‘Ibis hotel caught fire in the middle of the night. I want my money back’

A woman who can't sleep
Far from the quiet night’s sleep our reader was expecting, they were caught up in a fairly major incident Credit: Getty Images


Dear Katie,

I got stranded in Charleroi in Belgium, so I had to book a last-minute hotel room.

I opted for the Ibis in Charleroi Gare. It was almost midnight when I booked myself in at the desk. I was charged a total of £94.

An hour later I was in the hotel lobby when smoke started coming out of the building and it was evacuated.

No information was provided, nor were we offered anything for heat or comfort. We were left in the cold for almost three hours.

When we were finally let back into the building it still stank of smoke and the entire bottom floor was black. In my opinion, it wasn’t safe to re-enter the building. We should have been transferred to the other Ibis hotel in the city.

I made a complaint the following day and have been repeatedly ignored. Can you help me?

LO, via email

Dear LO,

Far from the quiet night’s sleep you were expecting, you were caught up in a fairly major incident.

On the night of your stay, staff at the hotel discovered a small fire in a lavatory in the ground floor public area. Of course, as per standard safety procedure, the hotel was immediately evacuated.

Fire crews arrived quickly, extinguished the fire, checked the building, and determined that it was safe for guests and staff to return to their rooms.

But all this took place in the middle of the night, and you and your fellow guests were forced to stand outside in the cold in your nightwear. You feel more could have been done to keep you warm and informed. It was around 4am before the whole fiasco was over.

Ibis told me its staff worked through the night to make sure the area that had been affected by the smoke was thoroughly cleaned. But you say the blackened appearance of the ground floor made you feel unsafe.

Soot from fires and smoke can pose a major health risk, but the fire brigade and the hotel carried out a risk assessment and concluded that, despite the hotel’s appearance, it was safe to re-enter. Regardless of this, I agree that you should have been offered alternative accommodation for the night.

In addition, Ibis said it was sorry that you felt you did not receive updates on the incident at the time of the fire. Following my involvement, the hotel manager has now contacted you to apologise.

Ibis has also refunded the £94 cost of your stay. This really was the very least it could do, considering that you spent much of the time you should have spent tucked up in bed outside on the street shivering while watching black smoke fill the hotel.

The fire started for reasons beyond Ibis’s control, but in future it should try harder to look after its guests when things go wrong.

