Legal Questions and Answers by
Jonathan Stones of John Barkers
Question :-
Could I take your advice about the problems which my wife and I
experienced on a fourteen day holiday in Turkey earlier this year.
The first difficulty arose as soon as we arrived at the hotel in Kusadasi. As a registered
disabled person I had requested ground floor accommodation but found we had been allocated
a room on the third floor. When I drew attention to my situation they did move us - down
one floor to a room situated at the very end of a long corridor.
I had been advised that to keep mosquitos at bay the fan in the room should be kept on all
night. The fan in our room was not working. Despite sleeping with the windows closed and
the curtains shut tight, within 24 hours my wife had received very bad mosquito bites on
both legs, which required medical treatment in the town.
On returning to the hotel we found a maintenance man leaving our room after inspecting the
broken fan. It had been broken for quite a while he announced and could not, in his
opinion, be repaired.
It never was repaired or replaced but on the third day we were awoken early in the morning
by banging and the smell of burning. Looking over the balcony we found a team of men
erecting a steel fire escape ladder. The work - and the racket - went on for five days.
On returning home I wrote to the holiday company, who expressed great concern and assured
me that matters would be fully investigated. There would be a full response in 28 days.
That was two months ago and I have still not heard another word from them, despite a
reminder.
I feel very angry about the way we have been treated. What action could I take? Could I
sue them?
Answer :-
There are a couple of things you could do to let the tour operators
know you are serious and are not going to disappear if they just ignore you.
First, if the holiday company is a member of ABTA then I think you should write to this
organisation with a detailed account of what happened, enclosing copies of your
correspondence with the company.
Secondly you could instruct a solicitor to write to the company on your behalf.
I would expect that either would shake them up and get them moving.
In terms of taking legal action against them I think you have to be realistic and weigh up
whether any likely compensation is going to be worth the cost and effort. I think it is
unlikely that there would be an award for the mosquito bites and although you could well
make progress on a claim with regard to the noise problem and the fan which didn’t
work. Action in the Small Claims Court would limit costs for you.
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