Originally Posted by base64

Booked the Courtyard View room with points, which is 13% more expensive than City View with points. Made the reservation and NUA 7 months ago and didn't touch it.

Pros

• The "King bed" is like 2 x Double bed joined together. The width is like 1.5 x King Bed.
• Was upgraded to 2/F Kamogawa View Standard Room at 14:00 local time 2 days before, which I appreciated as it is better than nothing after NUA was denied.

Cons

• The room is a disaster. It was nearest to the entrance of the hotel such that every single guest of the entire hotel can see through my room. The window films are not dark enough.
  The closet area inside the room isn't even big enough to open a medium suitcase.
  The bathtub width is huge (1.5 x width) but the wooden floor is full of stain.
  The room feels very small as it was full of beds to fit 2 adults + 2 teens. I bet they can fit 4 adults if the fire regulation allows. The sofa is a Larger Single bed that is permanently there.
• Location. This place is not like Okura Kyoto. Metro and Sanjo train is not exactly walking distance during summer heat and rain.
  When I arrived at Sanjo, it was raining and I had to call and wait for taxi at a bus stop, because the path between Sanjo and taxi stand is not covered.
• The entrance looks like an underground garage. Even the hallway from the taxi dropoff to the elevator looks like a garage.
• Lobby space is non-existent. I can understand why they have to bring guests into their rooms for in-room check in. No grandeur in architecture.
• Breakfast requires me to manually open a fridge, twist the cap, grab a glass, and pour out the orange juice? Are you serious?
• Indoor directions are unclear, hidden doors everywhere, multiple elevators for multiple purposes. The only way to leave the building is to follow the Emergency Exit green LED signs.
• 1:00 PM checkout is the max they would go for a normal room, perhaps it's for fairness among all Platinum+.
• 1 staff even called me a different name. Surprised pikachu.
• The messaging through the App takes 20 minutes between each reply. All I get is "Thank you for your patience / Thank you for your reply" throughout the conversations.
  I had to book restaurant, ended up using Tabelog by myself given the long wait. No other hotels on my trip reply this slowly, even Courtyard Shin-Osaka replied quicker than this "luxury hotel".

What is this? High density enlarged APA hotel? At 700 USD equivalent worth of points, this is the worst luxury hotel that I have been to in terms of value, regardless of the group/brand.
It's not that I can't afford it, it's the fact that I can get better hotels in Kyoto and the rest of Japan at the same 700 USD.
Coming from St Regis Osaka the day before where everything was luxurious, this is a stark contrast in terms of both the hard product and the service.



My view is other guest's view.