'I paid €890 for my holiday and spent week sick of rice and desperate for chips'

Irish Daily Mirror

2 days ago

With the summer holiday season just around the corner, many people across Ireland are gearing up for well-deserved getaways. But for one tourist, what was meant to be a relaxing break, turned into a "nightmare" she won't soon forget.
Susan Edwards, 69, from Westerhope in Newcastle upon Tyne, paid €890 for an all-inclusive seven-night holiday at the Lido Corfu Sun Hotel in Greece, hoping for sunshine, good food and quality time with her family.
Instead, she found herself "sick to death of looking at rice" as the largely local food menu left her group - which consisted of her cousins, aged 77 and 78, her daughter, 30, and second cousin, 50 - frustrated.
Susan said the holiday "was horrendous from the minute [they] got there". The hillside hotel, she claimed, offered limited dining options and steep ramps that made even getting around a struggle. After arriving around 2pm on May 12, the group were told poolside food wouldn't be served until 5pm, which Susan described as "one-inch square of baklava".
Susan was especially disappointed with the menu, claiming there was "no English food" available. Speaking to Newcastle Chronicle, she claimed: "It was all-inclusive, £750 (€890) each we paid and there was no food we could eat. I have to be careful because I have ulcerative colitis so there's certain things I can't eat.
"On a morning you could have toast, a hard boiled egg or something in sauce. There was no bacon. For breakfast there was mozzarella and sliced tomatoes. There was no hot bacon or sausage.
"We got chips one day. One day out of the whole lot. There was fish, sardines and rice - I was sick to death of looking at rice. There was pasta and salads, none of this was marked (labelled). One night there was a Greek night and they had kebabs, I couldn't eat that. It's the worst holiday I've ever been on."
The drinks selection didn't help either. She alleged: "The all inclusive drinks were wine, lager, ouzo or brandy. Yes, there were soft drinks, but we had to pay €1.50 for water." She added she normally enjoys a bottled lager or Bacardi and Coke, both of which she claims would have cost her €9 at the hotel as it was a different brand.
The problems didn't stop at food and drink. Susan claimed there was no entertainment at the hotel, which she described as "stuck there in the middle of nowhere", and its private beach was difficult to reach because of steep terrain.
TUI's website describes holidays at the Lido Corfu Sun Hotel as being "all about the laidback life" where "ping pong and pool are the liveliest activities on the agenda", aside from the occasional live music and Greek night. It also describes the four-star hotel as having its own private patch of beach "just steps away".
Susan added: "There was a private beach but it was so steep we couldn't get down to it and it was 150 yards from the hotel. There's a ramp at the side of the hotel that you have to try and pull your case up when you arrive. My daughter was up and down, up and down, trying to pull everyone's case up for them."
Susan said she normally holidays in Spain with her cousins and would always fly with TUI as she trusts the company's reputation for customer care. She added: "In the past I've paid more to get on a TUI flight because if anything happened I've always thought you've got a big company behind you if anything goes wrong. Not anymore. This holiday was a nightmare."
TUI offered Susan £100 (€118) in holiday vouchers, but she declined.
A TUI UK and Ireland Spokesperson said: "Our priority is to ensure customers have the best possible holiday experience, so we are sorry to hear that Mrs Edwards felt dissatisfied with her holiday. We have been in touch directly with Mrs Edwards to come to a resolution."