I booked a triple room at Baoshan via "Ineedhotel". The agency arranged the booking with the Hotel and then confirmed the booking via email with me.

We arrived at the hotel at 5 p.m. on 24th July. The rain was pouring down and it was peak hour. It was not a good time to be searching for alternative hotels, a fact of which Baoshan is obviously very aware.

They denied all knowledge of a booking from the agency. They went through the charade of a search under every possible variation of the name in which the booking was made. Sorry, no booking and sorry too, they said, there were no triple rooms available at that time. Maybe I would like to take a "Suite" which was all they had available capable of conversion to a triple room. And so up went our cost from about 300 RMB to 445 RMB.

The "suite" had that hallmark of the hotel, lolly pink doors in cheap paint, the paint well and truly peeling on the lolly pink door of the... more