First Choice Holidays has faced legal action by Irwin Mitchell for five consecutive years over standards at several of their Holiday Village Hotels. The problems with Holiday Village Hotels first came to Irwin Mitchell’s attention in 2008 when a group of 15 tourists instructed travel specialists to take action against the Holiday Village Costa Del Sol.
The next year, a further 11 tourists reported equally disastrous holidays. Amongst the complaints were reports of faeces in the swimming pool, raw sewage coming out of the plughole of a shower, rats in the children’s play area and an infestation of ants where food was served.
The series of complaints continued at another Holiday Village Hotel in Turkey, which was featured twice on the BBC’s consumer programme Watchdog. Over 700 holidaymakers who became ill at the Turkey site are now being represented by Irwin Mitchell.
Other Holiday Village Hotels that have been complained about by First Choice customers include sites in the Red Sea resort in Sharm El Sheikh, the Costa del Sol in Benalmadena, Ca’an Picafort in Majorca, Cozumel in Mexico and the Playa Dorada in the Dominican Republic One of the most complained about of all the sites is the Holiday Village in Sharm El Sheikh. Guests staying here contracted illnesses including Salmonella and Shigella. Many suffered gastric illness so severe they are still experiencing health problems today.
The total number of Holiday Village Hotels guests to have sought legal help from travel lawyers at Irwin Mitchell has reached an astonishing 1,500 in just five years. The Red Sea resort in Sharm El Sheikh alone has been forced to pay damages to more than 1,000 of Irwin Mitchell’s clients.
Irwin Mitchell has demanded that tour operator First Choice carries out a thorough investigation and removes the hotels from its roster if standards cannot be improved.
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