Check In

Orginall Post At https://www.albertaviation.com/single-post/2018/01/11/The-Nothing-EXTRA-Stay-Report-Crowne-Plaza-Berlin-City-Centre

January 11, 2018

Albert K. Field

The Crowe Plaza Berlin City Centre is at prime location of the major shopping street in Berlin - Tauentzienstraße. The retail price of a room is relatively inexpensive and affordable, but nothing with the hotel is extra fancy in terms of visual appeal, I suppose they are really focusing on tourists here, so functionality is key then. The picture above is from their IHG website where I have to say it looks extremely nice, or super instagramable, hehe, continue reading to see what it actually looks like with the pictures I took.

Check In:

Check in was smooth, upon the time I was checking in, no customers was waiting in line and I walked straight to the IHG reward counter, the receptionist was rather polite and greeted me for being in the IHG reward program and handed me a pre-prinited welcome letter. She also asked about whether I would choose Welcome Points or Free Drinks as my welcome amenity, I went for the points without hesitation. Although she was handling everything gracefully, no mention of room upgrade was bought up, I was guided with direction to the elevator when everything was in order.

The lobby was rather busy and things are tightly packed together with many guests packing their luggages on the floor near the sofa sets(?). 

They have like 60+ rooms at each floor so I encounter like several guests on my way to my room which is somewhat unusual to my experience, the small lobby area in front of the elevator is placed with photography prints and small side tables, I guess it can be count as decorated but nothing more than just that.

Room

The Room:

The room at the 6th floor is facing the other side of the building where nothing interesting is going on, upon entering the guest room, I find it rather small and too-simple, the desire for me to be upgraded to a bigger room led me to rang up the receptionist again, after expressing the doubt, one of the male staff replied with:" Sir, you are already in the executive floor, and you are facing the other side of the road which it's actually quiter and better." I politely thanked him and started to wonder, when I was walking through the hallway, it clearly stated "Quiet Zone" instead of executive floor, and judging on the fact I am already in the "better room", I went up to their website, and found out that the room I was assigned it's called executive room, and I was booked at standard room level, so in theory they did upgraded me to a higher level, although the only difference it's that the desk was pushed to the corner and an additional single couch was placed where in the standard room the desk took over all of the remaining floor space next to the bed, so I understand hotels wants to save money on upgrading everybody to a junior suite, but is it really acceptable to do such practices where they keep another room category to purposely use on upgrading guests? You tell me, Crowne Plaza Berlin.

The view outside the window is very boring or somewhat ugly, the vegetation on the roof didn't really help much I have to say, but it saves the planet hopefully, everything in the room looked neat and in order, but a certain smell of paint of the plastic furniture in the room (I am not exactly sure what it actually was) had really hit my impressions overall, things looked clean and the deco is not relatively outdated, so like said, nothing extra at this property.

Location

The Toilet:

Orginal article at https://www.albertaviation.com/singl...in-City-Centre

The toilet was clean and decent, however when I opened the cover of the toilet, there was remains of soap and cleaning liquid still inside, I guess the cleaning staff was so "rushed" to get to his next assignment he didn't get to check if it was really clean. Oh well.

The safe was inside the closet and the closet doesn't even have wooden bottoms, see? nothing extra, again.

Time for the swimming pool:

The swimming pool in the basement, the entrance looked nice and inviting, there were also ample towels stocked next to the entrance, see below the pictures I took for the swimming pool, when I showed up there, the staff was sweeping the floor and said hi to me, I smiled back and after took the pictures I went backed to my room.

Here's the real pictures of the swimming pool, as you can see, it's just a swimming pool, nothing else, no jacuzzi, no near pool shower area, nothing more. I also failed to find any facilities to change or to shower before and after using the pool. So, inviting setting, not really inviting facilitation.

Overall

Bottom Line:

Orginal article at https://www.albertaviation.com/singl...in-City-Centre

Score: 4/10  Keyword: No-Extra

This stay experience dictates that this property lacks the extra steps that a Crowne Plaza (Business Luxury Chain) should provide to ensure the comfort and stress-free need for business travellers.

This property is of decent value if your purpose in Berlin is to go for a shopping spree nearby or you just need a place to sleep at while you gonna use the majority of the time in the city. Anything extra wouldn't be satisfied easily here, I would just recommend you using the extra bucks on a real 5 star property then.

Did you experience something like this at any other hotels? Leave a comment, stay tuned. Peace !