Michael Ad

My feelings, largely.

I have to also say I really liked the firm felt couch in a suite I had their once - I'm reminded by the post about buying towels from a previous poster.

synd

Having just stayed at both properties last week, I have to say that personally while I like the Churchill location much more ie it suits my needs, I felt the Andaz was in a different league than the Churchill. The staff were much more friendly, and welcoming than the Churchill. The breakfast was also much better at the Andaz imo. the bathrobes, towels and bedding were of better quality at the Andaz as well. At the churchill I loved the balcony with the view of portman square, and the location.

Also I would be far from considering the Churchill a luxury property, its a decent business hotel in a good location, nothing more nothing less. If you want luxury in london go to : MO, Rosewood, Bulgari, 4S, etc, but a HR is very very far from a luxury hotel imo no matter how beefed up it may be.

steveholt

After I just spouted off in this thread about how I think the Andaz Liverpool Street was a wonderful hotel, perhaps I was doomed to have a bad stay.

- I had booked a one-night stay with my Hyatt 1-7 certificate, followed by a four-night stay with a GSU applied. I arrived late PM for the first night and was told I had been placed into a suite where I could remain for the entire five-night stay, which sounded great. Got to my room and the "suite" was a bedroom, a long hallway, and the typical Andaz bathroom. No sitting area, no couch or chair. Hotel even left me a note thanking me for making my 10th stay with the property. Since I wasn't entitled to a suite on the first night, I happily slept in the room and then inquired downstairs about being placed into an appropriate suite. The manager admitted that the suite often gets complaints and said she would see what she could do. The hotel moved me into a proper Andaz suite later in the afternoon, so no real complaints, but it would have been nice to be blocked into something better than a faux-suite for what the hotel was treating as an anniversary stay.

- Went to go take breakfast in 1901 at 10:45 on a weekend. Prime time, and there was a ten-minute wait. This isn't a huge deal, but given that the hotel has a restaurant literally next door where they offer brunch, it would be nice to have that as a spillover option for Globs when there's a wait.

What happened next wasn't ideal. The hostess seated me and asked what I wanted to drink. I asked for a Diet Coke. She stared at me. "A what?" "A Diet Coke, please." She stared more. "I...don't understand," she said. "A Diet Coke?," I asked, confused. She stammered. "Coffee?" I gave up at that point and said that I would ask the waiter about ordering a drink. The problem, unfortunately, was that I sat for ten full minutes and no waiter or waitress ever stopped by to take a drink order or ask what I wanted to order off the menu. By then, I'd had quite enough of the 1901 and went back to my room. I e-mailed the manager about this and they were again very apologetic; I didn't ask for any compensation, but they proactively offered 80 GBP to spend on food/beverage at the hotel.

- The elevators during this stay have been an absolute disaster. Of the three-elevator block, one has been out of service the entire stay. A second one appears to have a stuck "open doors" button; about two-thirds of the time I've gotten into the elevator, the doors have repeatedly tried to close and open with nothing blocking them or no button pressed. There's been no easy way to fix this issue. The middle elevator works, but whenever I try to go down from my floor, the elevator comes to my floor and announces "Going up!", even though I haven't pushed the button to go up and the elevator immediately goes down after I get inside and push the button for the ground floor.

I actually like the new lobby - having a table to actually queue up in front of helps, and the new seating area feels more comfortable than the wide-open space of the old lobby. The service recovery for the issues I've had have generally been excellent - the hotel sent up a snack plate this afternoon with housekeeping with a note wanting to "apologize again" for the breakfast issue. I'm not going to stop coming to the Andaz, but I'm going to explore my options over the next few months in London.

UA-NYC

"Coke Light" in many countries

ILuvParis

But, isn't it Diet Coke in the UK?

steveholt

Correct. More fun: the confirmation I got for my four-night stay from the Citi concierge listed the total rate at Ł996. Andaz bill had Ł1348 with no other additions. Asked a manager to look into it and they're now quoting me a total of Ł1196.

faboi0us

I'm visiting this property next week, your experience has me worried.

steveholt

Just wanted to update this for posterity's sake - the hotel ended up correcting the rate to Ł996 and said they would send 15,000 WoH points as service recovery. Bit of a mess, but all's well that ends well.

RichardInSF

I've had numerous stays here with never a glitch like the above, I doubt that it is representative of a general problem.

faboi0us

Just completed a two night stay at this property. Service was decent and we did not experience any billing issues. Not much globalist recognition or a pre-arrival e-mail.

BAGoldBoy

Mario Flanagan took over as new GM in March. Lots of new faces and level of service seems to be slipping. I completed a Hyatt survey after our last stay and got a very confusing email from M. Flanagan which basically said it's up to the guest to ensure the service is acceptable - confused

Aventine

Sounds like guest blaming to me.

scented

Ahh, lovely. My favorite breed of GM.

wittenscafe

My wife and I stayed here March 30 - April 6, for tourism purposes. The location is awesome as the hotel is actually connected to the Liverpool Street Station which has London Underground connections to many of the main points in the city. Walking mere feet to get to the tube each morning was nice. The room came with a complimentary minibar (non-alcoholic) which was awesome, as we made full use of it each day. It was stocked with cookies, chips, Coke, Diet Coke, orange juice, apple juice, and water. I ate the cookies each night with my Diet Coke, and drank the orange juice each morning. The bed was incredibly comfortable. There were many USB ports throughout the room so we could charge our various devices.

We really don't have any negatives to report, and would definitely stay at the Andaz again.

beachfan