Don’t get us wrong, we love Wi-Fi. We use it often. We’d use it more often except that hotels that promise Wi-Fi in every room are generally telling a little white (Wi-Fi) lie. And hotels that promise 'free' Wi-Fi that actually ends up being free are few and far between. It usually turns out that there’s only a signal in room 666 and in the foyer. Except to access the 'free' Wi-Fi in the foyer you have to log on and pay with your credit card. We've lost count of the number of times we’ve wandered hotel hallways looking for a signal. And that's even after we've double-checked that the hotel has Wi-Fi before booking the room and emailed the property to make sure we get a room with a wireless signal. Just last week, for example, we stayed in two five-star luxury hotels with Wi-Fi problems. In one of the hotels, the Wi-Fi router in our room was covered in dust and had never been connected to power. Ever. In the other, we had to stand in our hotel room doorway just to get enough signal to send emails. And these are hotels charging around €500 a night (not that we were paying that figure of course) and then have the hide to charge extra for Wi-FI – another annoyance. Give us good broadband access via cable and we’ll plug in our own Airport Express, thanks. At least we know it works! A general manager of a large multinational five-star luxury hotel responds: "Wi-Fi is the bane of our existence. At our hotel, we have an outside company that handles it but we just can’t get them to provide a service that consistently works. It’s mind-boggling. We have to try and get out of our contract with them to get it fixed. It’s a nightmare. And we know our guests are not happy, but our hands are tied."
While we sympathise, if the Wi-Fi's not working properly then guests shouldn't be charged for it. Frankly, though, it should be free anyway. We don't know about you, but to us, it's the most essential thing in the room, more crucial than a television or telephone. What do you think?
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