The hostel is nothing special but the staff (Eduardo) is very kind and friendly!

I don't know how to start this review... Well, I can say that the staff is really confused. Starting with my telephone calls to confirm my reservation. The tel number was from something like "backpackers", wich seems to be the hostel's office (not only ciao roma, but others also). They weren't able to give me a secure answer...
Getting there, no one could say what my room was, and they put me in a bedroom that was not the one I had made reservations. It was better, that's true, because it had private bathroom (and of course we payed the same price). The fact is that we (me and a friend) should stay in a 3 bed mixed room, so we knew that we could have someone else in the room, but in this other room, there were 4 beds, and i told the staff that I was worried that they would decide to put 2 more people there, because we have payed more too have more silence in the room, so we would only accept one more person there, etc.... They said "don't worry, you are right", but what wasn't our surprise when we found 2 guys in the other 2 beds? And what could we do at that time? They didn't even tell us about our new room mates...
Well ok, let me talk about the hostel now: it's a nice small place, good localization, in terms of catching buses and subways or go walking to some main atractions. The staff is nice, but, as I said, not well organized. Another problem some of the guys speak a terrible english, really hard to understand (and, people should know that in Italia they love to speak english, even if you speak italian...). Another thing that --- me off was that in the morning they would knok severall times at our door to wake us up (but we had never asked them to do so). And they also have a lock out that we didn't know about.
Well, maybe these are normal problems, and I cannot say that I would never get back there. You just have to be prepared for the unconveniences...

So we get there after taking a long train in and they tell us we are being upgraded to another place because they were overbooked. So, after trekking to the hostel, they send us back to the train station (where we origionally came into) and did not reimburse our fare. Thanks for the email letting us know of the change in plans...no ahead notice. Then we get to this terrible place called Ciao Roma...we learn we dont get included breakfast and dinner as was stated through Happy Days and that they stick us in a room that does not even lock. we had to shut the door with a chair...so when we left during the day, our room was wide open. We didnt get what we payed for and didnt stay where we booked it. The hostel was crap, the room smelled, and they were highly unprofessional. They also screwed over another couple who arrived with us at Happy Days and sent them with us to Cia Roma. They requested a private room private bath and they booked the room that they requested 3 weeks prior to somebody else without even telling them. And, the people who run Ciao Roma are never there and when we needed to pay they said they would get their in the morning...the failed to show. As a result of waiting for them, I missed seeing the Vatican. No Food. No service. No Professionalism. No Honesty...some freaking upgrade. Stay here if you like being cheated out of your money. If your sensible, go elsewhere.

basic accomodation, friendly staff, clean rooms and they
even have cigar balconies!!
plus as much free wine as you want and beer sometimes
too!!!
walking distance from the station and city centre.
had a lovely time.
would go back and stay here!