Traveller from Basingstoke stayed in January,2010

Guest Comment:
I chose this hotel after a Google search for hotels near the Royal Albert Hall as I was taking my girlfriend to see a show. It was very close to a tube station and reasonably priced, and more importantly for me at the time, just 10mins from the RAH. It also had an OK star rating and a few positive comments from previous guests. The room itself was a bit cramped (to be expected in London) and could use a bit of a fix up and/or modernisation in places, but overall was clean and orderly. The water pressure in the shower was good, although the shower head was fixed to the wall which was a shame. The staff I encountered could have been better. The telephone manner wasn’t great and I had to ask whether I was through to the right hotel, as I didn’t receive the expected “... thank you for calling the Rydges Kensington Hotel, how may I help?” I called up in the morning to see if I could book in slightly earlier than the 2pm book-in time. Rather than a “...I can’t promise your room will be ready sir, but I’ll speak to the cleaning staff to see if I can get your room ready first...” all I got was “...No. People have tried to do that before and we can’t do it...” Even if the member of staff at the reception desk knew it was unlikely, there are ways of saying no that will still make the customer feel like they are going to be getting good service. Fortunately the room came with an iron, and one of those tiny wall mounted ironing boards. Unfortunately the Iron had no fuse in the plug and the iron didn’t work. The wall socket was also smashed and I wasn’t overly confident it was safe. I went down to reception to ask for either an iron or a fuse, and I got a bit of a blank expression from the girl behind the desk. She was not from the UK, probably French by her accent and I’m guessing wasn’t as fluent in English as she’d like to be. After a quick fumble under the reception desk I was told there were no fuses. Almost begrudgingly, another girl on reception who had been glued to the computer screen as I waited for the French girl to come through the back doors asked “...what is it you want?” After explaining again (even though I had been standing in front of her all the while) she states that she’ll have a new iron sent up to my room. 20-25 minutes later I got an iron. Good job we weren’t in a hurry! There’s the option to pay 50% of your night’s fee to book out at 4pm, rather than 11am, which we wanted to do. Having called through to make this known, we were told we’d have to be charged a full night’s stay. After arguing this point (it’s on the first page of their guests’ book) we had to wait for a phone call back to confirm. 10 minutes later we got a call through saying we were absolutely right. Why they couldn’t have checked their own literature the first time we called (or known it anyway) is a bit of a mystery! I dread to think of the amount of guests that paid twice what they needed to in the past! Another annoyance was when we had just entered the room and started unpacking, a member of staff came in to make sure our mini-fridge had been re-stocked. Why this couldn’t have been done before the book in I have no idea. The hotel wasn’t bristling with guests to make the workload longer than normal. It felt like a bit of an invasion at the time, the room couldn’t really accommodate 3 people. Long story short, the staff could have been far better trained and organised. This is a central management issue rather than their fault. Although from the first telephone call did make for a less than perfect hotel destination. I was left feeling I was either talking to a first dayer, or an unmotivated/complacent long-timer working on their CV at the main desk. The Hotel was OK due to its proximity to our daytime destination, but I feel the hotel know this and don’t really have an interest in staff training/recruitment to make an average hotel a good one. You can forgive small rooms and faulty irons if the staff is welcoming, friendly and helpful. 2/5.

Top Tip:
There's a great little Italian just up the road. Can't remember the name, but opposite a half decent pub called the Gloucester Arms. Literally a 5 minute walk up the road. Very reasonably priced and great pasta - I'm amazed if their menu is that cheap during tourist season (we went in Jan 2010). Was very pleasantly surprised as it was near empty at the time.