InterContinental Hotels Group Stay Forum - IC Singapore

Stayed there already six times during this year. Always was well recognized as an Ambassador and can't wait to get there again in summer being now a RA.

But from the beginning:
Arrived in a taxi from Changi airport and got well received by the front desk.
After they found out I had a room at Club level, they immediately took me upstairs to the Club for check-in.
Check-in is taking very seriously and a staff member will sit down with you seperate to discuss your rooms, your needs and will do all the paperwork for you, while you only have to sign the documents at the end.
In the meantime they serve you some drinks and hand over the Ambassador present.
After that one of the staff members will guide you to your room and explain all features of it. In more than 50% of the cases my luggage had already arrived in the room before I got there.

The rooms are a mixture of old colonial style and modern equipment (flat screen tv, Bose sound system, etc.).

The Spa and Fitness area is very nice and the small pool has a nice area to relax. However, due to the Singapore climate one will not lie to long there.
The Gym okay, but the machines could be more modern.

The massage service is excellent and all of the staff have nice skills.

But the best is the club lounge, which has an excellent service. All the staff is extremely friendly and will most of the times recognize you and greet you by name. They will also try to remember your preferred drinks and food.
Breakfast is very good and the fresh juices are a must.
Throughout the day little snacks are offered with warm and cold (soft) drinks.
During Happy Hour a nice selection of warm and cold (finger) food is offered together with alcoholic beverages. Wines, Beers and also the Singapore Sling is available.

The IC Singapore is a very nice facility and has a very friendly and efficient atmosphere. Definitely a recommendation...

I had a stay there back in Feb. Booked cheapest room and initially got upgraded to a club floor room with club access, but I told the front desk staff I didn't need club access but needed a bigger room, so she tried to get me the L-shape premier room, but then I told her I stayed quite a lot in those L-shape room in the past and didn't want it again. She looked for a while and got me a shophouse suite, then I told her I didn't want it neither since I couldn't bare the noise outside the shopping mall. Finally she got me an excutive suite (the 2nd largest room in the hotel), but she kept reminding me that next time I had to book at least a Premier room in order to get upgraded to Executive Suite:D.

How many Executive Suites do they have? I was told by email, they have only 2 and these are taken for these days I was asking for upgrade.

How many Executive Suites do they have? I was told by email, they have only 2 and these are taken for these days I was asking for upgrade.

I also heard there are only 2 ESs and they are very popular to be booked/taken by the local couples who hold their wedding banquet in the hotel during weekend. The front desk staff also told me these ESs are often reserved by the experienced RA who books premier rooms. The 2 ESs are located on the top floor.

When they gave me a comp upgrade to the ES, they kept reminding me that I most likely had to move during weekend for the wedding people but fortunately they didn't move me.

It's definitely only the two ES. Stayed in one the one time, but never made it again up there.
But the other rooms are great too. I like especially the bathroom with that nice shower...

3 Stays...Nothing special...yet.

Stayed here this past week for 4 nights...was a very good stay. Was moved to exec floor (11th) at checkin and was a large corner room. Service was great and staff very accomodating. I really like this hotel as I usually stay at the Hilton and the mall is excellent. A great Cold Storage supermarket where you can buy nice wines for way cheaper than theh SGD65 house wine they give you (yea but I ordered it at 4am) and good shopping and movies. A short walk from Raffles Hotel and Purvis St where I visited my favourite chicken rice resto Yet Con...

Pool small and overcrowded on weekend but still I loved the stay. Throughly recommend this hotel to anyone.

Also, Bugis MRT goes right there...

A comprehensive review, including pictures, of the InterContinental Singapore can be found in my trip report;

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trip-reports/987820-singapore-style-tale-two-skybeds-inc-a380.html

Comments and questions are welcome. :)

After the prior posts, including Genius1's great pictures, I don't have a lot to add. Even so, I thought I'd provide a 2010 report. I stayed on points last week as a plat. ambassador. The system let me reserve a shophouse room, which is exactly what I received. I liked the Peranakan style, and I didn't notice any noise despite looking into the mall just below. It's a long walk to the lobby/exit, though.

I arrived by MRT (Bugis station) and made my way to the front desk without being offered any assistance (which is really my preference anyway). But then a man in a suit ran over and started offering unsolicted advice on SIN while a woman behind the desk handled the check-in. I wasn't clear of his title; he tried to be helpful but ultimately only succeeded in giving me wrong directions to the Night Safari. I gave him some money since he carried a bag to my room, arranged my bags, and lingered to show me every detail of the room and talk about the design, but maybe he was a manager of some kind.

The pashmina was presented on arrival. I didn't watch a movie or request late check-out. The Internet was outrageously priced -- something like S$0,50/minute. I wasn't able to pick up a free signal from the room.

A club room on my corporate rate (and other corporate rates and friends and family) was reasonable (in the mid-S$200s) and probably the way to go. It was harder than I expected to find a good breakfast in the neighborhood. I had to queue a bit for a pastry from a store in the basement of the Raffles City complex (love the kopi-c in SIN, incidentally).

I'd definitely return. The Raffles doesn't appear worth the money (I was finding rates around $700), and a lot of the other good hotels seem to be in less interesting areas.

That's funny, we stayed there last week and had the EXACT same guy do the EXACT same thing...basically had to throw him out of my room. Tried explaning to him that we live in Jakarta and IC Sing is a very frequent stop for us. I know how to use the TV and bathroom lights.. Again, not sure who he was. Not thrilled either about always getting the upgrade to the shophouse suite. I have had the L shaped premier a couple of times and truly prefer that one. I have only once gotten above the 3rd floor though. An Ambassador friend of mine had the luck of being upgraded to the Ambassador Suite for a 2 night stay. I will try again the direct email of someone who seemed unusually helpful. This has seemed to work in the past.

was this guy an older guy?
cos if so, he hangs around check in all the time.
Not sure what his actual role is, but hes mega helpful, and yes sometimes "inaccurate" ;)

Sounds like Peter :D

Sounds like Peter :D

Yes. He seems like a nice guy. I just don't understand his role.

Stayed there in March after attending a forum in Shangri-La Singapore.

As Ambassador Member, I received an upgrade to shophouse room which is great (even when I was RA, I asked for those rooms as well).

The service was top class compare to Shangri-La (which many people regards as a better hotel but the front-desk staff were not informed that my rate was subsidised by the organiser, so we had an argument during the check-in about the rates, which I were not informed by the organiser as well, they also messed up my check out date).

I did not requested a late check out as I have an afternoon flight to catch but the reception told me to inform them anytime should I need to check out late (Shangri-La told me they can only tell me if I can check out late 1 day before checking out, which they then said no because the hotel was full despite over 250 people attending the forum check out the day before or on that day - luckily my room in IC was ready for me to checkin at 12 noon!).

I would continue to stay here, the room is good, nothing to shout about but services is excellent and I just love the location - on top of a MRT station and close to many places for nice food. Only complaint is most 5 stars hotel in Singapore now include internet access in their rate but you still have to pay for it in IC.

I miss the lamb sausage in the club lounge.

I miss the lamb sausage in the club lounge.

I miss the Chivas Regal and the decent wines. They have definitely cut back on the quality of these since the 11th floor lounge days. Some of their red wines lately have just been terrible (an I told them so!).

I was at the IC Singapore earlier this week and, upon check-in, the Receptionist took great pains to mention that she had upgraded my room from Deluxe to a Shophouse room on the 3rd floor. Fine gesture, I thought, but the way that this was communicated appeared as if she had to cross through burning towers and raging rivers just to grant me the supposed upgrade.

Unfortunately, when I went to the room, I was aghast that the whole room smelled of curry. Obviously the previous guest had ordered room service, but Housekeeping failed to air the room sufficiently when the room was cleaned. I called Reception a couple of times to ask for a room change. No answer. Eventually left a message with "At Your Service" and a Receptionist called back to arrange a room change. There appeared to be some miscommunication - I understood that I was to move to another Shophouse room on the 3rd floor due to the earlier upgrade, but instead the bellhop delivered a replacement key for a room on the 10th floor. I was effectively downgraded back to a Deluxe room. I queried this. As the bellhop was not privy to my earlier conversation with the Receptionist, we both spent the next couple of minutes trying to get through to Reception on the phone to clarify. Again, no answer - despite the phone ringing a dozen times or so each time we called. The bellhop even tried to reach the Concierge to connect the call through to Reception, but without success.

Now, I've been a regular guest at the IC Singapore (once every 2 months or so over the last 3 years). And, from previous experiences, it was generally quite a challenge trying to get through to Reception on the phone. For a 5 star hotel, this level of tardiness is generally quite unacceptable.

Eventually we trekked back to Reception with my luggage to clarify the room change, to which I mentioned to one of the Receptionists there that they should really make a better effort to answer phone calls. I was rather shocked that a pencil thin and pompous Chinese lady, with a haughty attitude, declared - "That's because we're busy serving other guests!" No sorry sir for the delay. No we'll try better next time. Just tough - if we're already attending to other guests, we'll just ignore your phonecall... whether you like it or not!

Now, if Reception is constantly not answering phonecalls, it can only imply one thing - that it's understaffed. Not that there weren't many other staff hanging around the lobby, greeting and smiling; perhaps more of those can be deployed to Reception to take phonecalls during high call volumes. Instead of accepting my feedback with the right attitude and communicating it to management to assess general staffing levels required to maintain the desired level of customer service, that Receptionist appeared to just brush me off with her own arrogance. That interaction left a very sour taste. And, at the end of an already dreary day of travels, that was really the last thing I needed. :td:

What on earth has a shop-house room got that makes it worth going through all that malarkey?

Views of the aerobics class across the way? :)

Actually, I also personally don't like those rooms as it's a long ways to get to and a little noisy for my taste. I generally turn down this upgrade when offered.

did you guys stay there as an RA?

I usually get upgraded from Deluxe to Shophouse room. I was just Ambassador then.

On my last cash and points stay this month, no upgrade but did get the fruit, the Fiji water, and cookies, plus the gift was now some table mat with chopsticks I think.

Overall, I like to stay here for the location and convenience.

Has anyone who has stayed at the IC stayed at the Conrad? Just wondered how they compared?

Has anyone who has stayed at the IC stayed at the Conrad? Just wondered how they compared?

Yes done both but I prefer the IC...Conrad is older and less appealing to me...plus I like the shopping around the IC. Also, I feel the service is better and certainly more personal than the large Conrad. And IC location I feel is better.

Has anyone who has stayed at the IC stayed at the Conrad? Just wondered how they compared?

I also prefer the IC for location and as a regular, I am recognised by all the staff, so the level of service I receive is outstanding. I'm not a massive fan of the Shophouse Suites due to the noise from the mall, so I'm either upgraded to ES or take the premier rooms.

Hello,

I have moved a couple of posts discussing this hotel with the Conrad, Shangri-la among a few other hotels in Singapore to the IC Singapore Master Thread (www.flyertalk.com/forum/intercontinental-hotels-priority-club-inter-continental-ambassador/480580-ic-singapore-master-thread-merged.html).

The stay report subforum is more about posting stay reports, not that much about discussing the hotel itself.

Thank your for your understanding

FLYGVA
co-moderator IHG Forum

I had a stay there back in Feb. Booked cheapest room and initially got upgraded to a club floor room with club access, but I told the front desk staff I didn't need club access but needed a bigger room, so she tried to get me the L-shape premier room, but then I told her I stayed quite a lot in those L-shape room in the past and didn't want it again. She looked for a while and got me a shophouse suite, then I told her I didn't want it neither since I couldn't bare the noise outside the shopping mall. Finally she got me an excutive suite (the 2nd largest room in the hotel), but she kept reminding me that next time I had to book at least a Premier room in order to get upgraded to Executive Suite:D.
I admire your ability to keep saying no no no about the room you are given. I always feel all hotel front desk people dreadful no matter how friendly they appear to be...

Stayed one night at the IC S: pore (RA) and was underwhelmed by it.

Arrival - no one greets me at the front door, I "struggle" with my luggage alone.

Inside - again, no-one to greet me, not to mention offering help.

Check-in - making my own way to the Club. Not an easy thing, first time stay, huge hotel. Finally I manage to grab a passing by staff, who directs me to the club, but friendly informs me, that "you must check in at the front desk first to get in the lounge" Fortunately Club staff sees me and opens the door. From then on things start to roll better. Offered either larger room (I don't know which) or Club. Chose the club, good choice, too. Got the present at the Club (a very nice multi-function Swiss army type knife - great for those travelling with hand luggage only) Fruit basket, water, etc never appeared in the room. Probably should have called, but it was late in the evening and I was starting the day early next day.

Altogether I didn't feel welcome at all, in sharp contrast to the IC Bangkok on the previous nights.

I did, however appreciate, that I could stay in the Club after the 4 pm checkout for a couple of more hours before hitting the road to Changi.

Does anyone know the parking situation at this property and the rates?

Bugis Junction has reasonable rates but was hoping to avoid the hassle of Mall parking and wondering if IC has a dedicated parking, either self or valet.

Thanks.