We have had our travel agent book us hotels for Florence, Rome and Siena. I have been reading some of the threads on here and I found the name tripadvisor,com. I went there and our hotels were literally trashed. I am ready to cancel trip on these reports. If one can not trust one's travel agent who can you trust. How do I know that anyone is even telling the truth when they say a hotel is good location, good price, good rooms. Help

Hi Cromwell,

If you gave us the names of the hotels, perhaps we could tell you something about them.

I think you can trust the reports you read on places like tripadvisor and the reports here on Fodors more than your travel agent, who may not have any personal experience with the hotels. Have you asked your travel agent whether he or she had stayed in these hotels?

While not every report on the internet is accurate, you can detect a pattern of responses. Every place has a negative comment or two based on people's individual stays, but if the majority of reports are positive, that is a good sign.

Thanks Ira
The names of the hotels we are registered at are as follows
Rome - Giglio dell' Opera
Florence - Hotel Goldoni
Siena - Hotel Italia

I have never found one thing good or bad about the Siena one though.

Thanks for any help

Bottom line - you don't. What's a palace for one person is a dump for another. There are some people who find fault everywhere they go.

When booking my trip for the Italian Riviera I read conflicting reports for many of the hotels i was considering. And many of the hotels I contacted gave me the run around. I've made my reservations and for the grace God go I. There is only so much I can do.

I've noticed some negative reviews were written by people only staying one night in a place - and they were expecting the best room (duh!). If you had someone staying a week - who's going to get the better room?

I find the reviews on TripAdvisor very useful. They are descriptive and seem thoughtfully written (by real folks who've actually stayed there). You can easily tell which folks tend to be more critical than others.

As for travel agents - well, they are picking unknown (to them) hotels from a catalog, usually based only on ratings (based upon ammenities available, not "niceness" or service), price, and location.

With so many hotels everywhere, it is no surprise that hotels with the same rating, at the same price, next door or across the street from one another, can be a world apart in "niceness".

With the enormous resources on the web nowadays, I would never rely on a travel agent for hotel choices.

Hi cromwell,

If you enter the names of your hotels in the "search this forum" box, you will find one nice comment on the Goldoni, and a few on the Italia. The Giglio didn't bring up any hits.

Sorry for your dilemma. We recently had a similar experience (although our hotel wasn't chosen by a travel agent). I read some really bad reviews for the hotel we had reserved in Denver.

Our impression of the room we had was considerably less critical than those in the reviews I read. Granted, the room was far from the best we ever had--the rug was worn and a little shabby (as was the rug in the hall), some of the furniture was scratched, and our view was over an airshaft, none of which ruined our stay. The hotel has fabulous public rooms, convenient parking, and a restaurant we absolutely loved. In addition, the location couldn't be beat.

Your current situation is one reason we don't use TAs any longer. Since we have learned to plan our trips ourselves, we have been infinitely happier with the overall experience.

I'm sure it will all work out well for you. The cities you are visiting are so special, the quality of your room will hopefully become much less important (as long as it is clean and reasonably comfortable). Good luck.

When I saw the thread title, I thought to myself: what an unfortunate name for a hotel!

Hi Cromwell 43,

When are you leaving? If you're not within the hotel cancellation period, you may be able to get out of the reservations, and find other hotels that suit you better. Of course, you'd have to figure out what's fair with the travel agent ( some of them insist on a small cancellation or change fee), but I'd be tempted to show her/him the poor reviews you've found online and go from there!

If you are able to work this out, post again with your exact itinerary and budget. You'll find lots of helpful info from other travellers on the forum.

Good luck!

I haven't ever used a travel agent for hotels, and haven't used one in years for anything since the internet, but I think they can serve a purpose for some things, some people, and some specific kinds of travel.

I haven't ever had a good experience with a travel agent, the few times I used one many years ago, but I think a good travel agent can book decent hotels and that it is unreasonable to expect a travel agent to only recommend hotels they have personally stayed in. That isn't possible, nor even advisable. A good travel agent should have some idea where the hotel is located, however. If they are good, they could have ideas about a hotel from reading guidebooks, travel literature, travel magazines, and from experience with their own clients.

I think most travel agents just book hotels where they get commissions or that cooperate with agents or large tour groups, or that are part of large chains, though. I think if you use an agent, you have to ask them WHY they are recommending certain hotels, and whether they have ever been to the city, at least. If not, a bad agent could just be relying on booking sites or promotional literature to believe a hotel when it says it is near the center, for example. I would also check for myself exactly where a hotel is located in reference to the city and sites and public transportation. It seems like you'd have to know that anyway, just for planning your visit and what you wanted to do. I know that removes the idea that a travel agent just does everything for you without you having to spend any time, and there may not be much time saved for hotels. Although even then, having a travel agent book one could remove a small amount of time you'd spend making the reservations, and if you like them because they can get good air fares, or something, it might make sense.

Some top travel agents can get some discounts at certain hotels or some priorities, although I think this tends to be more for the expensive category of travel.

How typical. Most travel agents will opt for a catalog property where they will be assured of commision payment. Or, hitch hike on tour company hotels, which is always a bad idea. Search on this site and also go to slowtrav.com for other reviews.

I would never use a travel agent. Who can you trust instead? Yourself! My thinking is that *I* care a whole lot more about my successful vacation than they do. As mentioned, unless an exceptional situation, many travel agents are picking from catalogs, sometimes in cities they have never even visited. As far as how do you know if a hotel is in a good location - get a map (seriously) and see what neighborhood it is in, what it's near to. About other things get on the BB's - this one and others and the various hotel review sites, not to mention good old fashion guidebook listings, travel magazines, etc. Even the hotel's own website, if there is one (although these can be misleading since photos often look better than the reality, but take that into account). It's really quite easy since you obviously know how to use the internet.

(in parenthesis) I thought this was the name of a new boutique hotel when i saw the header. LOL

cmt: very funny

I swear to God, I will never book any hotel again without using TripAdvisor. Useful is not the word- that website can save your entire vacation! Even though I've lived and worked in London,been there a zillion times- for my upcoming one week trip this summer- I spent a few hours going through about 8-9 hotels on TripAd-and since the majority of reviews were overwhelmingly negative as to the hotels I had selected (an all too common problem with the London hotel scene, alas!) I nixed every one of them for an apt. that I believe will be okay-as the one poster said, you need to use your judgment, read the reviews carefully, and if the majority are negative-don't go there!

Let me say this again: TripAdvisor is INVALUABLE as a travel tool!

If you decide to use a travel agent be sure to use one who has either stayed at the hotels in question or has done a lot of traveling in the city/country. Otherwise its simply the blind leading the deaf - they don;t know any more than you do and have less interest in the results.

(I used to have a great travel agent that I used for reserving my trips to europe but about 6 years ago she had to give it up - because the income just wasn't enough. Have not since them been able to find one who knew anyhing about the cities where I was going and so just do it all myself. )

Typically if you look at enough diferent sources you can find what you need to know about the hotel in terms of location, amenities etc and at least the basics of quality.

I have always found TripAdvisor to be a good source - as long as you read between the lines - discount the obvious "whiners" - who paid $150 for a room and then complain they didn;t get the GeorgesV. If most people trash a hotel there I would assume they really had something to complain about.

Selecting a hotel is always something of a balancing act. You need to understand what you really want/need in a hotel vs what your budget is. I would be tempted to say you get what you pay for but it is perfectly possible to get less than what you paid for - and even - rarely - more than what you paid for.

What's most important for us is location - so we pay for that and may take a somewhat simpler hotel - or a less expensive room - and sometimes find we're upgraded for free.

Granted this can be a lot of work - but its part of the trip planning that we enjoy. If you really hate it you may be better off with a package from one of the arilines - then you just need to do basic research on the few options they offer. Or - there are travel agents out there that are experts on europe - if you look at the index of T&L or CN Traveler they have articles with lists of the expert agents - but they won't be cheap!

Suggest you reread the TripAdvisor reviews of the Goldoni - it was hardly trashed. 3 of the 4 reviews were quite positive and the 4th was mixed. Based on those reviews i would not hesitate to stay at the hotel - unless there were specific things in the review that were different than hotel attributes you had been promised. For a modest hotel the reviews were surprisingly upbeat.

I think tripadvisor's reviews can be counter productive.

Whilst, all the hotels I've stayed at that have received ALL positive feedback, were as expected, very good - however, those with moderate comments I also f ound to be excellent, and conversely those with on the whole good comments I found to be lacking.

Some people are too sensitive to "thin walls" and other noise, unless you sleep with ear plugs, there will always be some sort of noise. Of course, paper thin walls are undesirable, but some people will never be satisfied.

I think one should always be fair in reviewing a property - if you've paid an ultra low rate, accept that you won't be allocated the same room as someone who's received the rack rate. Furthermore, some people on tripadvisor appear to be naive about luxury properties, when writing about them - one person "...you didn't need to carry cash in the hotel, you could just sign for everything" and another "..after taking drinks in the bar they were so insistend on us signing for it, it was irritating" - if you don't sign, then you'll be complaining at check out dear!

Some people....

I totally agree with Ny and MK- if you're a relatively inexperienced traveler, Trip Advisor might not be as useful as it is to an experienced traveler, who knows how to parse through the complaints of those who like to complain over nothing, or are totally unused to traveling in foreign countries-but I maintain it is an invaluable travel resource in order to get an idea of the property before pressing that buy button, and making a huge mistake....as for travel agts., I've never used them, and never will-total waste of time- now with internet resources, and any sort of travel savvy- you can do much better on your own- and be totally in control of your travel plans-which for me is imperative.