I hate everybody's children except my own. I think it's great that IHG have left it to the individual hotels discretion as to the Children policy and club benefits.

The frustration is not that they are excluded from these areas. The frustration is that a bottle of water that is free to club members is only free in designated club areas. When you have paid for club bene's (which I hadn't), it would be very frustrating to have no way to use these club benefits while children are in-tow.

I think where kids are banned, it would be nice to extend comp water to those with a club card at one or two non-club outlets.

It is not usually very well detailed wether or not children will be welcome until you first check-in. So I can just see a case where parents that have bought club access would be feeling a little short changed.

At the end of the day, a hotel won't lose a customer by banning kids from the club. So it's, in my opinion a wise move to ban kids outright.