Edinburgh Travelodge ‘worse than a landfill’

The Travelodge apparently did not provide a comfortable stay for at least one tourist.Picture: Ian Georgeson

Scott Harvey reckons he suffered food poisoning at the hotel in central Edinburgh that was so bad he was confined to bed for several days.

To make matters worse the student from Chattanooga, Tennessee, claims the wi-fi was rubbish, that he couldn’t reach power sockets, and staff kept him awake with random fire alarm tests.

The Furman University exchange student wrote about the St Mary’s Street Travelodge under the headline “Toxic landfill”.

He complained: “Before booking your stay at this hotel, I would recommend checking to see if there are any landfills, waste dumps, or street corners vacant in Edinburgh.

“They will undoubtedly provide more livable, less hazardous, and, certainly, less expensive accommodations than this vile, repulsive, irredeemable place of lodging, if that is even a title which it can be bestowed with.”

He added: “I have stayed in some truly horrendous establishments during my tenure on this Earth, but I can say, in very good faith, that none of those come close to reaching the depths of despair achieved by this hotel.”

Scott was in Edinburgh for one semester and says that while he did not expect the Ritz, he was shocked by his week long stay at the budget hotel, which was yesterday quoting online up to £82 a night.

Scott wrote on TripAdvisor: “On one evening, some friends and I decided to dine at the ‘hotel’s’ ‘restaurant’. I ordered fish and chips, assuming this to be a safe decision, given that this dish is a traditional staple of British cuisine.

“What I was served with, however, would’ve been sent back by even the hungriest of prison inmates.

“Tasting the food once was a traumatic enough experience, but tasting it twice, as I vomited it up the next morning from food poisoning, is something which I am prepared to go as far as lobotomy to erase from my memory.”

Scott said that once confined to his room it was almost impossible to enjoy the comfort of keeping in touch with relatives back home.

Referring to wi-fi, he wrote: “Essentially, the only option that I had was to purchase a week’s worth of internet for £12, the same price for which I could’ve bought four £3 burritos from Pancho Villa’s restaurant around the corner from the hotel.

“And having purchased and endured the wifi for a week, I can truly say that the burritos would have been a far better investment.

“Not only was the internet slow, but it consistently kicked me off of the network and rendered me unable to send text messages to my friends and family updating them on the state of my illness.”

“The third year English undergraduate went on: “The lack of conveniently placed outlets was also quite a nuisance. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

“What is a man to do, you might ask, when confined to his room at this hellhole, sweating, dizzy, and sick, with no wifi and all outlets placed at insane distances from the bed?

“Sleep, of course. Yet this Travelodge was incapable of satisfying even this most basic of human needs, awakening me from my slumber not once, but twice, for seemingly random 5 second tests of the fire alarm system, which, I can assure, was functioning just fine.”

Staff at the hotel, which has a four out of five star rating based on 692 reviews, responded: “Many thanks for submitting your review. We understand that your overall experience was not exceptional and we do apologise for this.”

A Travelodge spokeswoman said: “Our Edinburgh Central Travelodge is a very popular hotel and receives an average score of four out of five stars on TripAdvisor. It is unfortunate that the customer did not feedback directly to the hotel team, so that we could personally respond.

“Our competitive WiFi charges are clearly displayed on our website and within our rooms to make customers fully aware of the charge. The fire drill is a legal requirement and took place at 12.30pm, and a notice was placed in reception to inform guests that it was taking place.

“We are asking the customer to contact us directly so that we can respond to their feedback.”