We stayed in Fabio’s studio from 23/11 til 27/11. A few days before leaving, we informed Fabio that we would arrive in Rome around 11 AM and asked if we could perhaps check-in a bit sooner, since the check-in time for this room was 2 PM and since the room wasn’t booked the days before our arrival. His answer was hard to decipher (I guess he translated an Italian text into English via a translating website), but we could understand that this was possible, if the cleaning lady could manage to get there a bit earlier (check-out time = 10 AM). This was a bit strange, since no one had to check-out: the room wasn’t booked for several days. We asked him again in simpler English and also in French (perhaps this was easier for him) to check if we understood correctly, but never received an answer. We arrived in Rome around 10:30 AM. We called him that we were on our way and would be at the apartment around 11:30 AM. He called his house keeper to ask whether she also could go to the apartment, so that we could already meet for the keys and leave our baggage. He made it seem as if she would be there really soon (maybe she lives 15 min. from the apartment, Rome isn’t that big after all). We arrived at the apartment at 11:30 AM and waited until 11:45 AM. We called Fabio to check if she was on her way/maybe already inside (since there’s no bell to ring with his name, or the name of the apartment). He confirmed us that she was on her way. Unfortunately, we didn’t see the house keeper until 1:30 PM – which is 2 hours later. He could have told us she wouldn’t be there soon, so that we didn’t have to wait. Yet we didn’t make an issue of this: after all, we were in Rome to relax and didn’t mind waiting. We assumed this to be “normal” in Rome/IT: perhaps they have different definitions of “soon”. Or maybe she had some difficulties with the public transport. The house keeper was friendly, yet very hard to communicate with; she had Spanish roots and could barely speak English. French was no option at all. It then became very clear why there was no possibility of simply picking up a key or being let in by a neighbor for example: We apparently had to pay 28 € tourist tax, immediately and cash, to the house keeper. We assumed this was a misunderstanding, since everything was supposed to be paid through Airbnb. There was also nothing mentioned about an extra tourist tax, to pay upon arrival, on the web page of this room. He changed the web page afterwards and now the tourist tax is mentioned (in Italian). Since communicating with the house keeper was very hard, she called Fabio for us. He confirmed: we had to pay 28 €, immediately. Since Airbnb is our “payment medium”, we asked him if he was sure (maybe he was confusing us with another booking, not via Airbnb). We also asked if payment afterwards, via Airbnb, was possible. All answers were negative, this was no option. We asked if we could at least receive some sort of proof/receipt of this payment then. This was possible “afterwards”, he would e-mail it to us (for you information: at this moment, 2 weeks later, we still didn’t receive any proof of this payment!). We tried to explain that we really needed some proof, which doesn’t seem so odd. You can’t just pay for something without getting anything in return. Fabio lost his patience and got mad at the phone, with the words: “I don’t like you” and “go find yourself a hotel”. We couldn’t simply “go” to a hotel and perhaps lose all the money we already payed to stay in this room. The only option we had, was to pay the cleaning lady – which we did. With no proof of our payment. This gave us a really bad feeling, as if we were scammed. Not such a great start of what should be a relaxing trip to Rome! We barely didn’t dare to leave our luggage at the studio, because of this very un-friendly encounter – but we had no choice. He kind of pushed us against the wall. The room wasn’t cleaned at that moment, but since the check-in-time was 2 PM, we didn’t make any issue of this. We received the key and the house keeper told us it would be ready in an hour. Since she arrived at 1:30 PM, check-in time became 2:30 PM instead of 2 PM – 30 min. later. We can’t help but wonder… 1) Why they couldn’t clean the place sooner, since the room wasn’t rented the days before we came. 2) Why he made it look like coming earlier was no problem, though he didn’t do any real effort to let us check-in in earlier (he could have simply said: No, that’s not an option) 3) Why he couldn’t simply (for example) make us sign an agreement of paying € 28 via Airbnb afterwards + with the confirmation that we would receive an official document stating that this € 28 was indeed a tourist tax (and not simply some cash “bonus” for him) We came back an hour later and the apartment was clean. A few remarks though: 1) Don’t call this place an apartment, it’s nothing more than a really tiny studio of 18 m². 2) There’s a certain smell in the room, also in the closets – I could still smell it in all of our clothes when we got home. We tried to ventilate the room as much as possible, but it didn’t help. 3) The toilet has swing doors which you can’t block. Since it’s a really tiny room you always get “smacked” by the doors. 4) There’s some electricity in the shower that’s unfinished. Not really...