I booked a 4 night break at this hotel after booking my flight with jet2.com. approx 6 weeks before departure jet2.com advises me that this flight is cancelled. I tried to cancel my booking as I couldn't find a direct flight from manchester. The hotel said no refund, I understand that last minuet cancellations must be paid for, but surely they could have filled the room within the 6 weeks they had. Expedia tried to help but the hotel was adament, no refund. So I had to travel with british airways, via london heathrow, and pay more for the flight. Not a good advertisement for the hotel.

As for the hotel, the stay was fine, the room was clean, service good. Not a bad location. Would I stop there again - no. The time and effort it took to locate another flight on the dates I had booked was bad, not to mention the extra travelling. no going back to the hotel, and no booking with jet2.com.

This hotel is a collection of buildings around an old alley, which serves as an outdoor restaurant in good weather. There are apparently two levels of room - ours was snug, but the higher level is I guess of fairly standard size. The bathroom was first-class. The hot-and-cold breakfast buffet was fine, and the restaurant food very good, with a lot of interesting wines offered. (There were locals in the dining room, which is always a good sign.)

The hotel is not "steps from St. Stephen's": it is 3/4 mile from there. However, it is on an important local street, with good stores and restaurants, a 5-minute walk from the Rochusgasse metro station and thus well-connected to the city.

I have stayed in the Mercure Biedermeier several times over the last few weeks (March/April 07) on Business. For me the location is good, although if you are here for siteseeing then its a little bit of a walk from the centre of town.

Rooms are not massive but the bathrooms are nice and everything works. I usually go for breakfast at one of the bakeries on Landstrasse.

The U bahn is a 5 minute walk and there is a bus (74A) just outside the door. Landstrasse street is full of shops and have many resturants.

I had one fairly major issue on my last stay. I was due to checkout Wednesday but needed to extend my stay. I spoke to reservation at the hotel and they confirmed I could stay 2 more nights. When I returned to my room at midnight all of my belongings had gone (toothbrush and all), the only thing remaining was the things in the safe(which was still locked). They could not find my bag until 7.30am the next day -this is the really annoying part, had they given me my bag there and then I would have accepted it was just a reservations mixup. There had been a mixup between the reservations dept and the front desk. They did not charge me for 1 night of the stay after I complained.

However despite this issue I have no problem in returning to this hotel (except they are full up next week when Im going back).

This is not a four star hotel. Rooms and bathrooms are small. Bed linens, pillows very skimpy and bath towels scratchy. These basic essentials need a major upgrade. Breakfast was the best part of our stay.