Note: I had originally posted this as a private letter to the Hilton Group, but after waiting over 14 business days (and still waiting) for a response to my complaint, I decided to start spreading the news of my poor experience.

I recently took my girlfriend away for her birthday to Edinburgh, where we stayed in the Hilton on Grosvenor Street.

The hotel was booked through lastminute.com, so the price was less than I'd expect to pay for a room at a Hilton hotel, but I felt sure the experience would not reflect the price. Unfortunately, that turned out not to be the case.

We arrived too early to check in, but took advantage of the facility to check our bags in so we could enjoy Edinburgh without being hampered by our luggage. We were told that when we returned to check in, that our rooms were located across the street in the Grosvenor Club and so we should check in there.

When we returned to the Grosvenor Club, the decor and overall quality of the building wasn't on par with what we'd experienced in the reception of the building over the road, although that was something we were happy to accept at that stage.

Upon entering our room, there was a slight chill to it, and it seems the radiator wasn't working, or there was no way to turn it on - although the staff had provided a small electric heater. In hindsight, I should have complained and asked for a change of room, but at that point in the day the temperature was reasonable.

When we returned later that night we discovered the room to be a lot colder, and the small electric heater did nothing to reverse the situation in the hour before we retired to bed. We didn't feel comfortable leaving an electric heater running while we slept, and didn't want such upheaval in the middle of the night, so we put up with the cold.

The next morning, by now disappointed with the experience, I started to notice other things that I didn't expect from a four star hotel: gripper rods clearly visible between the carpet and the skirting boards, broken window frames and dirty bathroom tiles being the worst.

I have included photos of the radiator missing controls, the small electric heater, dirty bathroom tiles and visible gripper rods below.

I considered raising this complaint upon leaving the next day, but didn't have time to get into a discussion and felt I would be better sitting down to compose a letter once I had put some distance between myself and the situation. I'm not entirely sure what constitutes a four star hotel, but this was not what I expected. If you consider this to be acceptable then I do not foresee any future visits to the Hilton chain from myself.

Thank you for your time.

Anthony Burns

Example of the tiles in the bathroom.

Radiator missing controls and clearly visible gripper rods.

The small electric heater provided in liu of working radiator.

Broken wood on the window frames.