Victoria Hotel Oxford

I booked this hotel because they had a large family room. I have 2 young daughters and it was not safe to have them in a different room.

Although the room we got was the one shown on their website, the conditions have deteriorated. The beige carpets had mouldy patches, the paint was flaking off, TV poor reception, saggy beds, drawers that would not slide open smoothly.The next day i noticed shattered glass under the shower stall, probably lunswept from an earlier renovation (I have photos of that) and that the bathroom floor still had drops of water which were left from our showering the evening before. The room was so damp and dank that the floor would not dry. We began to understand the reason for the mouldy carpet.

The English breakfast they served the next day was too salty, greasy and unhealthy.

Later that day we found the conditions unbearable and unsafe for the children and asked what the penalty would be to cancel our reservation for the remaining 2 nights. That was when things got really ugly. The lady turned hostile and started shouting at me, asking me what I was unhappy about. I could barely get a word in because she kept yelling at me, making me so upset. The next day we decided to forfeit the GBP240 for the 2 remaining nights. The young man at the reception again asked why we were unhappy with our rooms. We did not manage to go very far down the list of complaints because he accused us of making up allegations, without first investigating.

We had decided to forfeit GBP240 because the room and service were appalling. Would we lie? When we threatened to write about the bad service on the internet, the young man said that he would counter it with glowing testimonials about his B&B. How rude and dishonest are they?

This B&B is not run by a typical english family. It is being run by Eastern Europeans with extremely low standards. The young man at the reception kept insisting that the rooms were wonderful and perfect. We are world travellers and have stayed in many B&Bs in England - my husband studied in England and is an Oxford alumnus. This is the first time we have been treated so rudely at any B&B.