When we have to move your room

Within a type

Which of the four Garden Queens you get is decided on the morning you arrive, by whoever is doing the board. They are genuinely alike — same size, same outlook, same bed — with one exception: one of the four is the step-free room, and if you have booked it because you need it, you get it, and it is held for you rather than allocated on the day.

Between types, upwards

Sometimes the only room left on the night is a better one. You get it, at the rate you booked, and nobody mentions it as a favour. It is not an upgrade you earned; it is arithmetic, and pretending otherwise is a small dishonesty that costs nothing to avoid.

Between types, downwards

This is the one that matters. If we cannot give you the type you booked and the only thing we have is a smaller room, then it is your decision, not ours. We will telephone before you travel, tell you exactly which room it is and what is different about it, and offer you either the smaller room at the smaller room's rate — refunding the difference for every night — or a full cancellation with nothing to pay and help finding a room elsewhere in the neighbourhood.

What we will not do is move you down and charge the rate you booked, and hope you do not notice because the room has a bed in it.

Mid-stay

Only if you have agreed to it. A split stay across two rooms is something we offer when a night in the middle is full, and it is offered before you book rather than sprung on you on the Wednesday. If you have not agreed to a move, you are not being moved — if the building has a problem, the problem is ours to solve around you.

The one exception, and it is a real one. A burst pipe, a heating failure or a fault that makes a room unusable is not something we can solve around you. If that happens we will move you into the best room we have free, at the rate you booked, and if there is nothing free we will find and pay for a room at another property in this neighbourhood and the taxi to it.

When one night of a stay is full