Tailors Hall Hotel

I stayed at Tailors Hall during the Hallowe'en weekend this year with my sister. We had originally booked Ellersly House Hotel but were contacted the day before we were due to travel to say that the hotel had unexpectedly had to close. We were therefore offered Tailors Hall as a substitute on the same terms (ie b&b).
I am not familiar with any hotels in Edinburgh so I looked up the website before we travelled and thought it looked like a nice place. How wrong could I be?!
It took us a while to find the hotel (due to rubbish map/map reading skills) but we eventually found our way to Cowgate. The outside looked much like the website but once inside it was clear that it wasn't as well maintained as the website would appear to show.
The receptionist refused to let us check in until I paid a £25 deposit to cover "incidentals" as I didn't have a credit card to give her. She then told us we were on a room only basis. When I queried this with her she wasn't overly helpful until I pointed out that the voucher stated "buffet breakfast" was included, her reply was that they didn't do buffet breakfasts but after some discussion she agreed to provide complimentary breakfasts. Unfortunately for us the staff seemed determined not to provide the breakfast as when we turned up to eat next morning we were told that breakfast was over and if we wanted to eat we would have to pay for it in the Three Sisters Pub. We were hungry so we paid but were so embarrassed by the way we were dealt with that we didn;t attempt to get breakfast for the rest of our stay. The communal areas were grubbly and smelled of bleach and vomit in some places- not very pleasant first thing in the morning. Most of the carpets had chewing gum trampled into them and there was a lot of dust/dirt. The shower in our room was faulty which meant that we were nearly scalded every time we tried to use it, we asked for it to be fixed but it seemed as though nothing was done. The general attitude I got from the staff was that they really couldn't be bothered and didn't want to be there. Even getting my deposit back was difficult as the "24 hour" reception was closed with a sign on it directing us to find a night porter if we needed help. Luckily a member of staff was having a cigarette in the courtyard so he eventually came in and after a lot of sighing and checking of the computer which apparently held no details of a deposit he discovered an envelope with my money in it in a cashbox behind the desk. The atmosphere of the hotel was more like a youth hostel(really noisy at night)- fine if you just want to get hammered and then collapse in a heap but not really a place to relax in. Thankfully Edinburgh is great place with plenty to keep us occupied, so we spent the bare minimum of time in the hotel. How this place is supposed to be a 3 star hotel I cannot fathom as I have had better service/facilities in places with 1 or 2 stars. In terms of being close to the city centre the location is excellent (with the exception of its proximity to the local "massage parlour/escort service". There are plenty of pubs/restaurants and small independent shops close at hand and I can thoroughly recommend the David Bann Vegetarian restaurant just up the road. I don't think I would stay in Tailors Hall again unless I booked room only and brought a can of air-freshener, some industrial earplugs and made arrangements in advance to eat breakfast elsewhere.