Dream US break turns into nightmare after villa mix-up

Margaret Munro paid £5198 for a luxury holiday to Florida to celebrate her daughter Julie’s 40th birthday.

The booking with DialAFlight included a four-bed villa with pool for 12 nights, car hire and air travel.

But the family arrived to be told there was no record of them – and were allocated a filthy villa.

Margaret, 63, said: “This ruined the holiday. The house was a dump. There were blood stains on the carpets and bedding, cockroaches dead in a bedroom and the toilet was disgusting. The stench was awful. We’d been so excited when we arrived in Orlando. That bubble soon burst.”

Travelling with the pair in April were Julie’s sons Billy, 19, and 13-year-old Joseph, and Billy’s girlfriend Danielle Dwight, 19.

Margaret, a widow, was forced to take the family to a hotel for the night, paying £350.

Next day the firm promised to clean the villa and have the keys back to her by 12 noon. But the place was just as bad.

She said: “The carpets had been cleaned as they were still soaking but nothing else had been done. We then noticed even more filth, which we hadn’t spotted the first time around. We were shocked.”

Margaret, a retail display rep, of Oxton, near Lauder in the Borders, was finally given another villa and told to make a claim when she got home.

But she called me in when she was getting nowhere with DialAFlight.

I got on to the travel firm, who said: “We’re disappointed the villa was found to need additional cleaning. The client stayed in a hotel and next day an alternative villa was found.

“We agreed a refund of the £180 cost of the hotel, £150 compensation plus £150 credit against a holiday.

“But we are happy to offer a total cash payment of £450.”