR SISTER COMPANY

Reply to this comment
If you are commenting on behalf of the company that has been reviewed, please consider upgrading to Official Business Response for higher impact replies.
Was this review helpful? 0 0