Bray John

I booked a holiday cottage for dates I can no longer use due to a mix up with school holiday dates. I cannot rebook to 2023 as there is no availability nor can I convert my week into a weekend as that is not something they will offer. I will therefore lose my deposit of over 1000 despite the fact that they will be able to relet this very popular house. It seems money grabbing and unhelpful to me.

After using this company at least twice a year for the past 10-15 years we are sadly not booking with them this summer. The service since they have moved over to Sykes has deteriorated and on top of this the cost this summer for properties is extortionate. We would normally rent properties for approximately 850 at the end of July and they have risen to over 2,500 per week. So sad not to be able to return to Port Isaac this year for the first time in many years.

Since this company has been taken over by Sykes Holiday Cottages it has gone massively downhill. They cancel accommodation with no compensation or customer service response and disregard long term John Bray customers. Avoid at all costs and I suggest property owners who had their houses with John Bray should look elsewhere. After 30 years, I won't be booking with John Bray (aka Sykes) again and I suspect I won't be the only one.

We had a 2 week holiday booked at Windlass in August. We arrived and the property is lovely and it is in a great location. After the 1st night we spoke with John Bray Cottages to say that 2 of the single beds has terrible mattresses and needed replacing, also, on the stairs there were some nails or carpet tacs that were sticking up and had already cut the feet of 2 children and 1 adult.

These are both logged and as soon as the maintenance team were back on Monday they would get this resolved - which they did. Although in replacing the mattresses, 1 of them had the mattress cover taken, we did ask for another, we were told one would be sent down, but it never arrived. A few days in I was contacted by one of the team at John Bray and asked if we wanted a linen change on Friday (this would be normal change over day) to which I replied we would and I asked if we needed to strip beds etc - I was told yes. Friday came we were going out for the day, so we stripped all beds, put then into linen bags provided with towels, a large linen bag was dropped off and we were told they would return to pick up dirty linen - we then went out for the day.

We arrived back at around 6pm to find we had been left with just towels, no bed linen. Panic set in as it was already 6pm, so I called the office number and eventually got through to someone at Sykes who logged the problem, I said we have 4 children, 2 of them very young that would need to go to bed within the next hours and half, so we would need linen by then, I was told this is ok they will pass information on.

After an hour we had heard nothing, a follow up call to the number was made, I had chosen the in cottage emergency option, left a message but heard nothing, an email to the original person who had contacted me about the linen change was sent, another telephone call and message left and a strongly worded complaint email to Johnbrayletting, the kids ended up going to bed late waiting for some linen to be delivered - suffice to say that we heard NOTHING, everyone has to go to bed with no bed linen.

The next morning I had an email from the lady who had originally contacted us about the linen change, asking if the situation had been resolved to which I responded no, a very vague sort of an apology was offered over email and assurance this would get sorted. I had no follow up from calls made to the emergency line, email sent to Jobnbraylettings or from Sykes who I had originally spoken with on Friday evening.

Eventually 1 of our party called John Bray to complain and was told someone would come back to us. We were now waiting around on Saturday for linen to be delivered (& the mattress cover that had never been delivered from earlier in the week) half the day gone and eventually it arrived - we now had to make the beds, then could go out. We again heard nothing from more from John Bray - I called once more and spoke with someone at the Rock office who seemed like she was going to take control if the situation and assured me I would have an email by the next day once she had investigated what had gone wrong - unsurprisingly, we heard nothing.

We contacted John Bray on 2 more occasions while we were away (they had nothing logged on our booking, which is ridiculous) but again no follow up. I called again when we got home, I spoke with someone who gave me complaint reference number who told me she was taking ownership for the issue and I would hear something over the next couple of days - can you guess what happened next? - yep, nothing!

Once more I emailed, told info was being sent to John Bray Complaints team - nothing. The first rule of customer service is to get back to someone if you say you will. I will never book with Sykes Cottages or John Bray again - their customer service is shocking, if I were the owner of a cottage that I asked John Bray/Sykes to manage for me I would be exceedingly unhappy with the service that I was paying them to deliver.

I rented the same property from this company three years in a row. The property became slightly more shabby each time. I reported an issue with a loose tile over our bedroom window on my second visit, which lifted and banged when the wind picked up. but it wasn't sorted during my stay. Some of the chairs in the dining are were losing their covering.

Two were quite wobbly. On my third visit, the same loose tile was still banging away at night, sometimes making sleep virtually impossible. The chairs hadn't improved. There were 7 downlights in the kitchen area. Only 4 of them worked. I told Bray's two days into my stay. They didn't replace any of the lights. I considered renting the property again and contacted them, asking if the previous issues had been resolved. They didn't bother responding. I get the impression that because the property is in a good location in Port Isaac, it is taken for granted that it will rent out.

We have used John Bray over 15 times in the past year's. Good selection of properties and most of them satisfactory the odd one or two disappointing.

The location of our cottage was brilliant, a short walk down onto Porthilly Beach, quier peaceful, full of character. We last stayed in this cottage 26 yeara ago and not a lot has changed. However, I was appalled to find that whilst the beds had been changed, the house hadnt actually been cleanes. The last people had stayed with dogs and it was covered in dog hair.

On reporting this we were told that we could get a free clean at the end, which I find odd as a clean is always included in a cottage stay. Having paid in excess of 4000 to rent this, I found the response lacking and sadly would not rent from them again.

John Bray have told us the property is no longer available to rent for our dates in June 2020. They will not issue a refund! They want us to change to a date in 16 months time. Give us our money back and let us decide what to do with it. We have paid in full. Where is our money?

We have been with John Bray for over 30 years and we have not one complaint. I would totally recommend them., I have tried different companies over the years but always return to JB. Properties have always been beautifully clean and the staff are very welcoming.would never go anywhere else.