City Kit

The first thing we would recommend is, avoid doing anything with CityKid.

This team has defined a smart method how to make easy money on you whilst you are in New York.

After they got your full payment in cash, in our case over 3000$, they tell you where your apartment is.Believe me many surprises will follow!! all of your complains or calls will be ignored , or they play along with you until you leave.

We a family of 4 booked an apartment for 6 days in Manhattan. Kitchen equipment, towels was poor.

In the first night water dripped in 1 bathroom from the ceiling above, 1 bin per day. The water came out of the lamp!!Which is more than dangerous. We informed immediately the front desk by phone/mail.For 6 days nothing happened. Only stories, a plumber will come, the super will fix it...and ignorance.

I went to police, they recommend me to contact federal authorities.After I complained at several organizations and informed a lawyer, City Kid gave me a refund which doesn`t satisfy me. No second bathroom for 6 Days should be minimum a refund of 30%.

The only plus factor is that the apartment is very close to Time square.

Review: I contracted with City Kit to lease a vacation rental from September [redacted], 2014. My reservation or benefit #[redacted]. The rental was a 3 bedroom & 2 Bathrooms.It had beautiful pictures online. When we walked in nothing looked the same. Linens weren't provided as listed (1 towel was provided for each person for "5" days), the 3 TV's didn't work, the 3rd bedroom had dirty linen on it and the wooden floors were dirty. In the 1st bedroom the bed had BED BUGS. I have bites all on my chest, which I took pictures of. I made 4 calls to the number they provided. On the 3rd day we finally got a call back. I told him all of the above. NOTHING was done about any. I put a stop on the credit card portion but they required the balance to be paid in cash, bank check, or wire.I'm asking for a FULL refund. When I noticed the bed bug bites we left and spent more money to stay in a hotel. The total rental amount is $2469.50.Following is what they said would be provided:Bedding: Linens, pillows and bedding for all beds and sleep sofas.Towels: Two sets of towels per bed and per couch. Kitchen towels and bath mats are also provided.Appliances: Basic kitchen appliances such as a toaster, coffee maker and teapot.Cookware: Utensils, plates, cups, pots and pans, dish soap and sponge.Internet; Wireless internet.Cosmetics: Hair dryer, flatiron and ironing board.Consumables: An initial supply of toilet paper and hand soap are provided as a courtesy.Desired Settlement: I would like a total refund.

Consumer

Response:

The selected photos are of the bed bug bites.

At this time, I have not been contacted by City Kit regarding complaint ID [redacted].

Sincerely,

Review: Rented a property through city kit upon arrival property was dirty and was not as advertised. We arrived to a dirty property with dirty linens on the bed and filthy couch and stove and TV not working. We contacted city kit that night and was informed that the superintendent would come to the apartment in 30 mins. The Superintendent never came and when we went to the office at 9:49 pm it was closed even though they advertise office hours of 10am to 10pm this was after we made to contact them from 9pm onward.We left multiple voicemail messages and no one return our call. We contacted them the next day to ask for refund and was denied same as they the contract agreement.Desired Settlement: Refund

Business

Response:

CityKit acknowledges that [redacted] was having issues with the facility when we spoke with her. At that point we offered to repair and or replace any of the said issues she was having. [redacted] went out and purchased linens and cleaning supplies which CityKit agreed to reimburse her. On Sunday [redacted] asked for a refund and CityKit explained to [redacted] that a refund wasn't possible and was asked if she had read out terms and conditions before she added her e-signature. Please see the below statement which is in our terms and conditions which [redacted] agreed to and signed off on before buying our membership. Yes our office was closed at 9:49pm on July [redacted] due to one of the team members having to help someone who thought they were locked out of their facility. On Sunday July [redacted] was moved to a larger facility than she had originally paid for at no extra cost. [redacted] accepted the facility. On Monday July [redacted], her friend [redacted] and CityKit came to a mutual agreement. They didn't want to stay past Friday the [redacted] even though they weren't due to leave [redacted] until Monday July [redacted]. In our agreement they were leaving on Friday the [redacted] at 11am and CityKit would refund them for Saturday, Sunday and Monday. On Wednesday the [redacted] and [redacted] backed out of our original agreement, but then agreed to it again via email at 10:35 am on Friday the [redacted]. At the point of leaving at 11am [redacted] was credited the three days and the supplies she purchased for a total of $1299.83. [redacted] stayed in a CityKit facility for 6 days and was refunded for the days she didn't stay. Failure to Provide Services: Issues including but not limited to, broken items, missing supplies, sanitation issues, interrupted services or utilities must be reported to the Management Company. The Management Company shall have sufficient time - usually 24 hours - to correct repair or replace any reported deficiencies that are within the Management Company´s control, before Operator considers issuing any credits to the Member's account. If the Facility, due to unforeseen circumstances, is not available or otherwise uninhabitable, the Operator may offer the Member an alternative Facility. A Member may be provided a substitute Facility for all or part of their stay due to the original Facility not being immediately available due to unforeseen circumstances, or due to required maintenance and repairs. Member agrees that they will accept any alternate facility provided by Operator and that no refunds shall be given in cases where an alternate facility is provided. Mem ber agrees that they must move to the original facility upon notice by the management that the original Facility is available.

Review: A group of women (I am one of them) visited NY and rented a property from CityKit. After arriving at our rental unit on 10/**/2014, we left for dinner (about 9:30 PM). When we returned to the unit we were unable to open the door with the key provided. By this time it was 11:15 PM. All of our paperwork/phone numbers were inside the unit. In order to reenter the unit we had to call a locksmith (conveniently, there was a number for a locksmith on a sticker on the door). The locksmith arrived, confirmed that the key was a faulty copy, put a new lock in the door and gave us new keys. We got back into our rental unit at about midnight. The next day we informed CityKit of the problem and the person that we spoke to said they would return our call with a plan to refund our money. That didn't happen. A few days later, we took time out of our vacation to go to the office of CityKit to personally ask for the refund. At that time, they said they needed the faulty key, the old lock and the receipt in order to process the refund and they also said they need to contact the landlord of the building before refunding our money. Since that time no one from CityKit has contacted us and I have sent several emails.

As an aside… two of the women in our group are quite elderly - 83 and 75 and waiting on the cold steps of an unfamiliar building in a big city late at night was quite scary and unnerving for all of us, but for them especially. Also, there should have been no question about whether we should receive a refund - the key was faulty! CityKit should have refunded the money - no questions asked! Looking back, maybe we should have kept the new keys to the unit until we got the refund, but since we are honest, trusting people we assumed they would refund the money, and we left the new keys with them when we left NYC.Desired Settlement: We just want to be reimbursed for the cost of the locksmith/lock replacement. It was approx. $337.00 (the original receipt was left with [redacted] at CityKit)

Consumer

Response:

I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted], and find that this resolution is satisfactory to me and the matter has been resolved.

Sincerely,

Review: We booked a holiday to visit New York from the [redacted] to [redacted] of October. We booked an apartment via Trip Advisor link which went to the Citykit webiste. We chose an apartment and made the booking we paid an initial deposit $1635 by credit card as per instruction. The day before we were to leave they advised us by email they had changed the apartment we booked. We were not happy about this and informed Citykit of our disappointment of the late change. We arrived in New York on the [redacted] of October and visited there office as instructed, we paid the balance in cash to a man called Mohammed. He gave us the keys and we went to the apartment. We were not made aware that the apartment was on the [redacted] floor with no lift, they did not advise us of this at any stage. As we had a 76 year old grandmother with us this was not acceptable. Also the apartment was not clean and the furniture was damaged. To make matters my wife twisted her ankle on the stairs.

We went back to the Citykit office and advised that the apartment was not satisfactory and we would be cancelling our stay. The contact Mohammed advised that he had no other apartments available and advised that we will get a refund. As it was late at night we stayed one night and cancelled the rest of the booking the next morning. They did not give us any money back. we were advised to email [redacted] and [redacted] to arrange the refund. I emailed them whilst we were still in New York, they stated they would comeback to us. Since we have returned to the UK I have been continuing to contact Citykit and have been advised to wait 30 days, which has now elapsed and we have not been given any adequate responses.

We have been appalled at the all round service we have received and would like a refund as detailed below.

We would be greatly appreciative if you can assist us in this matter as this seriously ruined our first visit to New York.Desired Settlement: I would like a refund of $2883 less one night stay of $411, therefore I would like a total refund of $2472.

Consumer

Response:

At this time, I have not been contacted by City Kit regarding complaint ID [redacted].Sincerely,[redacted]

Review: I was looking for an apartment to rent October [redacted], 2015 in Manhattan, New York City. I wanted a relatively quiet location mid-block on a street away from the corner. I saw an apartment online at [redacted] on [redacted] managed by CityKit. The agent at CityKit, Terry, wouldn't disclose the address (she said for competitive reasons), but told me that it was a mid-block location on [redacted] just east o[redacted], which is what I wanted. She then told me to go online to book it, which I did on September *, 2015, and placed a credit card deposit for the majority of the rental. After booking it, I found out from a real estate website that the apartment was not mid-block but was actually on the corner of [redacted] in a building known as [redacted]. When I called CityKit this morning (September *, 2015 - still a month and a half before the date of the rental), Terry told me that to her knowledge the apartment was midblock. She then transferred me to Jonathan, who told me that the unit is not on the corner. but above a shoe repair shop next to the corner in the corner building (as if that makes any difference). Due to their misrepresentation about the location of the apartment., I asked for my deposit to be refunded, but he refused. I did not ask him to cancel the reservation, as there was no reason to cancel it if I didn't receive my deposit back as I had already paid for most of it.. He canceled the reservation, however, without my consent, thereby allowing him to keep my deposit and re-rent the apartment.Desired Settlement: I would like my deposit refunded. Because I gave CityKit a deposit only because they misrepresented the location of the apartment, I should get it refunded. Because there is still a month and a half before the occupancy date, CityKit has plenty of time to re-rent it.

Review: To whom it may concern,

We rented a property near [redacted] through VBRO on Mon Dec [redacted] for that evening. Once we put in our rental request we found that CityKit was managing the property. After putting down the partial payment required by city kit, we received an email stating that the rest of the payment was required in cash or certified check and the key pick up location was across town from the rental property. This email did not contain the address of the property only the pick-up location. I emailed Terry (our Citykit rental agent) to inquire about the address of the property at 2:26pm (see copy of email below). She never responded.

We went to the pickup location at 5pm, paid what was owed in cash and were given a receipt and a key that had a tag with "123" on it that appeared to be an address. Unfortunately given the time it took us to get to the office, we didn't have time to go to the rental property before our evening dinner meeting which was followed by a holiday reception. Upon leaving the event went to [redacted]. We looked for an address of "123" but couldn't find anything, I checked my email but Terry never responded and there was also no address on the receipt provided. We called the City Kit a number of times but there was no answer. So, eventually we found a nearby hotel and checked in.

When we called City Kit the next day we were passed to a Manager that was extremely rude and would not provide me with his name and would not pass me along to his boss. After arguing for a bit he agreed to give us a refund (as the representative from whom we picked the keys up was supposed to give us a wi-fi card which had the address on it), which we never received. But he said a refund would take 60 days to process. I told him that was unacceptable and he agreed to process it immediately. I thought things would have been resolved.

A few days later when I followed up, Tammy told me that we had to email this address to "request a refund." After the horrible customer service we received and multiple conversations we had with the Manager, you can understand how a request to send this email adds insult to injury. We have wasted so much time and money on this horrible experience from taking cabs across town and paying for them to wait while we got the key (which took forever) and while we searched uselessly for an address, not to mention the high cost of getting a hotel with no notice. This is not an acceptable way to run a business.

City Kit is at fault and should resolve this matter by responding to acknowledge this email and immediately issuing a refund. If our money is quickly refunded, we won't take any additional action. If a prompt refund isn't provided I'll engage our legal counsel (who I have Bcc'd on this email) to seek retribution for the full amount to which we are entitled (which I imagine will include the cost of the room, cab, additional money spent on the more expensive hotel room we stayed in and of course legal/ filing fees).

I look forward to resolving this once and for all, the means to that end is up to you.Desired Settlement: We would like a refund for the residence we were never able to obtain after payment was collected.

Business

Response:

This Client arrived at our office to check-in, when checking in you must clear your balance before picking up the key, guest cleared they balance and was then given a key tag, and ID card for the apt with the apt address, the following day the guest called and said they did not receive the address, which with all due respect is impossible, in the 10 years we have been in business, there have may been some issues, but a guest will never pay their balance without knowing where exactly they are going. My take from this is that, the guest went to the gathering they were going to, lost the card info, and tried to reach someone after hours, however our office is open until 10:00 PM, they weren't able to get in contact with front desk because it was after hours, so they then checked into a hotel. Kim

We rented an apartment from them last summer through HomeAway/VRBO. The apartment was in horrible condition - water damaged ceilings with large holes in the plaster and mold. Very dirty throughout. Toilet paper stuffed around the doors and window air conditioner. Lint filter in dryer hadn't been emptied in ages. Dirty linen/laundry left behind. 5 remote controls that didn't work (no batteries). Non functional smoke detector. The items promised to cook with were mostly non existent. Make you pay cash - so you can't get a refund from your credit card I'm certain (they told me so you can't cancel your credit card after you leave). Tried to get a partial refund from them but they would not respond. VRBO was not helpful either. Still renting the property. Have lots of photos to substantiate.