Nobody was ever hanging out drinking and eating at front tables:( would have been great to see that!

Nothing

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More recommendations for local restaurants (away from Gran Villa), activities or places of interest within walking distance of the hotel.

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I prepaid the booking for my girlfriend, using booking.com, as I have done countless times before. When she arrived after a long journey, she was told that she could not have the room unless she paid again for the booking (that had already been paid for) and implied that a stolen credit card had been used to make the reservation. She called me to tell me this and I asked to speak to the receptionist to explain that I had a confirmation email from booking.com that the prepayment had been made. This guy was astonishingly arrogant and rude. Was not interested at all. He said that I could either fill in a form by hand that he would email me or he would cancel the booking. I said that I have never written down my bank details by hand and sent them by email, as this is an obvious security risk. He then said fine, he'd cancel the booking. This would have left her stranded in Madrid, late at night with nowhere to stay. To say there was a lack of customer service is a massive understatement. He was openly hostile, raising his voice at both of us in an aggressive manner, when all I had done was make a standard reservation as I had done many times before on this website. Eventually she paid for the booking herself, despite me already having paid for it, so that she had somewhere to stay. Next day she spoke to a manager who explained that all this guy the night before needed to do was send through a confirmation link, which he hadn't done, and the payment would have been processed. In other words, this staff member did not know how the booking system worked and, instead of asking someone who did, he verbally abused us and tried to cancel the reservation. All to protect his ridiculous ego. My girlfriend said the hotel is actually very nice, in a great location and the rest of the staff were lovely, however I cannot recommend this place to stay at all, as I wouldn't want anyone else to go through the same experience.

Noise from above room, flushing toilets from other rooms.