So mother and I plan a "luxury" trip to London this June. last June was Paris, it was great except for the days with too much sun and the various impediments due to Olympics preparations, and they did make an enormous difference. The Louvre couldn't have been worsem, for example. But I digress.

London. After searching the "usual suspects" we settled on the Savoy, around $1100/night for a room meeting our requirements (NOT the "cheapest" room, at least 30 square meters, walk-in shower, refundable.

After I "studied" the Tripadvisor reviews i found some less expensive alternatives, the Sofitel was tops among them, The Intercontinental as well, which is in a less desirable location (to us).

I am NOT in the indusrtry, some of you clearly are. Obviously I scanned the reviews according to time, so I was only mnindful of recent reviews. Some of them are pretty awful. Also, for the Sofitel, a lot of them revolve around lousy accomodations, rather than saucy staff members, so presumably "hard product" and immutable. Insofar as saucy staff members, some of us are masochists and enjoy that....

So my question is, and I am using my imagination, are the worst reviews coming from "short stay" and "late booking" and "third party booking" guests? I am guessing American Express is in a special category of third party that the hotels would never intentionally cross.

Can someone comment on my inferences? The Sofitel came out to about half the cost of the Savoy, again, not their cheapest rooms, only rooms and prices that met our minimum requirements, so we could make some kind of comparison. Even in that sense they weren't "precisely" equal because the rooms that met our requirements were being renovated at the Sofitel and wouldn't be ready until...May. Which is just befiore June.

to make things worse, I live in Center City (our Manhattan) Philadelphia, and the bad reviews of the Sofitel here are about the same things more or less, a shabby hard product. It's restaurant is nothing special, basically an extension of the lobby, with a very small men u, and certainly not France's best respresentative in Philly.

Thoughts?