If you value your family’s safety – avoid, avoid, avoid!

I am not usually one to complain, not really a “letter-writer” or “forum-poster” but the events of our one-week family holiday to St Raphael, near Frejus, France (25th June – 2nd July), absolutely beggar belief – and I feel it my duty to share this story with fellow Brits to avoid anybody else going through what we did.

Firstly – a little bit of background. We had arranged to rent an apartment from one Madame Gomet, via Welcome Cottages (part of the Hoseasons group) – property reference W10446 if you’re interested. During the week commencing 20th June 2011, my wife and I attempted to make contact with the property owner to arrange collection of keys at the start of our holiday. We would be arriving late (approx 10:30pm) and this initially caused a problem – due to the owner apparently residing 100km away and “not knowing anybody in the area” (which later turned out to be a lie). This issue was rectified at our tour operator’s expense – although not before WE were asked to pay the owners’ overnight expenses as a “compromise”! Understandably, we rejected this proposal.

On Saturday 25th June my wife, 8-month-old son, mother-in-law and I arrived slightly later than planned, at approximately 11:15pm. There had been a major hold-up at Nice Cote d’Azur airport in the car hire reception, which delayed our anticipated departure by 45 minutes. We telephoned the owner to explain the situation. Upon arrival at the apartment, the owner was standing aggressively in the entrance, arms folded, seemingly unimpressed. She speaks no English, but luckily my mother-in-law is able to converse in French at a basic level and we were able to apologise for our late arrival. The owner then spent the next 40 minutes explaining to my wife and mother-in-law exactly how she expected the apartment to be cleaned – even removing the plug hole from the shower to illustrate that any hair should be removed – how to open and close the shutters and how to lock the main door (which she showed us 3 or 4 times). She neglected to explain how the oven, microwave, washing machine, or anything else for that matter, functioned and there was confusion over the provision of a cot, which had been clearly requested from the start – with the owner even suggesting at one point that our 8-month-old son would be sleeping in our bed, with us. Finally (at approximately ten-to-midnight), the property’s keys were handed over in exchange for my €180 cash deposit, which was hungrily stuffed into the front pocket of the owner’s - without being counted, and no receipt was issued. I have to say that at that point I had a bad feeling I’d never see the money again.

Our week in St Raphael was pleasant. My mother-in-law spent a few days in our company, leaving on Wednesday (29th) to join-up with her Open University course in Northern France. She had been using the larger of the two bedrooms (the one with the en suite), and cleaned her room from top-to-bottom before leaving.

On Friday 1st July we received a telephone call from the owner, via the next door apartment – quite impressive considering the owner had initially claimed to “know nobody in the area” – asking to confirm the time we needed to leave. My wife informed the owner that we needed to leave at 8am latest – and the owner appeared to understand this.

Somewhat fearful of the ‘deposit situation’ and remembering the lecture when we arrived, we spent the entire afternoon cleaning the apartment from top-to-bottom. In detail this involved cleaning all surfaces, sinks and fittings in the kitchen and all three bathrooms. We then brushed and mopped all floors throughout and polished the windows and mirrors. There is absolutely no doubt that we left the apartment in a cleaner condition than when we arrived.

On Saturday 2nd July the owner and her mute partner arrived at five-minutes-to-eight - hardly suitable for a client that had already requested (on two separate occasions) to be ready to depart at 8am sharp. She seemed intent on finding “problems”, scrutinising the place room-by-room. As I loaded the remainder of our belongings into my hired car (brand new, by the way), I became aware of a kerfuffle in which my wife’s arm had been aggressively grabbed, and forcefully pointed repeatedly at a bed-sheet (at which point the owner shouted “no, no, no, no, no” as if chastening a schoolchild). It was alleged that we had spilt ink (“le crayon”) on the aforementioned bed-sheet and therefore the owner would not be returning our deposit (le cushón). My wife argued (in her limited French) that if – indeed we actually HAD spilt the ink – it hardly justified €180-worth of damage. However, we would have accepted a nominal charge at this point in our growing desperation to make our journey to the airport, and argued the toss on our return to the UK. The time was now 08:15.

(Incidentally, we are almost certain the ink-damage was not caused by us. My mother-in-law used the bedroom in question for the four nights of her stay and is certain that she did not “spill ink” as is alleged. To me, this feels like a classic confidence scam whereby the property owner uses the same excuse repeatedly, in order to extrapolate ill-gotten Euros from defenceless tourists).

The owner then suggested that WE contact the agency (“le agencie”) to discuss the issue. We were unhappy to do so, chiefly because of the cost to make the call but also because we were not in the wrong. In apparent exasperation she used her own telephone, claiming to be contacting “the agency”. This, again, turned out to be a lie – she had simply telephoned somebody who spoke a little bit of English to “explain the situation” to us - as if we didn’t already know.

The events that followed this initial altercation represent something that wouldn’t have been out of place in the ‘Monty Python’ escapades, and are in my opinion the mark of an unhinged – frankly – crazed and unsafe, individual:

As the owner was refusing to return my cash deposit, I refused to return her keys. This seemed like a fair representation to make given that - the previous Saturday - the keys had been handed to me in exchange for the same. By now the time was 08:20 and we desperately needed to leave. First, I wheeled my baby son into the apartment block’s lift, and, along with my wife was barricaded-in by an increasingly angry and agitated owner. I was confident that – if necessary – I could overpower our ‘kidnapper’ however I am not a violent person and always shy-away from conflict. Reluctantly - after a couple of minutes - I was forced to push-past in order to remove my wife and baby son from the hot, confined space in which they were imprisoned. This was the only physical contact that either of us made with the owner, who continued to shout and scream (in French) at my family and I.

Next, we attempted to descend the steps from the first floor down to the apartment block entrance (with a pushchair in tow) in order to escape this frightening and aggressive woman. We reached the entrance and made our way to our hired car, where my wife picked up our baby son from his pushchair. At that point the owner was seen running from the apartment entrance, screaming French obscenities at us. She then jumped onto the bonnet of our hired car and began attempting to prise the windscreen wiper from its mechanism. When this failed, she assaulted my wife – grabbing her wrist with such pressure to cause a shooting pain up her arm – and yanking her to the floor. All of this whilst my wife was still holding our eight-month-old son – who despite his tender age – seemed to understand the danger, screamed and burst into tears!

(In fairness the woman’s mute partner (name unknown) was visibly shocked and appalled by her behaviour; especially with our baby boy involved, over whom he had being cooing when he arrived. Although he made it clear – via his body language and resigned hand signals - that he has no influence over the woman whatsoever. Somehow, I doubt that anybody does).

In extreme anger (she had harmed my wife and endangered the life of my baby son) I threw the owner’s keys to the ground into the car park across the road. Retrospectively, I apologise for this action but I think that – taking into account the events preceding – this was a fairly understandable reaction from somebody who has no history of violence whatsoever and not even the owner’s assault of my wife and son was enough to push me over the edge in this respect. I did raise my voice a little, although again I feel that this was justified.

My wife was in tears as she strapped our son into the car and I folded-up the pushchair. As a parting gesture the owner skipped past us (waving her keys – now retrieved), seemingly delighted with her ‘victory’ – happily screeching “Au revoir” “Bye bye” – effectively laughing in our faces – €180 better off.

We finally drove away at 08:35 with an absolute mad dash to the airport - emotionally, mentally and physically scarred by the whole experience and with no money to purchase food or drink either prior to, or on our flight home (which, by the way we made just in time, with minutes to spare). The next time my baby son would have something to eat would be at 2pm following our arrival back in the UK. If you have children of your own, you’ll understand how difficult that is.

I have made a specific complaint to my tour operator, and will update you on the outcome.


IF YOU VALUE YOUR FAMILY’S SAFETY, AVOID THIS APARTMENT LIKE THE PLAGUE.

IF YOU HAVE ALREADY BOOKED TO RENT THIS APARTMENT I WOULD URGE YOU TO CANCEL IMMEDIATELY USING OUR EXPERIENCE AS THE JUSTIFICATION FOR YOUR TOUR OPERATOR TO RETURN YOUR MONEY WITHOUT DELAY.

DON’T RISK IT.

Matt Cowell, Bolton, UK