We had booked the hotel over the internet and rang to confirm the booking, only to be told that they had forgotten to put on the website that they're fully booked. But the twist is if we're willing to pay 20 Euros more, they can give us a room. Excuse me? You have a room but you're saying you're fully booked? Very unprofessional start.

We made it clear to them that we have a booking and have also paid a non-refundable deposit to secure the room, they are legally obligated to give us accommodation, we also dropped in the fact that my partner is a lawyer, to which they quickly said they'll sort things out.

When we arrived at the hotel, we were told that we would need to stay at another nearby hotel for the first 2 nights, and return back to this hotel for the final night. As long as we have a place to stay, we're willing to go along with it. We walked a few minutes over to the other hotel, only to realise they've put us in a very tiny room with hardly any room for us to open our suitcase, not to mention that the window opens into a lounge, what happened to our 'seaview room'?? OK. We understand it's a busy period, we won't argue with them, it's a place to stay.

But the second day as we were heading out in the morning, the hotel owner asked what time we'll be checking out that day. What? After several phone calls between the hotels, both insisting they're fully booked and urged the other to take us, we were told to pack our bags to move to yet another hotel for the night. This hotel is however in a different area, we had to take a taxi that cost $10, we never got that back from the hotel. It was a nice enough hotel, but highly inconvenient as was in a different area, not to mention our day was ruined with yet another move that set us back a few hours, wasted time.

Third day we took yet another taxi back to Umay, they did apologise for the muck up, but did nothing to make up for the trouble. They also asked us to pay the deposit again as they said the website hadn't forwarded the payment to them! We told them it's not our problem, it's between the website and them, they knew we were right but wanted to push the issue to see if they could get more money out of us. Lovely.

As a hotel itself, the room was ok, very dated, view was great, heating didn't work, shower was disgusting, walls paper thin we heard next door's snoring, breakfast was ok, and reception advice lousy (we were recommended a place to eat but it was a complete ripoff, food wasn't great and overpriced, and charged us for 'free' pick up service).

Overall I would never recommend this hotel, it's over priced, unprofessional, and not up to the standard that it claims to have. There are better and cheaper places to stay in the same area, Peninsula for one.

We stayed at the Hoitel Umay because it was part of an extremely reasonable on-line vacation package offered by TUI Euorpe's largest travel agent and its location is near Istanbul's monuments. The Hotel has 13 rooms and on-line it is stated that most of the rooms have a view of the Marmara Sea. We asked repeatedly for one of them but were always told they were full. Tthe hotel is described as a "boutique" hotel. This is absurb, its decor is hideous. The rooms were clean but there was mould in the bathrooms. The staff was friendly enough, but on returning home we realized that one of them was a thief who went through our bags on the last day of our stay and removed cash.. There are many other economical and much more attractive hotels in this area. You can certainly do better than this hotel. I would not return here.

What a shame for Turkey and Istanbul to have such a terrible hotel! Rooms where it is really difficult to breathe because of the humidity inside! Very poor breakfast!Choose another one

This family run hotel is conveniently located at some 5 minutes walk from the Blue Mosque and the Haghia Sophia. So this is the best thing about it. It is far from a "boutique" hotel as the hotel's home page claims. The owner definitely has had an initial idea of how to establish a small inn with a traditional Ottoman feel which is obvious by the great attention to detail in dealing with the outer and inner design of the entire hotel. It truly looks authentic.

But this is the end to all things positive. The breakfast was utterly poor (a far cry from the declared "Turkish breakfast”) and the service is even worse. Only the owner speaks good English and was always very friendly, but no use from that as he was rarely there. The others, starting from the receptionist to the lady at the dining area could not utter more than "hi and bye."

The rooms were very very tiny. Could be okay for a single traveler, but are claustrophobic for a pair.

A pity it is that a little bit of more effort was not put by the hotel owner to make Umay a truly authentic Turkish experience.