Caprice

Korolev Review

I recently booked a 3-week villa vacation in Barbados through Altman Rental Barbados - directly through the villa rental agency. My experience of this rental was by far the worst of all our many holiday rentals. To start, upon arrival at the airport the taxi that had been pre-booked did not arrive, which meant that after a 9-hour flight we had to wait a further 25 minutes at the local airport until the taxi arrived. Upon arrival at the villa and after inspection it was soon apparent that the accommodation was horribly dirty and needed to be professionally cleaned. Although I asked the house managers, Alexis and Laura, to arrange this, and while they may have passed this message on, the house was never professionally cleaned for the entire duration. I repeatedly asked the staff to clean the house, but they never did - so we had to stay in a dirty house for the entire stay. I managed to keep my rather annoyed family and guests calm about the situation, trying to save their vacation. Instead of appreciating my efforts and patience, however, Alexis decided I was a nice enough person to be defrauded At the end of the stay, when doing the check out, it became apparent that I was going to be forced into having to pay for damage to the property for which I was not in fact responsible. On the last day of the holiday, house manager Alexis called the local police and brought along with her two constables. The police blocked the entrance to the house with their police car and would not let us leave the premises or let our taxi enter it. The police demanded that I immediately pay whatever Alexis wanted us to pay. They knew that we were running late for the airport, I had two small kids and a sick father and could not afford missing the flight. They had no interest in hearing my position, concerns or checking if there was any substance to this claim. They just waited till I paid what they claimed as the deductible amount of damage, totalling $4000. I did make it clear to all the police on site (and a dozen or so witnesses) that I was being forced to sign the payment slip giving authorization to charge my credit card under duress with no contractual or other obligation to pay what Alexis demanded and that I did not agree with any of the charges and considered their actions illegal. They committed a range of Barbadian and international crimes that day (incl forcible confinement, coercion and fraud), against 7 citizens of 4 countries (US, France, Australia and Russia). We are in the process of filing formal complaints with the relevant authorities and tourist organizations of the 4 countries. I have notified both my banks of this criminal activity and they have started their investigations. I am simply posting this note to warn other people who are considering using Altman Villas Barbados to take extreme caution and care so that they do not fall into the same trap and to take extreme caution when booking with them.<br/>