This hotel plays some serious jenga with room allocation.
Booked a paid stay for a "deluxe" room and e-mailed in advance requesting a river view. Morning of check in at least 6+ river rooms were available for my entire stay via hilton.com. Right before check in they had all disappeared and I had not been upgraded in the app. Enquired at check in and was offered a river view for half the nights and a deluxe city view suite for the other half. I said sounds great, but I needed to consult my schedule for a time to change rooms so it worked for the hotel and myself.
The night before I was scheduled to change I went to the front desk and said I didn't know what their availability looked like, but was it possible to stay in the same room and if not, I'm happy to switch but needed to move either before XX or after XX due to scheduling, both which were reasonable times during the day. I was told that someone the next morning would call me in the room at XX time to let me know either way. So the next morning comes and the time passes so I call downstairs and they have no idea what I'm talking about. So I go downstairs and the desk agent says very curtly and without even looking up from her keyboard, "You need to leave the room." Some hospitality! So I explained for the third time, I am more than happy to change rooms but need to do it before or after certain times. Again, I'm not begging to stay in the same room, I'm asking what do you want me to do and when can we do it? 45 minutes later I get a call from the front desk, "Hello, I understand you want to change rooms?" Um.... ok. All this unnecessary drama for a simple room change.
Oh, and there were at least 4+ river rooms for sale in the app past 8 pm for the remainder of my stay.
Anyway, let's get to the room. There's an electronic panel by the bed that controls everything, except there's also a DND and "make up the room" switch at the door that's so lightly embossed you'd never know it. So I kept changing privacy and housekeeping settings without knowing it and thought the bed control was broken. That one's on me. None of the actual switches are intuitive or match up to proper fixtures. So you may take five full minutes fumbling around before you get what you want.
Welcome gift of plated fruit and a jar of shortbread cookies.
Welcome drink taken at the Long Bar which everyone should check out. I was offered a cocktail of my choosing instead of a stingy Diamond menu.
Breakfast at Grand Brasserie was plentiful with quality ranging from fair to very good. A la carte menu available and complimentary for Diamonds.
The deluxe river room had two VERY BRIGHT lights illuminated which I ended up getting duct taped over at nearly 1 am. They kept trying to explain they were motion sensors, or nightlights or whatever. They motion sensors were different. In the second room, these bright lights were off with no intervention. Clearly an electrical bug.
The suite is spacious and tasteful but the furnishings are more of granny's taste than modern, sleek or contemporary.
Dinner at Grand Brasserie was terrible. While the plating was excellent, I'm not sure how they make a salad with a stone cold poached egg and a bacon portion obviously cooked for breakfast and stored for dinner. And I was the only person in the restaurant for the entire meal. Big mistake to waste a meal there.
Concierge was capable and helpful including writing several destinations on taxi cards.
Perhaps the piece de resistance was the drunk gentleman throwing up all over the lobby in to a WA waste basket. Now, I certainly can't fault the hotel for having a drunk visitor. What I couldn't figure out was, with so many staff on the floor and so many cameras and in such a visible location, why am I pointing out this sick fellow to the hotel? I suggested someone may be in need of medical assistance and the response I got was "he's drunk."
So while the view is spectacular and the rooms certainly passable by a luxury standard and the staff helpful and accommodating, there were too many "off" things.
But here's some tips if you find yourself there:
LAUNDRY
Laundry Express :. Shanghai Green Dry Cleaning and Laundry Delivery Service is a GREAT service that will pick up your laundry and drop it off for cheap. I had a 20 hour turnaround and everything was packaged perfectly. They're not good at responding to e-mails, so place an order online and ask the concierge to confirm it the day before.
BAR
There are so many great bars on the Bund, but I urge you try Captain Bar around the corner. It's located on the top floor of a hostel and I won't tell you anything else other than prepare to be wowed when you turn the corner. Really one of Shanghai's best bars.
overall hotel score: 8/10