South France Accommodation - 2 Bedroom Rental in Montpellier (PR-1133)

The apartment itself was clean and comfortable. There were road works occurring during our stay (the road is level with the mezzanine bedroom windows) and the noise was irritating. Even during the night, cars would drive over the temporary metal sheets on the road and the noise regularly kept me awake.

The location was ok, but not excellent, the apartment was accessed by a gravel street which was difficult to negotiate with luggage. The nearby streets were also very dirty.

The biggest concern I had was with the level of difficulty encountered when dealing with the apartment's owner and the 'home intendant' who was supposed to welcome us. The booking of the apartment prior to our stay was rendered extremely stressful by the unreasonable expectations of the owner (an exorbitantly high bond to pay, expectation to pay the bond over two months prior to our stay, issues with the paypal payments, errors in calculations meaning we had to cover extra international charges and fees).

Once we were in France, we had problems with the train strikes and our train from Paris was cancelled. this meant that we had to hire a mini bus to drive us down to Montpellier (we were travelling with a group of school students who were staying with host families in Montpellier). The journey took longer than expected and, when we contacted the home intendant (as we understood it, he is employed by the apartment owner to welcome guests and arrange check in and check out), he was incredibly unhelpful, simply stating that we had to arrive earlier because he had a dinner than evening. When we explained that we couldn't do anything (we were on a bus with a group of students) he continued to be belligerent, rude and unhelpful. Eventually he agreed to meet us a little later which meant that we had to see our students to their host families quickly, and then ask our bus driver to continue a bit further than agreed to drop us off at the apartment. When we arrived, the home intendant had arranged for some else to meet us. He made no effort to help us with our luggage on the gravel, did a quick check in and left.

When it came time to leave (we left at 6.30am as we had an early train so that we could make our flight in Paris that day) we were told that the departure time was too early and that no one could be there to do check out. We were simply told to lock the apartment and leave the key in the letterbox. Normally this wouldn't be a problem, but with the huge bond we had to pay, I was reluctant to leave without confirmation that the apartment was in pristine condition on our departure. This was the delay in providing feedback - I wanted the bond returned first.

The bond has now been returned and I can say that the apartment itself was very nice (despite the noise). It was large, comfortable and well furnished. We enjoyed staying there but won't book it again as the process was far to difficult, time consuming and stressful.

I do not recommend this apartment.