"Arrival/Checking-in
This hotel has no parking of any description however paid parking is available within a 9 minute walk. However, we had very heavy bags and carrying them from the car park wouldn’t have been possible. There is a very convenient pull in directly outside the hotel but be extremely careful using this for dropping off bags, as we were fined £35 by the council within 5 minutes of arriving. We arrived around 5PM on a Friday and asked at reception if it was ok to quickly leave the car and run the bags up to the room. The lady on reception confirmed it wasn’t owned by the hotel but couldn’t see a problem for a couple of minutes and based on the time of day. On arriving back to the car to drive to the car park I found a parking fine issued just after we had arrived. The warden must have been stalking the area as so little time had passed it was highly unlikely it was just a coincidence.
Room Quality
The room itself was spotlessly clean, very modern and very well presented by the room service team. The bed was very comfy and the room included pretty much everything you could ask for. The bathroom was very impressive including a bath and huge separate shower, again everything was exceptionally clean.
We did find some issues however:
We had a balcony room and the seal on the window was poor as it constantly sounded like it was open from the ambient noise and wind outside.
Each side of the bed should have had a reading lamp, but the left side had a bracket and no lamp as though someone had snapped it off. A small thing maybe but after paying over £600 for 2 nights we expected everything to be perfect.
We had booked a couples package deal however there was only 1 robe and 1 pair of slippers available in the wardrobe.
Pool/Spa
As our deal included tickets to the Thermospa so we didn’t use the onsite pool/spa.
Breakfast and Dining
We were a bit concerned that we were the only people in the restaurant on a Friday evening and thought maybe it was a bad sign. We were pleasantly surprised though as the food was consisted of quality ingredients and was very well cooked. The only let down was the time it took for the food to be served which seemed to be an age especially when we were the only customers.
We had breakfast on both mornings and the quality seemed to take a significant dip compared to the evening meal. The first morning we had the full English which was serviceable but not great, the quality of the ingredients was poor and the cooking wasn’t good either. The beans seem to have been sat for a very long time and the hashbrown must have been deep fried as it just tasted like grease. It also took over 20 minutes from ordering for it to be served.
The next morning we ordered pancakes with bacon and an omelette which took over 35 minutes to be served which is very poor. We ended up going over the checkout time due to this, although it wasn’t an issue when checking out. Again, the food was very average at best and not worth the wait.
Checking Out
This is where we had another issue mainly with staff knowledge of the deal we had booked. As we were checking out the lady on reception told us there is £19 outstanding to pay. We both looked bemused as we had asked an hour or so before and was told we still had £35 credit left. I had to explain this to the receptionist who was struggling with the system to amend the balance. To be fair the manager took over to rectify our account and we thought the issue had been solved. However, a few days after checking out I noticed a charge to my card for £19! This is unacceptable as a admin error has now cost me an additional £19 on top of the £600+ I had already paid!
Overall, it is a very nice modern clean hotel with an excellent room service team. Staff were very friendly and welcoming, however information provided needs to be clearer and more consistent. The restaurant and food service speed definitely needs improvement."
