The apartment was not accessible by our van and our group had to be let off outside the city center and we ended up unloading everything from our van and taking 2 taxi cabs to get to the apartment in the city center. Not only that, the apt address was a pedestrian-only street and not accessible to taxis so again we had to get off a block away and had to lug all our stuff and luggages by foot to the apt. When we arrived, the host was not in the lobby so we had to knock on apt doors to look for him. Worst of all there was no elevator and to our surprise the apt was on the 4th floor! This omission of this fact from their listing (that it was a 4th floor walkup and no elevator) appeared to be misleading as such an important feature should have been disclosed to prospective guests. Had we known it was a 4th floor walkup apt with no elevators, we would have not booked this apt. We are all seniors over 70 (5 females and 1 male) and with health issues, and not used to climbing stairs, let alone 4 long (not short !) flights of steps!
When we located the host, and asked if he could assist in carrying our luggage upstairs, we were rudely replied to that “This is not a hotel!” . We practically begged him, because we obviously could not carry our heavy luggages up 4 flights of steps without assistance. He did finally help with a couple of the bags but most of the bags we had to drag up ourselves, stopping numerous times along the way trying to catch our breaths. Being seniors and some of us under medical heart maintenance medications, we were afraid some would collapse from this difficult task. We were all the more worried for one of our companions had a bad fall during the transfer from van to taxi and had to be taken to the hospital emergency where she stayed overnight.
The first night of our stay we discovered the ac was not working in one of the bedrooms and in the living room. Obviously the host knew about this because he sent a message the following morning advising that a technician would be coming to fix the ac’s. This was not disclosed to us when we arrived.
I understand the host has posted a review describing us as rude and uneducated etc etc. On the contrary, we thought him to be rude, having to make us beg him to assist with our luggages! We were asked if we wanted to cancel or transfer, but we were all exhausted and irritated at the way we were treated, and had no patience to deal with looking for another place let alone move all our stuff back down the 4 long flights of steps! We felt stuck with no place to go! Besides we had to deal with having to take our companion to the hospital emergency, and that was our primary immediate concern.
The host’s review described us as leaving the apt dirty. The bathrooms were left in “used” conditions and more than fairly clean. The kitchen tops were wiped clean, all used plates, cups, glasses, utensils, pans were washed clean. I don’t think we need to clean the place for the host. A cleaning fee was part of the fees we paid.
As for our late arrival, when we informed the host of our initial planned estimated arrival of 5-6pm (we were driving from Lourdes France) we did not receive a reply. Then we tried to contact airbnb customer support and advised them we did not receive a reply and told them we will be arriving between 6-7pm or later. Then we finally received a reply from the host to just call 30 mins before arriving, which we did. The delayed arrival was due to our companion having fallen on the sidewalk (hitting her head on cement!) trasferring from van to taxi on the way.