Sykes Holiday Cottages Reviews 

Update 23/08/2026: Sykes' customer service team is so automated that they responded to a formal legal Letter Before Action with a copy-pasted script. I have now dispatched the legal papers via Recorded Delivery directly to their corporate headquarters in Chester. See you in court.

Our holiday was completely ruined by arriving at a filthy, unhygienic cottage. Under the Consumer Rights Act 2015, a service must be provided with reasonable care and skill - Sykes completely failed here.
Sykes refused compensation, claiming we did not give the owner a chance to put the issues right. This is entirely false. We phoned the owner numerous times to report the issues, but he failed to answer. Any other suitable accommodation in the local area was fully booked, so we had no choice but to stay in a substandard property. I have full, video and photo evidence of the filth and call logs proving the owner was unreachable.
It took Sykes over a month to respond via their online form, and with a lot of toing and froing they came back to offer a token £150 "goodwill gesture" (on a total booking fee of £699) which I have rejected as a final settlement. I have now escalated this to a formal regulatory complaint against the payment providers to recover the remaining balance. Shocking handling of a clear breach of contract.

Having booked to stay at Gilfachwydd in Wales (near Dolgellau) through Sykes Cottages several months in advance, we drove nearly four hours arriving on the evening of checkin day only to get a text from the owner telling us the stay was cancelled because of no functioning toilets, no water. The place was disgustingly dirty with blood on some towel, dirty bedding on the floor, unwashed surfaces, grime in the bathroom and one toilet was blocked up and stinking. They said the cottage relied on water from a spring which dried up in the drought. Nobody told us about that. Nobody told us it was cancelled. Sykes had sent me several emails confirming the stay and advising of how to checkin. I phoned Sykes who could not find suitable accommodation. Owner ignored message requesting a cleaner, and Sykes told us the owner refused to take their calls. We spent ages cleaning the grubby kitchen and one bathroom, even had to clean all surfaces as there was dust. We spent ages fetching water in a bucket from a tap at the campsite about 20 minutes round trip each time. By Monday Sykes said the owner refused to issue any plumber or water supply or cleaner and demanded they cancel our stay. Sykes said they had thereby cancelled our stay, asked us to leave early the next morning, and said they would issue a full refund. It was a very demeaning and disgusting experience and two days later no refund. I phoned Sykes to hear them tell me the stay wasn’t cancelled and they will charge for the days spent there. Now on the phone for yet another pointless waste of time to Sykes. I would never book anything with Sykes ever again, and never ever recommend anyone stay at Gilfachwydd either. We have had to deep clean our clothes after arriving home and feel very upset by how Sykes and the owner treated us.

We booked via booking.com in June, but necessary extras that were essential to our party had to be booked via Sykes Cottages. This proved IMPOSSIBLE.

Access to Sykes Cottages portal didn't work. They didn't respond to any messages (from June to August!), including via their advertised Whatsapp channel. They don't ever pick the phone up (regularly waited over 35 mins).

Eventually with one week to go before our stay, I got booking.com's own customer services involved (who were great), so Sykes Cottages miraculously responded to me to arrange the necessary extras, but they refused any token gesture of compensation for the months it has taken me to sort this out.

Appalling customer service, appalling systems and processes and an incredibly difficult and stressful customer experience, compounded by a terrible official response to my complaint which amounted to "Thanks for bringing this to our attention and we apologise, but you've booked them now so there'll be no compensation for the months you've had to spend trying". - Except their response had no spaces between any of the words in each sentence. I kid you not.

Such a shoddy outfit. I will definitely avoid booking with them again.

Price that I paid ended up being more than was advertised. Staff in the call centre were argumentative and would not acknowledge the details that were displayed on their own website. Our holiday was fantastic but the service from Sykes has put me off in future.

Arrived at a property with a tiny waste bin under the sink and no additional bin liners. Sykes were completely unable to resolve this - here is the diary of my attempts:
Day 1 - contact via WhatsApp - no response
Day 2 - contact via WhatsApp - no response
Day 3 - contact via phone - promised replacement would be sent
Day 4 - no replacement arrives, contact via phone - promised replacement would be sent
Day 5 - no replacement arrives
Day 6 - no replacement arrives, contact via phone - told they won’t be able help now

Shocking.

Very disappointed with Sykes’ handling of our complaint

We paid approximately £300 for a two-night stay in Southport and unfortunately experienced numerous issues with the property, including damp towels, non-working sockets, very poor Wi-Fi, maintenance and cleanliness issues, problems with the key safe, incorrect bed configuration and misleading parking information.

Most concerningly, our booking information clearly stated an 11am checkout, yet at 10:45am the owner opened the door and told us we should have left at 10am. I have evidence confirming our checkout time was 11am.

I raised a detailed complaint with Sykes expecting them to investigate the issues fairly. I waited days at a time for a response from the chatbot, before eventually having to submit a formal complaint. Sykes’ final response largely repeated the owner’s version of events and dismissed our concerns. They even stated that checkout had been amended to 10am – despite the evidence (supplied to us by Sykes) showing 11am.

They also stated that roadworks affected access to a driveway. This is simply not what we experienced – there was no off-road parking available to us at all. We parked on the road outside.

I wasn’t expecting Sykes to automatically agree with everything I said or simply issue a refund. I expected them to look objectively at the evidence and properly investigate clear discrepancies.

Instead, no compensation was offered and the matter was closed.

The problems with the accommodation were disappointing, but Sykes’ handling of our complaint has been even more disappointing. It has left me seriously questioning what protection or meaningful support customers receive when something goes wrong.

I will not book through Sykes again.

Terrible company! Avoid like the plague! We booked a holiday cottage on the 2nd of June, they took our money and cancelled the holiday. There was no communication about the cancellation and we were all packed and ready to leave when we searched for the cottage and found out about the cancellation.
They have still not given us a refund!
We tried to get the money back via my bank and the scammers have managed to get it back. I have lost £320.00. They do it so you have no way to contact them as they keep saying that my reference is not valid.
Please be warned about this company.

We've booked with Sykes 6 or 7 times over the last 5 years and generally had very positive experience. The app is great and having reviews of each property is helpful. 99% of the stays have been wonderful. One was not so good and we had to complain about various issues with a cottage in Windermere, it proved difficult to contact the company over the weekend and took a few days of us ringing and messaging to get a proper response. The complaint was eventually dealt with but as with many companies they seem to need more customer service staff and a bigger team, not just rely on useless pointless AI to respond to customers.
We've just had another brilliant holiday in Cornwall and would highly recommend on the basis of ease of booking, price options and range of properties available.

The house that we rented was amazing! There was plenty of space for our party of fourteen, with a variety of bedroom configurations that accommodated us very well
The facilities were of a very good standard, with something for everyone- especially the children.

The Sykes website was clear and easy to navigate and the property listing was detailed and accurate. Only 30% deposit required to book with good communication on booking and before our holiday.

Easy to book and cottage just as described.

Stayed in holiday accommodation that was damp, dirty and filled with flies. We used a dehumidifier to ease the damp, and daily emptied smelly water from full down the sink. I emailed Sykes 3 times after the stay, and they have not replied at all. Booking.com responded slowly, and eventually offered me booking credits. They both now are not answering emails when I ask for proper compensation. Both companies failed to challenge the owner of the property, and then told me that the owner had attempted to take money from the £400 bond I had to hand over when booking! Appalling. Avoid!!

Avoid avoid avoid. Let me make a booking took my money then cancelled 2 days later. Said they issued a refund and would take upto 30days to receive. It’s been 30 days still no money so got in touch with booking.com and Sykes at not cabcelled the booking and processed a refund to booking.com try to scam you out your money then tell you lies, please try another provider unless you want problems

Incredibly easy booking experience, we had a lovely holiday. The house in the Wye valley was perfect.

simple process booking and the property lived up to its description

Ages from 76 down to 18 months old. 14 of us had a very enjoyable time and would definitely stay there again

Myself and my family stayed at 4 DORETHY AVENUE in Skegness for a week in July. I saw that the property had some bad reviews 2 weeks before we were due to arrive so I contacted Sykes and also the number that was given by the maintenance person. I was reassured that all the issues had been dealt with and the property was fit for purpose bearing in mind it was a disability friendly property and my mother is disabled and I have 2 autistic sons that needed certain requirements for the stay which looking at the pictures of the property it all seemed fine. Until we arrived! At first glance everything seemed ok, until we checked out the beds and the mattress myself and my husband had was nothing but bare springs so I reported that straight away! Then the next morning my parents bed unbeknownst to us collapsed due to the wooden slats underneath the mattress being broken so my parents both fell through the mattress! So I took pictures and reported that so they sent a maintenance man out to repair the broken bits. Then the chairs round the dining table were all falling to peices so they had to bring all different chairs. The groundfloor shower didnt work so they had to send an electrician to look at it to find it needed a whole new shower unit so my disabled mum had to wait nearly 2 days before she could shower. The seal on the upstairs bathroom shower fell off the minute we opened the door, my sons bedroom window handle fell off when he opened the window. The dishwasher had the most stomach churning smell of rotten eggs so we couodnt use that. There was a great big whole in the floorboards near the tv in the living room thats covered by carpet which you could break your ankle in. And besides all that it shows in the advertised pics that the house has a lovely garden to sit in which would've been lovely for my parents as they couldnt get out much be of my mums disability and it was an extremely hot week so they didnt want to be indoors, but the garden is not there anymore they have cut it off and all you have now is a concrete strip and the fence! And the bedrooms are pictured to have televisions in them which my boys needed as they need that stimulation while they were in the house, but no tvs were there when we arrived!
All these issues were the issues that id been assured had been fixed and put right and they HAD NOT!
So the things that I insisted that they came out to put right got sorted but only through me having to constantly message when it should have been done from the start! Im absolutely disgusted by the whole thing! And I also contacted them to tell them that the pictures advertised are not what you get when you arrive to which I got told that its not up to them to change the pictures its down to Sykes! Well they still havent been changed! Ive since contacted Sykes and the maintenance person to say thay I want 50% of my money back die to the upset and discomfort it all caused plus the fact that they are simply not in the slightest bit bothered about their customers or even updating the advertisement for the property and ive been ignored for ages then told the owner of the property isnt giving me anything back because they corrected what was wrong when I told them too!
Well its simply not good enough and il be taking it further!!!!

Ease of booking

We had a lovely holiday in the main but sadly there was an issue in the house which meant we couldn’t use the shower because there was water coming through the kitchen ceiling! The owner was rather slow in responding and we were glad to come home for a proper bathroom. Such a shame as the house was good in other respects.

I have booked one of its client holiday house and got cancellation without getting any notice.
We arrived the holiday home and found it is already being occupied.

The booking is made on Airbnb.
Skyes Holiday is the agent for the host.
And the host own the holiday home.

On Airbnb side, the record is a valid booking.
On the host side, his record is the booking has been cancelled.

I can get contact with both the host and airbnb.
This agent, Skyes holiday, never reply anything.

I will avoid booking any house being managed by this company.