How to determine if a hostel room is a walk-through room?

Question

This summer I stayed in a hostel in Moscow. The ratings from Hostelworld weren't that bad. I have to admit that I have seen places far worse, but one thing really annoyed me: We booked a room in a 6 bed dorm. We also get our place there, but in reality the dorm was a walk-through room for another 8 bed dorm. So judging from the noise we had a 14 bed dorm instead of a 6 bed dorm. I complained about this, but it wasn't really successful.

So I'm wondering if there is a possibility to judge before booking if a dorm is a walk-through room?

Answer 1

There's little you can do, apart from the obvious, depending how thorough you want to be:

• Check the photos - see if it shows the dorms and the layout
• Check the reviews, hopefully you left a review about it, and others may have too.
• Email them - ask the layout of the room and any other suitable questions.
• Or even call them - a friendly chat will also let you know their level of English, which can be useful to know in advance.

Answer 2

Don't just check one site, check all the sites that rate hostels:

• Hostelworld
• HostelBookers
• TripAdvisor

TripAdvisor lets you review anything, not just hostels, and not only ones you booked through them, unlike the hostel-specific sites. It's easiest to look up each one that looks interesting by name since they mix hostels in with "specialty lodging".

TripAdvisor even lets you email people who did a review and ask them specific questions!

Here's an example for Nova Hostel in Moscow. Look for the links that say "Ask ... about ..."

Ask dizemka about Nova Hostel