How to get a mention in my good hotel guide - and it's not by handing out a bunch of reward points

I’m just back from more hot-air balloon training in Italy. I do this in Piedmont, about an hour from Turin. The area is stunning, almost entirely tourist-free, with food like no other. British balloonists are treated exceptionally well here. We are a little like minor rock stars and all it takes is to reply in the affirmative to the question: “Sei un mongolfierista?” and the world is your pizza.

We stay at a lovely little three-star hotel in Vicoforte directly opposite the imposing Santuario di Vicoforte (the largest elliptical dome in the world, don’t cha know?). It’s possibly the friendliest place that I’ve ever stayed at. Upon arrival, I’m given two bedrooms despite multiple protestations that one will be ample. The concept of handing over a credit card as a deposit is laughable, as is any attempt to pay for coffees, food… anything. I repeatedly insisted that I wanted to pay my way and was finally told that it would be easier if I put everything on my room. When it came to checking out, however, there was no sign of any extras on the bill and they had taken €50 off the already ludicrously cheap room rate.

I’m always astonished when I come across hotels like these, that seem to have minimal interest in making money off their clients and appear to actually enjoy looking after you. Maybe they are smarter than I think? I have such a fondness for the place that I would never dream of staying anywhere else. It’s a lesson that the “hospitality” industry often forgets. Big, expensive hotels are my particular bêtes noires as they seem to get so many things wrong. Here, for your annoyance, is a list of my first-world problems.

First off, when you arrive at a hotel, the last thing you want is to spend ages in reception. I don’t want to sit down with some representative of the establishment being taken through the opening hours of the spa, nor do I want to fill out some pointless information form. I just want my key and to go to the room. The more expensive the hotel, the more ludicrous the check-in, check-out times. If you have to check out at 11am and can only check in at 3pm, what the hell is happening in the time in-between – lunchtime specials?

Once in the room, I have several bugbears. I do not want to have to move the table and dig around behind it to find the plug socket. Put it at table level so you can plug straight in. If a hotel charges me for the internet, then I leave immediately. If you must, incorporate the cost in the bill, but don’t rub it in my face. And then, there’s the hotel breakfast, the biggest robbery of them all. There’s never any scope for someone who just wants a coffee and a croissant – you have to pay the full whack of £15 or more for the privilege… multiply that by four when you are travelling with a family and it starts to add up.

My lovely Italian hotel had non-existent Wi-Fi, hard beds, dodgy plugs, weak showers… but I couldn’t care less. They were lovely, generous, and welcoming and that’s the secret to true hospitality – not a bunch of reward points.