Art of Comfort - Haus Ingeborg - Cologne, Germany 

My travel agent booked 3 nights at this hotel and we canceled after I had a room at my first choice (Zur Quelle - which was excellent) more than a day out as stated in the cancellation policy and they charged my credit card 80% of the 3 nights anyway saying their policy on that particular week was a ridiculous 14 days notice for cancellations. Our business does has a lot of travel in the area with a local agency so I had one of my German colleagues talk to them and they would not dismiss the charge even under the promise that 15 less people might be staying there in a month. Now I'm stuck with the hassle of protesting the charge with my bank.

This is an overpriced, noisy, smoky place with a misleading name "Art of comfortableness" . . . wish it would have been just a bit comfortable. For $ 75 Euro (100 dollars, there was a fair and heavy price gouging going on) I got: Confusion at check in (could not find my reservation in a place with only 17 rooms!), a room as tiny as a jail cell (the sink and a shower as part of the room, not extra), extreme late night noise from other rooms, hallway and toilets, cigarette smoke wavering into the room (they do not have nonsmoking floors or rooms), NO aircon, airplane and constant traffic noise when you open the window (a nearby construction business parks their vans on the "hotel" parking spots), half-naked punks drinking beer on the patio until midnight, a tiny table and almost no space to move around, and a lot more things you won`t like. The only upside: A decent breakfast in a room where everybody is allowed to smoke. Their advertising is fancy and comes close to fraud ("quiet"). I bet there are hundreds better options in Cologne.