Royal Cambridge Hotel review - we wonât be staying again
My boyfriend and I stayed at the Royal Cambridge Hotel in April 2016. I paid ÂŁ149 for two nights stay on a Friday and Saturday night, plus a ÂŁ15 per night parking charge. This included a buffet breakfast. The booking process was smooth and friendly.
The hotel staff unfortunately, were not - the Saturday evening we spent in the hotel bar, and were shocked by the rude and negative attitude of the staff member on duty! They had a wedding reception taking place in the downstairs bar, and apparently there are just two credit card machines in the hotel and one is fixed to the reception area. The other machine was taken to the function room. We were understanding of this, however the staff member behind the bar wasn't - when we instead offered to pay on card, and she snapped at us and said no, it was too late now, she'd already entered it as a card payment on the till so we had to go to Reception and pay now. No option to keep a card behind the bar and run a tab (there was only one other couple in the bar - it wasn't busy!), for example - having to go to the Reception area and wait for the card payment to process was very lengthy and interrupted our evening.
Another couple later came to the bar, sat down and were talking between themselves. She then shouted across the bar at them 'are you going to order or what?' and interrupted their conversation (from no more than 6ft away - and as I said it was an empty bar!) - the gentleman said 'well, yes, sorry, what beers do you have?' 'no, you have to come up to the bar and order' 'Do you have any local beers here?' 'no, I don't think there even ARE any.' Her rude attitude continued for the rest of the evening - all questions were given short, rude answers and it was quite clear she didn't want to be there! We left early as we were made to feel very unwelcome.
In the morning when we had the buffet breakfast, while my boyfriend was putting food onto his plate, one of the waiters looked at him, rolled his eyes, and walked away muttering 'fatty' under his breath. We laughed about it at the time, but actually this is incredibly shocking (he's 5'9 and 10st - not exactly overweight - and even if he was, that's an appalling way to speak to a guest!).
The room itself was dirty - the grout around the bath and the towel radiator was covered in mould and rust. The wardrobe door had broken so we were unable to use it. The lift doesn't work properly and the corridors felt dark and dirty. Carpets were stuck together with tape in places where they were damaged. The whole hotel had a very tired feel to it - it was likely very elegant and fine 20-30 years ago, but it's certainly in need of refurbishment and some TLC now.
And, for me, the worst part - I attempted to contact the hotel to complain about the service we received and the state of our room after the stay, but the hotel ignored me.
Good points - the location is central, the bed is very comfortable, the price was reasonable, and parking (for Cambridge) is good value. Our room was a reasonable size for a central city hotel room. If you just need somewhere cheap to stay and don't plan on being in the room or spending time in the hotel, it's perfect. However, after this experience, we won't be staying again.
