07.07.10

avoid staying at ‘Hotel Southern’ in Delhi

Posted in Uncategorized at 1:09 pm by admin

My friend Gururaj Vasudev had a very bad experience at ‘Hotel Southern’ in Karol Bagh, Delhi – read his experience below and avoid staying there at all costs!!

“ Fresh from our stupendous stay at Goa, me and my wife landed in Delhi on 30^th of June in the afternoon as part of the last leg of our vacation. We had booked Hotel Southern located at Karolbagh area in New Delhi (package of five days and four nights @ Rs.15,260/-) in Executive Suite room. We were promised a host of things during the package starting from welcome drink to tour package to Agra/Mathura and sightseeing in an AC car.

We were promptly picked up by the hotel guys and transported from the Airport to the hotel in an AC Innova. We thought our memorable tour of Goa will be continued in Delhi too but only to be disappointed thoroughly.  We were given a room full of mosquitoes and badly maintained linen (the room is supposedly called Executive Suite. We could not stay in that room even for a couple of minutes and request the reception guys to give us a different room. There was no welcome drink, no fruit basket, no slippers (we had to ask several times for these); they gave slippers of the same size to both of us and that too of very low quality. Surprisingly, they agreed and allotted us another room which was no better than the earlier but at least we thought we are safe from mosquito bites.  I thought of taking a shower and went inside the restroom only to come running out on seeing a centipede which was freely roaming inside the restroom. My wife became too agitated and immediately called the hotel guys. They sent one house keeping boy sometime later and he removed that centipede. When we went there to vent our frustration, the reception guys replied as though it is our fault and assured it will not come again as though they knew the future. This is the first trouble we encountered at the hotel. We later realized that in that room there are more centipedes which were roaming freely day and night. We had a nightmarish sleep on that night.

The next morning we had to proceed to Agra/Mathura package. To our dismay we found that the Volvo bus was leaking when it rained (Southern Travels was accorded the best Domestic Tour Operator a couple of years back…).

Once we came back from the tour, the same night we approached the reception guys to help us out with a new room (third time we changed the room in two days); they gave us another room in another building. Fortunately, the room was not the home for centipedes though mosquitoes were having a gala time. We thought it is better to have a mosquito as our partner rather than a centipede.

Next day we were proceeding to Haridwar early morning and had requested them to make arrangements for hot water. They promised that it will be available but again the same story of disappointment; there was no hot water and we had to take cold water bath and rush to the railway station. It was a mad scramble even to get the taxi from the hotel which showed how disorganized they were.  In our five days of stay at the hotel, we could get hot water only once.

We need to ask several times for water, coffee and tea sachets (which were all promised as part of the package). There was no exhaust in the toilet too.

The last nail in the coffin was we were asked to go in a old maruti van after we vacated the hotel as against the promise of AC car drop to the Airport.

Overall I would say the stay at Southern Hotel was a nightmare for both of us and we will never ever again even step into that hotel. “

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