Raffaelli Park Hotel

The hotel itself is quite dated and lacks any real charm. The mattress was hard as a rock and we had to have maintenance come fix the air conditioning as it did not work upon arrival. While it was nice to have a balcony the only view was of an overgrown, unkempt tool shed in the side yard. If you’re just looking for a place to leave your things while going to the beach it will suffice but there are likely better and cheaper options at every turn. The real issue was the staff though. After being remarkably unhelpful upon arrival (refusing to recommend or give directions to anything other than the hotel restaurant), they were even worse on departure. When trying to depart for the train station not only did they refuse to help book any sort of taxi or transfer they also provided wrong directions to the bus and falsely claimed we could just buy bus tickets on the bus. So after waiting 30 minutes for the bus we ended up having to go back to the main part of town to buy bus tickets at a local shop and wait another hour for the next bus. All of which feel like an easily avoidable situation with even the most basic customer service. All in all would recommend staying anywhere else in Forte for your trip.

For context, I am a veteran traveler to Italy for more than 35 years having traveled for both work and pleasure. Presently I am a part-time tour operator organizing tours to Italy and have traveled as a guest with the Italian Government Tourist Agency/ENIT. In Italy I have stayed in luxury hotels and in simple agriturismos and have never experienced an absence of customer service on this level. Here's what happened. During our two-night stay which started out pleasantly at this somewhat 'tired' hotel, on the first night my adult son reserved a used beach cruiser bike the hotel offers guests. The bike was unfortunately stolen. (He locked it in a proper bike rack) When we reported the theft to the hotel owner, we were treated with a lack of respect or empathy as hotel guests but rather as criminals and not a victim of crime. We promptly contacted the US Consulate who encouraged us to ask the hotel to file a report with the local police. We asked for the owner’s assistance and he said ‘no’. And, before offering to help with any additional inquiry he promptly demanded payment for the bike. I asked to see documentation on the date the bike was purchased and the original price. He said he did not have it but would provide it by the end of the day. We asked about the hotel insurance policy which he claimed did not cover the bike. He did say the bike was used and thought he paid $280 about 18 months prior…(Note: we noticed the loaner bikes were left outdoors, not in an indoor storage facility.) Following the advice from the US Consulate we went on our own to the local police station and filed a statement. (This was a two hour ordeal which cut into our two day stay...) They suggested we provide the report to the hotel owner which upon showing it to him he reluctantly accepted. At the end of the day, the owner said the paperwork he requested from the bike shop had still not arrived. At this point he became very belligerent and berated us for not agreeing on a payment even though we offered to pay 1/3 which we thought reasonable for a used bike without seeing the date and price he paid for it. We had an early morning train the next day and requested to check out that evening and he would not let us without restitution on the bike. (Note: again the paperwork he said he’d have was never provided and apparently he did not feel the 1/3 for the bike was sufficient.) Following his hostile verbal demeanor, we called the police to ask them to help arrange for a checkout. An hour later the police said everything was taken care of. At the checkout that night (with a hotel employee, not the owner) we paid our bill and noticed a “service charge” of $140. We were told this was for the bike payment. This was half of the original “alleged” price as we never saw a receipt. We paid this amount to get the unpleasant experience behind us. Would highly advise against staying at this tired facility despite its close location to the beach.