sfo

I have two questions.
Reading the cancelation policy when booking. I find that if you book in advance you will pre pay your reservation to take advantage of the lower rate. Then it says if you cancel up to 3 days prior to arrival no cancelation fee will be charged. I assume this means that your credit card will be credited back with the prepayment? and has anyone had a problem receiving the credit returned to your credit card account?

Looking at Ibis/Ibis Styles breakfasts, they seem quite expensive. The hotels I have looked at charge 12 to 17 euros per breakfast unless you purchase the room and breakfast package, then it seems they knock off 5 euros per day. I would be interested in what is being done now at breakfast, Pre packaged food? Table service? I assume no buffet. Pre packaged food seems like a high price to pay.

Thanks in advance to any that reply.

testman

How breakfast is served will depend on local regulations (both national and regional).

I can describe my experience at ibis Styles Warsaw Centre in July.

* The buffet area was off-limits to guests as the hotel had put a long countertop to separate it from the eating area.
* There was some hot food (eggs, sausages, beans, vegetable stew), ham and cheese plates, yoghurts and cereal, jam, nutella and other spreads. Probably fewer choice than before. All options were written on the wall above the buffet area in Polish and English.
* You had to queue patiently and talk to hotel employees and tell them what they wanted to have (inc. drinks).
* Hot food and bread were served by the hotel employees from the buffet area. Ham and cheese had been previously sliced and wrapped in plastic.
* You got your food on a tray and then you had to take it to your table.

I think that at that time the hotel offered breakfast for almost everyone and they didn't have any rates without breakfast.
As you can imagine, there were A LOT OF people in the breakfast room (weekend stay). Most people didn't keep the safe distance from other guests in the queue.
The service was very slow. I was lucky because I only spent about 15 minutes in the queue, but then it got much longer.
I was under the impression that the tables in the breakfast area were not being cleaned properly. The staff were too busing serving, so they only took dirty plates away. (There was nowhere where you could leave your tray after the meal.)

On the whole, it was a rather stressful situation: too many people around you, a long wait, having to choosing food in a hurry.
Next time I'd rather have a McMuffin if next to a McDonald's or buy a pre-packed sandwich the day before.

Other hotels might do things slightly differently.

sfo

Thanks for the information. I am thinking about skipping the breakfast, and I don't want to pay 12/17 euros for something which is probably not good value any longer.
Going to a nice bakery, having a pastry and coffee would do me fine, or MD as you have mentioned. Always have yogurt for breakfast, but a supermarket is usually a short walk away.

JTCz

Members in Accor FB groups post different experiences from the DACH area - buffets mostly open to guests, even if the spread seems slightly reduced given the light occupation.

Generating long queues of guests not maintaining proper separation and breathing onto each others and the overloaded staff seems to be a Warsaw thing. A friend staying at a Hilton property in WAW reported the same experience as at the Ibis Styles above.

Anything over EUR 10 for an Ibis breakfast is a bit too much, depending on where you choose to stay (you may want to share to get better feedback) you may get a nice breakfast in town for the price. THAT SAID, anything spent on breakfast at the hotel counts towards points, and breakfast-included rates usually incur a lower premium than paying for breakfast separately when booking a room-only rate.

Again, there are fabulous and forgettable Ibis breakfasts - before COVID, the Ibis Styles Warszawa Centrum had one of the best spreads, actually, comparable to many mid-level or even premium properties, with multiple hot items available. Most British Ibises deliver on that front as well (London Shoreditch comes to mind as a particularly good example). Ibis Styles, however, generally tend to have the bare-bones, tick-the-box breakfast selections as they used to be forced to include breakfast in the room rate and thus their F&B budgets were minimal. Portuguese Ibises always have pasteis de nata in their spreads, and the Spanish ones have churrors with hot chocolate, both worth going for the breakfast option alone

JTCz

Also re: payment - depends on the country. In Germany, for the most part hotels bona fide take your prepayment declaration and do not actually charge you before the date of your arrival. In France, you are being charged on the spot when booking. And now in Italy I am being asked for credit card details on a non-prepaid, freely cancellable rate (the most expensive flex one) by separate emails. So it is more to do with the hotel and the local Accor organization.

Did not have any experience with a rate when I was charged and later able to cancel, but when COVID struck, I asked to cancel a few bookings that were prepaid and non-cancellable at hotels where I am a regular, and was reimbursed the full amount quite swiftly.

sfo

Thanks JTCz for your responses. Not sure which Ibis I will be staying in at this point. I will see how covid is affecting Germany in Nov/Dec for travel in Jan. For the most6 part I have always enjoyed my breakfast at Ibis. I have not had a bad experience at any of them. The only one I can think of that was just not up to par is the Prague ibis Mala Strana. It was ok, but not as good as others.

i usually book the flexible rate and then closer to the travel date will cancel and switch to the non refundable rate. This is probably what I will do this time, unless there is a private sale making worth my while to book the non refundable rate and keeping my fingers crossed that there will be no penalty cancelling 3 days prior to arrival.

WRAF137

Yes, I'm currently having a problem getting the money refunded from a pre-paid but refundable reservation. Cancelled on 8th August, received an e-mail confirming the cancellation but no mention of a refund. I e-mailed the hotel direct to ask about the refund, no reply. I then contacted Accor through their website and received a reply to say they would forward my request to the hotel to be dealt with, despite me having explained that I'd already contacted the hotel direct and hadn't heard back. To date I've heard nothing, not even the courtesy of an acknowledgement.

sfo

I don't like the sound of that. 😧 I am better off just booking the refundable rate as I have done in the past, and then switching to the NR rate just prior to my departure date.
Thanks for your input.