Name of the hotel: Sofitel Vienna Stephansdom
What is your Le Club status? Gold
Were you (or for multi-stayers were you generally) happy with the hotel/stay? Mixed
Which room did you book and which upgrade did you receive?
Booked two luxury rooms and received just that. (see below)
How are the rooms?
Generally good condition. One room was in dark grey - which had a view facing the Danube (front of the hotel). Other was in white with two double beds facing the Ferris Wheel (back of hotel). Both on 17th floor, so fabulous views (but the front is better)
Could do with more lighting in the grey room
Nespresso machine a little fiddly for obtaining hot water for tea
What was good and what was bad?
Good:
Concierge - really helpful and extremely friendly - very warm welcome when we returned after a day of sightseeing.
Quality of breakfast - excellent and well worth it.
Gym - great facilities
Front office manager - good service recovery and very customer-orientated
Room well prepared for arrival of Junior HpW - crib, changing mat, bottle warmer and little toy all in room.
Bad:
Gave all manner of excuses when requesting late check-out - hotel fully booked the following day etc. When I showed availability for all rooms on the phone, said they could extend to 1pm. I told not to bother - either a proper late check out, or don't offer an additional 60mins.
No upgrade. I had to ask as luxury rooms were confirmed during check-in. Explanation given that when two rooms are booked together, priority is to ensure they are as close together as possible. I explicitly stated in an email two days before arrival that other room would be for my parents and that there's no need for the rooms to be on the same floor / near each other.
Then claimed to be fully booked, so I asked how I can still book a junior suite by showing availability on the app on my phone. Staff member just went silent and carried on with issuing keys. Explained my disapproval but decided not to push it further.
Inconsistency of granting of benefits. Welcome gifts in both rooms, but drinks voucher for only one room.
I sent an email two days prior to arrival, stating that I would like to have an arrangement of fresh flowers in our room on the second day of our stay (wife's birthday - and she loves fresh flowers).
In the same email I requested high floor for rooms and confirmation of whether my Accor details are in the booking. Received a reply back confirming the rooms, but no mention of flowers and unsurprisingly, they never turned up.
Service at breakfast was very strained as soon as it became busy
Did you get club lounge access? How was the lounge?
NA
What about welcome drinks, welcome amenities or any other special perks?
Drink voucher only for one room (beer, wine & softs).
Welcome gift of a plate of sweet treats in each room on day of arrival, with note from concierge in one.
Value for $ or Vouchers? Would you return?
Not cheap (but wasn't booked with price in mind anyways). There were some basic errors in the sense that they failed to take note (ignored) my request r.e. the flowers and were inconsistent with granting of benefits.
I raised most of my issues (apart from the flowers) with the front office manager and he was very apologetic regarding the inconsistency of the drinks voucher, lack of upgrade and their refusal to provide late check-out. He instantly comp'd breakfast for one room, for one of the three days of our stay.
This was my first stay as a Gold, having dropped down from Plat in August - and hope my next stays at the Legend in Amsterdam and Sofitel Bangkok Sukhumvit coming up will be more positive from a member perspective.
Vienna is a beautiful city and I'd like to give the hotel another chance.