Ronan Larkin

Review of Bewleys Hotels

I stayed at the Clayton overnight to attend a wedd...

I stayed at the Clayton overnight to attend a wedding and a second day BBQ. Overall the hotel was lovely, the location was excellent and the food was great. However, there was a significant issue with the staff at all the touch points during our stay. To begin with, I rang reservations to ask about a late check out. The operator on the phone didn't know what I was talking about and eventually started quoting the room fine at me. During the wedding reception, the staff were walking around with bottles of wine but not serving anyone. When someone at our table asked for wine, they served them and then walked off again. We had to get them back and ask them to fill all the glasses. When the bottle ran out the waiter left and never returned. We eventually all had wine at the table but this was after our starter and half way through the soup course. We got potato and vegetables which were delivered when most people had finished there dinner. We needed to use our own dessert spoons (3) for the potato and veg, and when we asked to have the cutlery replaced for our dessert we were given 1 soup spoon. Our used main course plates remained in front of us right the way through the speeches and were only removed to put our desserts down. We kept being asked did we want tea or coffee, but had not been given cups. In the end 3 out of the 10 people at our table got cups while the rest just gave up asking.

Going to the bar was a struggle. They were incredibly slow to get drinks and there was a real feeling of moving around looking busy but not actually doing anything. Ordering a coffee at the bar resulted in me having to ask for milk and then ask for sugar and then ask for a spoon. One of our group ordered an egg and chicken sandwich. 45 minutes later he finally got it. There were no other food orders in at the time.

I asked at reception for a late check out and the receptionist said that would be no problem and that she would update the booking. However, at 13:00 the next day while we were lying down for a rest, the cleaners came straight into the room. She was very embarrassed and told us that according to her records we had checked out an hour ago.

When we did check out, the girl at reception had no idea how to check people out and had to ask her colleague. Her colleague was confused and started asking her 'How do you not know how to check people out?' The girl did not have an 'In training' badge on so I don't know how she was so clueless about her job.

On the other side, the staff looking after breakfast and the staff who ran the BBQ on the second day were excellent.

For a 4 star hotel, I was disappointed with the level of service given the cost. It really felt like staff were trying their best but the level of training that is required to fulfil their duties was not given.