4/10 Fair
Adam
Oct 4, 2026The apartment itself is lovely, clean and comfortable, and the owner Mario is genuinely lovely. Our complaint is entirely about Wonderful Italy, the agency handling check-in. A few days before arrival, we told Wonderful Italy through Expedia that, due to travelling by train, we could not give an exact time but would arrive between 6–8pm. We repeatedly confirmed we would be there before 8pm. On the day, we told them we would arrive at Genoa station at around 6:40pm. The apartment is only a 15-minute walk from the station. Despite this, we were rudely told to hurry and take a taxi or risk being charged a late check-in fee. I reiterated that we would arrive well before 8pm and were walking. We arrived at the apartment at 6:52pm, yet nobody was there. Wonderful Italy then stopped responding. We waited outside for 40 minutes despite having given them our arrival window and actual arrival time. We eventually had to disturb the neighbour, who was incredibly kind and knew the owner. She contacted Mario, who contacted Wonderful Italy. Only after the owner intervened did the agency finally send someone to let us in. Without the neighbour and Mario, we would have been waiting even longer. We had done exactly what we said we would do: arrive well before the agreed 8pm deadline. Being threatened with a late fee, told to take a taxi unnecessarily, then left waiting outside while the agency ignored us was extremely poor customer service. Wonderful Italy's check-in ruined our evening