Hotel Britannia Excelsior

I was staying at a nearby hotel. The Britannia is closed for refurbishment. There is considerable negligence by the new owners. The pool on the lake is breaking up and even though this was happening in June when I last visited, no effort has been made to repair or remove it in the last 6 months. While staying my sleep was disturbed every night by the creaking and banging of this feature as it finally gave up the ghost. It sounded like a couple of out of tune saxophones accompanied by an anvil being banged. When I left, the thing was looking more like the Titanic and the seating had presumably disappeared into the lake.

I’ll begin by mentioning both me, my partner and my 70 year old grandma contracted norovirus after eating at this hotel on our very first night, and that it’s the worst part about it- we often laugh at how bad of an experience this holiday was for us all. Not to mention how unhelpful and vile Janet on the front desk was to my step mum, exclaiming it was our fault that we were having such a bad holiday for booking a 3 star hotel to begin with!!! We couldn’t believe how rude staff were, this was all on the first day of course. Our rooms stunk when we walked in, it was a fishy dirty smell. The smell of the rooms topped with our norovirus symptoms staying in what I can only describe as the Italian version of Cecil hotel with their prehistoric curtains and dodgy maintenance truly made this a holiday to remember. Don’t stay here please, your stomach and your nose will thank you.

Just returned from a week’s stay and overall was a good experience. We got a welcome drink on arrival and our bags were put in our room while sipped our treat. The hotel is right on the lake and the view across is stunning. Breakfast was slick and varied apart from one day when there was an influx of new guests. The pool was really good and a real sun trap. The main town is only a short stroll from the hotel so again a tick in the box. We didn’t pay the extra for a lake facing room but that doesn’t bother us. No tea/coffee in the room but was kept clean daily So as a hotel a recommendation is in order, staff always friendly.

March 2020 my partner and I paid alot of money to stay. The pandemic hit. We were given a voucher . Today I contacted the hotel to ask to use the voucher . I received an informal, rude reply "hotel close ,your voucher expired,sorry Francesca" . Firstly , there is a pandemic so how could we enter Italy? Secondly there was never an expiration date on the voucher because of Covid19. Why is this seen as an acceptable way to treat your customers who spend money to be denied their money back then just treat us this way ?