HÔTEL DE FRANCE ^{* * *}

J’ai séjourné deux nuits dans cet hôtel en juin durant une période de forte chaleur. À mon arrivée, j’ai constaté que la climatisation ne fonctionnait pas dans la chambre. Ce point n’avait pas été mentionné au moment de l’enregistrement.||En posant la question au personnel, il m’a été indiqué que le système de climatisation central était en panne depuis plus de deux semaines, et qu’aucune réparation n’était prévue à court terme en raison du coût élevé du devis. ||En plein mois de juin, dans une ville comme Aix, l’absence totale de climatisation est problématique. Ce qui m’a surtout déçu, c’est qu’aucune information préalable n’ait été donnée aux clients.||Je comprends que des pannes puissent arriver, mais je considère qu’un minimum de transparence aurait été nécessaire, d’autant que le tarif de la chambre est resté inchangé. Cela a eu un impact réel sur mon confort durant le séjour.

Probably one of the worst hotel experiences. The air conditioning was not working, and this made my stay unbearable for 2 nights. The staff made excuses and could not do anything about the air conditioning. Otherwise, in a central location of the city, clean room, breakfast is basic and not worth paying extra for.

My advice? Look elsewhere. One very graceless, unprofessional receptionist who could not hide his impatience when I was slow to give my name ( all whilst I gave him a printed confirmation with all my details on it, which he ignored). Room unlike any advertised on their Booking.com, so very deceptive. Tiny, airless, with a fridge that didn't work and nowhere to put belongings. Air con didn't work properly, reported twice then gave up as they clearly had no intention of helping ( previous reviews suggest this problem goes back months if not years, so how utterly cynical of the management not to rectify this for paying clients). The fan in the room also points to this being an ongoing established problem. Really uncomfortable and dehydrated at night. Stayed 2 nights and when room was made up, towels were taken away and not fully replaced, leaving us with one hand towel and one bath towel. Bottled water also not replaced. Breakfast was fine but goodness, awful milk! Breakfast staff lovely. A small group in a corner of the breakfast room had laptops and were clearly having some kind of marketing meeting. If only they'd asked. A good consistent level of 'accueil', comfortable temperatures in these extreme heat conditions, rooms that properly reflect the online photos- these are worth far more than establishing further 'online presence' unless you are only interested in one-off visits ( sadly I suspect this to be the case).
In short- invest in the hotel not your online presence with platitudes about being delighted to welcome us (The guy in reception was anything but!). And train all your front of house staff for a more consistent and happier customer experience.

Maybe change the thumbnail photo that advertises this hotel. It is rather misleading. Firstly, I cannot fault the location. A perfect spot for a stay in Aix. However, not a great start. We arrived to find the reception unattended when we wanted to check in after a tiring train journey from Nice. Just a phone number to call on a note on the front desk. Eventually we got our key cards only to find our double room was tiny. An extremely small double room. There was nowhere to unpack our luggage into apart from a wire coat stand with a dusty shelf. No drawers anywhere. Conversely the bathroom was bigger than the bedroom; a ‘wet room’ shower which made the entire floor wet, and a bizarre mirror with a shaving magnifier that would only be suitable if you were three feet tall. Worst of all, the AC was faulty and the room was boiling hot. When we first entered the room it was sweltering. There was no control for the AC in the room. We called reception and someone came up to check and had to go and find a handset. When he returned with one he pressed a few buttons and left us to it. We assumed the room would cool while we were out for dinner. Unfortunately when we got back the room was about 40 degrees and soaked in humidity; the problem was not resolved and we had a very uncomfortable night indeed. When we raised the issue again in the morning a more helpful staff member assured us that the problem would be resolved while we were out. I requested we be moved to a different room if the problem could not be resolved and, when we returned a couple of hours later, we had been allocated another room. This room was far superior so we were much happier. There was however an overwhelming smell of insect spray which was quite disconcerting. That night we had to open all the windows as the AC was still inadequate. We didn’t bother complaining again as we preferred the larger room and we were only staying 3 nights. We overheard some other guests at reception complaining their room had been infested with flies! Perhaps that was the chemical smell we had in our room?|We had two keys so that we could keep the power on in the room while we were out and we returned to find the key card gone and the room in darkness. We had medication stored in the fridge that had been off all day. No explanation offered for this, they just gave us another key card.|Some of the reception staff were really rather surly with us after we had, quite rightly, asked for their help. It was rather odd that the hotel appeared to be managed by teenagers who didn’t know what they were doing; more like a youth hostel. Sadly we were pleased to check out in the end. I’m guessing there was a problem centrally with the AC but it could have been dealt with in a much more refined way rather than treating us like it was our fault.

Wir hatten ein Prestige Zimmer gebucht, was laut Bebilderung auf der Hotel Homepage sehr schön aussah. Als wir ankamen wurde uns ein Zimmer gegeben, das in keiner Weise dem Angebot entsprach. Das Fenster ging in einen engen, sehr verschmutzten Innenhof mit Küchen- bzw. Friteusen-Geruch und konnte wegen des ekelhaften Geruchs nicht geöffnet werden. Im Zimmer hatte es 28 Grad und die Klimaanlage funktionierte nicht. Nachdem wir das reklamiert hatten, versprach uns der Rezeptionist die Klimaanlage richtig einzustellen, als wir ausser Haus gingen. Als wir wieder zurück kamen war alles unverändert. Wir reklamierten nochmals, dass wir bei der Temperatur nicht schlafen können, sie sollen uns ein anderes Zimmer geben. Die Antwort war, sie seien ausgebucht und hätten kein anderes Zimmer und die Klimaanlage sei halt schon alt und er könnte uns einen Ventilator bringen. Die Nacht war ein Alptraum. Wir reklamierten nochmals beim checkout und es wurde uns dann zum Glück nur die Ort-Taxe verrechnet.