Novotel Shenzhen Watergate: a review

100   Recommended
Room 1206 , Superior Room
January 31, 2020 by

 Map | 1 Review | 100% Recommended
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Novotel Watergate Shenzhen
 Map | 1 Review | 100% Recommended

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Room 1206

Superior Room

Liked:
Location
Service
Food
Amenities
Room
Stats
Room
Superior Room

Location

Located on the border of Futian district, the hotel is well located to metro stations (Line 9 is ~150 meters away, with another station servicing two lines about 800m away). It is close to shopping malls and local restaurants. The hotel entrance itself is a little hard to find – the entrance is around the back of the building and the signage at street-side is poor.

There is a Family Mart (24hr convenience store) and a decent Cantonese breakfast place in the adjacent building.

Loyalty

Room upgrade – met expectations (one category to Superior Room) and given proactively. It was not mentioned on check in that an upgrade had been given

Drink voucher – only one given, but my partner and I did check in separately. Good for soft drink, juice, coffee, tea or beer – so no big loss on the lack of second voucher

No welcome gift provided

Room

The room is a comfortable Novotel one, though a bit dated. The bed and pillows were comfortable, giving a decent night’s sleep. There is a pillow menu available, but this is at reception, with no documentation in the room indicating a pillow menu is available.

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The TV does not allow HDMI/USB input.

The room had a shower/bath combination, with some visible mould above the shower. I know Shenzhen is a high humidity city, but this is not really a good excuse. I believe the Superior Room category has either shower-only or bath/shower rooms available (according to the website). If that is the case, then my profile preferences were not looked at, because I definitely have "shower only" selected as my preferred bathroom.

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The room has complimentary mini bar, restocked daily, which featured a can of Coca Cola, a Sprite and a beer. Water bottles were replenished daily.

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The WiFi was decent, without being fantastic. It did allow streaming of video at a reasonable quality.

The walls are quite thin - we could hear our neighbour's TV very clearly.

 

 

Services

I had some laundry done. On the first service, my socks came back still a bit damp, which was disappointing, but I just hung them up on the hangers provided. I did require a second service for additional washing. I asked the hotel to please ensure that the socks came back from the laundry company dry, as the previous ones were still a bit damp. After some brief investigation and words/meaning lost in translation, apologies were extended, and the second laundry service was provided without charge, which was greatly appreciated.

Due to the coronavirus issue, I received a call from Reception that the breakfast buffet had been cancelled, but that my complimentary Platinum breakfast would be provided as room service. Order forms were delivered to the room. The order never truly reflected what I had ordered (it was close enough), but was decent enough. The beef congee was especially good.

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Dinner was still provided as a-la-carte in the restaurant, where my Accor Plus card was accepted.

Slightly disappointing was the (lack of) communication between Front Office and Housekeeping teams. My stay was a back-to-back stay, but we still had Housekeeping knocking on our door on our first "check out day" asking when we would be departing. This also happened one hour before what the normal check out time was, anyway.

Staff

The staff at the hotel were fantastic. Language was definitely a barrier, but between my terrible Chinese and their passable English, we got there. The staff were very friendly and willing to help.

Due to the coronavirus, guests were required to have their temperature taken on check-in, and once daily.

Overall

I recommend this hotel. Do not expect anything too flash – the online reviews should provide enough of a warning. But, I found the staff to be very approachable and helpful and the room good enough to provide a comfortable stay.

Edit

6 Feb - Added bits about the thin walls and lack of communication between Front Office and Housekeeping with our back-to-back reservations.

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