I was informed at 6pm the night that I was to check in that the air conditioner in the unit was broken, but that it should be fixed before we arrived (12-1am). I received no additional call so I assumed that it was fixed. It was not. We “slept” in 80+ degree heat and humidity that night.
I called the property manager around 6:30am and he said that the AC technician put Freon in the unit and decided that it was fixed since it blew cold air after that. Of course it would immediately after putting Freon in it. So the temperature was now rising because the sun had come up, my Labor Day long weekend vacation was being wasted with us trying to find another place to stay in the area which was hopeless because there is no same-day check-in and it was the Friday of Labor Day weekend.
We were finally offered another house that was not beach front (400 yards from the beach). We had to either accept that with zero refund or essentially pack up and go home. We spent the morning and afternoon of the first day of the vacation trying to find another place to stay then moving to another location and no refund was offered.
The house we moved to was nice and the accommodations were fine if that is what we would’ve paid for. No pool and no private beach access, unless we drove (with all the beach supplies and a 2 year old) to the location that we had originally booked.
The trip ended up being okay, but I think that a refund for at least one night would’ve been fair. I understand that the property manager, realty office, and owner of the property weren’t totally to blame, but we essentially lost a whole 24 hours of a 3 day vacation for reasons that weren’t in our control.