Couple who sued over 'stale hotel croissants' on Provence getaway awarded £4k damages by judge
23 January 2025, 11:37
A couple who sued Club Med over "uneatable" and "stale" breakfast pastries has been awarded nearly £4,000 by a judge.
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The British couple were holidaying in France when their hotel reportedly provided "uneatable" food and a smelly and "mouldy" room.
Lawyer Damen Bennion, 52, and his accountant wife, Jane, 49, paid £6,670 for the all-inclusive holiday to Provence in 2023.
Joined by their two sons, their Club Med Opio experience was ruined, according to the couple, after being served an "awful" dinner on the first night of the holiday, followed by "stale breakfast pastries".
The judge ruled that it had been the couple’s choice to refuse evening meals at the resport's restaurant.
Despite this, the family was awarded £3,945 in damages - compensation for the dirty room they were greeted with.
Mr Bennion, a lawyer for a firm specialising in advising car collectors, sued the travel company over the stale cuisine and mouldy sleeping conditions provided by the company.
His wife told the court in central London: “It’s not hard to get pastries right in France, but they got them wrong.”
“We told our children on the first night that daddy would get things sorted, but it wasn’t sorted,” the lawyer said.
“At the end of the week, we as a family went home miserable,” he added.
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The couple told the court Club Med told them to expect a “gourmet” experience during the stay and were left disappointed after the quality of the stay fell below their expectations.
“Everything about the food was poor,” they told the court.
The judge confirmed the room was "dirty" after referring to photographic evidence and that charging the family for hotel parking was “inconsistent" with the advertised "all-inclusive experience”.
After hearing the evidence, the judge told the court he was “persuaded that there were misrepresentations as to the standard of the resort”.
