Amanpulo, Philippines (Consolidated/review thread)
#571
Join Date: Dec 2013
Location: Tennessee
Programs: SPG, Marriott, United, SWA, AA
Posts: 700
All of this is certainly a bit discouraging. I had heard so many wonderful things about Amanpulo and thought I had found "the spot" for a perfect beach get a away. I am always on the look out for the perfect super soft white sand beach. That is a major factor for our warm weather holidays along with peace and quiet away from crowds. Now I am wondering if it's going to be worth the premium. We have not booked yet as this trip would not be until until Feb or March of 2020. Maybe things will improve there by then or else I may consider somewhere else. Amanoi looks nice but the beach is just not in the same league judging from the pictures. We had an amazing but short stay at Amanpuri this year and ever since I have wanted to try out another one of their properties.
#572
Join Date: Nov 2009
Location: La Jolla, California
Programs: KrisFlyer Gold, SWA CP
Posts: 1,126
I had this exact problem when checking out of Pulo. My CC company completely freaked out, despite being told I was traveling internationally. I remember going through three different cards before I found one that worked. The CC algorithms simply do not like 5 figure charges from the Philipines. I vowed to prepay a large portion of the fees when I returned.
#573
I had this exact problem when checking out of Pulo. My CC company completely freaked out, despite being told I was traveling internationally. I remember going through three different cards before I found one that worked. The CC algorithms simply do not like 5 figure charges from the Philipines. I vowed to prepay a large portion of the fees when I returned.
#574
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: IAD/DCA
Posts: 31,797
is it possible that was a factor in decision?
credit cards certainly changing over time
(anyone have issue with amex charge card?)
as long as you avoid holidays and events at pulo
even during holidays many stay in villas/casitas
credit cards certainly changing over time
(anyone have issue with amex charge card?)
as long as you avoid holidays and events at pulo
even during holidays many stay in villas/casitas
Last edited by Kagehitokiri; Dec 10, 2018 at 2:41 pm
#575
Join Date: Sep 2009
Location: Europe
Posts: 2,609
All of this is certainly a bit discouraging. I had heard so many wonderful things about Amanpulo and thought I had found "the spot" for a perfect beach get a away. I am always on the look out for the perfect super soft white sand beach. That is a major factor for our warm weather holidays along with peace and quiet away from crowds. Now I am wondering if it's going to be worth the premium. We have not booked yet as this trip would not be until until Feb or March of 2020. Maybe things will improve there by then or else I may consider somewhere else. Amanoi looks nice but the beach is just not in the same league judging from the pictures. We had an amazing but short stay at Amanpuri this year and ever since I have wanted to try out another one of their properties.
#576
Frankly, Pulo is a national icon in the Philippines and once you visit the country, you will notice how many people have heard of it, even outside hospitality. That says something. And even though Pulo may have peaked during Tapa tenure, most of the team is still there and happy. And while service issues occur more frequently than before, the beauty of the island and staff/room count are unparalleled considering the excellent value. It is tough to find anything remotely that compares, maybe in the Maldives but rates can easily be double the price, although hard product is more polished. But then again, more rooms!
#577
Join Date: Sep 2009
Location: Europe
Posts: 2,609
I recall many years ago staying in Manila for the first time before heading on to Pamalican I got into conversation with Pinoy friends there and even the eyes of their 5 year old kids would light up when mentioning Pulo. This was at the now torn down MO, fond memories. But I don't think all that much has changed.
Pulo was the first internationally renowned resort and brought lots of high profile visitors to the country and brought attention to various causes associated with it. Actually Pulo is one of the better examples of positive aspects of tourism, and I know personally many other people who donated for schools on the islands etc.
Aside from the slightly less high end Boracay, not much has changed and I don't see much competition on the horizon...
#578
Join Date: Dec 2013
Location: Tennessee
Programs: SPG, Marriott, United, SWA, AA
Posts: 700
Frankly, Pulo is a national icon in the Philippines and once you visit the country, you will notice how many people have heard of it, even outside hospitality. That says something. And even though Pulo may have peaked during Tapa tenure, most of the team is still there and happy. And while service issues occur more frequently than before, the beauty of the island and staff/room count are unparalleled considering the excellent value. It is tough to find anything remotely that compares, maybe in the Maldives but rates can easily be double the price, although hard product is more polished. But then again, more rooms!
Thanks this makes me feel better
I have also been looking at el nido resorts pangulasian island and Shangri- La Boracay, but it judging from the pictures these would be a step down from Amanpulo. Is that correct?
Last edited by 1readyset2go; Dec 15, 2018 at 3:49 pm
#579
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: IAD/DCA
Posts: 31,797
just different? pulo is unique even compared to north island
el nido definitely allows guests between islands, not sure re public
hectares (el nido) >
310 lagen
224 miniloc
[ 89 amanpulo ]
40 pangulasian
40 apulit
not island nor beach >
The Farm at San Benito (Philippines)
el nido definitely allows guests between islands, not sure re public
hectares (el nido) >
310 lagen
224 miniloc
[ 89 amanpulo ]
40 pangulasian
40 apulit
not island nor beach >
The Farm at San Benito (Philippines)
Last edited by Kagehitokiri; Dec 16, 2018 at 7:49 pm
#580
Join Date: Jan 2019
Posts: 5
Hello,
Just found this thread as I was looking online some reviews, and surprisingly all tripadvisor ones were good... we were feeling a bit alone
We just left the resort and we re so disappointed... I dont know how it was before or anything as were new to Aman. Everybody was saying Aman is the best service blablabla it was everything except that. We did 4 Amans this year (I think its quite a bit for new consumers. We never went to Aman before this year) and only Amanjena was this bad. We were very excited about Amanpulo as everybody said it was better than the Maldives etc and it was our only big vacation in the year.
First of all, when we arrived at 4pm our beach casita wasnt ready, we had to wait 6:30pm. (Hopefully we slept one night in HK, as there is no direct France-Manilla but still we woke up at 6am to do HK Manilla so we were tired and just wanted to have our casita ready to relax after 12hrs flights). They gave us a tree casita for us to wait.
The beach casita was ok, felt a bit dated, but the island and the beach were amazing... the next 3 days there was a tropical depression so it was kind of rainy (not their fault though)
We asked our GA to do some activities and all her answers were sorry it s fully booked , she never propose us any other activities and we barely saw her during our stay but she was very nice.(when at Park Hyatt Maldives we saw our GA every morning and every night to schedule activities or just to check if everything was alright). The activities reservation person was the same always saying its fully booked and never propose anything else, we wanted to do the seabobs as we did in Amanyara but we couldnt as it was fully booked for the week... our ga never told us it was so popular and that it needed reservation
The fully booked thing went as far as they refuse us at the beach club at 1pm as it was fully booked , never an hotel restaurant ever refused us before, it was a first.
Then it was very rainy and as the island signaletic isnt that great, my friend had an car accident, the car slipped with the rain on a bump and crashed on a tree, the GM assistant (who we saw every day) gave us a bill of 800$ saying we had to pay for the car damage. We totaly understood that we had to pay but they could have use their insurance. They agreed to reduce a bit the fees of 150$ for the manwork.
The service at the restaurants was VERY long, sometimes we had our coffee in last, after the meal for breakfast, we waited 1hour to have some sushi on our last dinner (a guest went very angry to a waitress as he was waiting for ages) the next morning the gm assistant said they were overwhelmed because it was full and they hired an extra chef at the japanese restaurant, funny because just after we ordered lunch and we waited 45min to have a club sandwich and the restaurant was empty.
+ they asked us if we wanted to book for NYE and never told us there was an other restaurant opened for those who didnt want to book (we discovered this after), the NYE dinner was 700$ without the party and wasnt great and overpriced (as all NYE), the animations were not what we excpected, not very discreet and private, singers singing on the pool current song like Bruno Mars, and pink lights everywhere... they made people coming at 8pm but at 9:30 everybody had finish to eat and had to wait for the fireworks at 00am, hopefully we saw it from the beach... but maybe clients likes those kind of party. The dinner was a buffet (not great, not a lot) and you had to wait in lines to have your meals, not what we excpected.
What was weird was that everybody was nice, not helpful but nice and kept asking if we will come back, it sounds like a joke how can we come back after this level of service after having paid 20k + 8200$ of extras?!
I dont think we ever go back to any Aman after this, we didnt understood why no one cared about us as we could be potential recurrent clients and we did 4 Amans this year. It wasnt that bad but for the price and all the fuss Aman is doing about their level of excellence it was not that great.
Just found this thread as I was looking online some reviews, and surprisingly all tripadvisor ones were good... we were feeling a bit alone
We just left the resort and we re so disappointed... I dont know how it was before or anything as were new to Aman. Everybody was saying Aman is the best service blablabla it was everything except that. We did 4 Amans this year (I think its quite a bit for new consumers. We never went to Aman before this year) and only Amanjena was this bad. We were very excited about Amanpulo as everybody said it was better than the Maldives etc and it was our only big vacation in the year.
First of all, when we arrived at 4pm our beach casita wasnt ready, we had to wait 6:30pm. (Hopefully we slept one night in HK, as there is no direct France-Manilla but still we woke up at 6am to do HK Manilla so we were tired and just wanted to have our casita ready to relax after 12hrs flights). They gave us a tree casita for us to wait.
The beach casita was ok, felt a bit dated, but the island and the beach were amazing... the next 3 days there was a tropical depression so it was kind of rainy (not their fault though)
We asked our GA to do some activities and all her answers were sorry it s fully booked , she never propose us any other activities and we barely saw her during our stay but she was very nice.(when at Park Hyatt Maldives we saw our GA every morning and every night to schedule activities or just to check if everything was alright). The activities reservation person was the same always saying its fully booked and never propose anything else, we wanted to do the seabobs as we did in Amanyara but we couldnt as it was fully booked for the week... our ga never told us it was so popular and that it needed reservation
The fully booked thing went as far as they refuse us at the beach club at 1pm as it was fully booked , never an hotel restaurant ever refused us before, it was a first.
Then it was very rainy and as the island signaletic isnt that great, my friend had an car accident, the car slipped with the rain on a bump and crashed on a tree, the GM assistant (who we saw every day) gave us a bill of 800$ saying we had to pay for the car damage. We totaly understood that we had to pay but they could have use their insurance. They agreed to reduce a bit the fees of 150$ for the manwork.
The service at the restaurants was VERY long, sometimes we had our coffee in last, after the meal for breakfast, we waited 1hour to have some sushi on our last dinner (a guest went very angry to a waitress as he was waiting for ages) the next morning the gm assistant said they were overwhelmed because it was full and they hired an extra chef at the japanese restaurant, funny because just after we ordered lunch and we waited 45min to have a club sandwich and the restaurant was empty.
+ they asked us if we wanted to book for NYE and never told us there was an other restaurant opened for those who didnt want to book (we discovered this after), the NYE dinner was 700$ without the party and wasnt great and overpriced (as all NYE), the animations were not what we excpected, not very discreet and private, singers singing on the pool current song like Bruno Mars, and pink lights everywhere... they made people coming at 8pm but at 9:30 everybody had finish to eat and had to wait for the fireworks at 00am, hopefully we saw it from the beach... but maybe clients likes those kind of party. The dinner was a buffet (not great, not a lot) and you had to wait in lines to have your meals, not what we excpected.
What was weird was that everybody was nice, not helpful but nice and kept asking if we will come back, it sounds like a joke how can we come back after this level of service after having paid 20k + 8200$ of extras?!
I dont think we ever go back to any Aman after this, we didnt understood why no one cared about us as we could be potential recurrent clients and we did 4 Amans this year. It wasnt that bad but for the price and all the fuss Aman is doing about their level of excellence it was not that great.
#582
Join Date: Oct 2006
Posts: 862
I feel your pain, FlyP, as one of the people who did post a rave review on TA and, then, a few pages upstream, had to report on a miserable honeymoon experience there, booked and paid for by me. I can tell you that Audeline has done little to make me feel better and, in fact, seems a bit tone deaf. As reported, our first response from her was along the lines of "gosh, so sorry, can't go back in time." I did ask her to look after a couple at festive, which she did,
but as they are known in entertainment circles, they would probably have been VIPed anyway. She also said she would write a note to the honeymoon couple, which did NOT happen without a reminder from me three weeks later.
I made it clear to Audeline that I wanted absolutely nothing from her, but a platform to share my observations and the promised apology. She said we could have a beach casita for a few days gratis off season with many limitations which is truly an empty offer as the flight to the resort, meals, and other expenses would likely accrue more benefit to Amanpulo than us during the off season. As well, despite living on the East Coast and saying VERY clearly that we
would never return, guess what her surprise was? Yep, 4 days off season that we explicitly did not want. A heartfelt, specific apology with some random item from the gift shop at the proper time (i.e., when promised),
would have closed the loop but this need to remind her to get anything rankled. Of course, it is unfortunate that this couple did not speak up more assertively at the time, but none of this should have happened in the first place and the ongoing nature of the promised apology, etc. has intensified the negative feelings about the property for them and me. For those who are planning to go, I wish you the wonderful experience we had but, if things start to go
south, speak up.
but as they are known in entertainment circles, they would probably have been VIPed anyway. She also said she would write a note to the honeymoon couple, which did NOT happen without a reminder from me three weeks later.
I made it clear to Audeline that I wanted absolutely nothing from her, but a platform to share my observations and the promised apology. She said we could have a beach casita for a few days gratis off season with many limitations which is truly an empty offer as the flight to the resort, meals, and other expenses would likely accrue more benefit to Amanpulo than us during the off season. As well, despite living on the East Coast and saying VERY clearly that we
would never return, guess what her surprise was? Yep, 4 days off season that we explicitly did not want. A heartfelt, specific apology with some random item from the gift shop at the proper time (i.e., when promised),
would have closed the loop but this need to remind her to get anything rankled. Of course, it is unfortunate that this couple did not speak up more assertively at the time, but none of this should have happened in the first place and the ongoing nature of the promised apology, etc. has intensified the negative feelings about the property for them and me. For those who are planning to go, I wish you the wonderful experience we had but, if things start to go
south, speak up.
#583
Join Date: Dec 2006
Location: Enroute to ? & likely flying in ' A ':)
Programs: TPPS, UA, EK ...; Marriott BONVOY , HH, GP, GC..
Posts: 4,221
Hello,
Just found this thread as I was looking online some reviews, and surprisingly all tripadvisor ones were good... we were feeling a bit alone
We just left the resort and we re so disappointed... I don’t know how it was before or anything as we’re new to Aman. Everybody was saying Aman is the best service blablabla it was everything except that. We did 4 Amans this year (I think it’s quite a bit for new consumers. We never went to Aman before this year) and only Amanjena was this bad. We were very excited about Amanpulo as everybody said it was better than the Maldives etc and it was our only big vacation in the year.
First of all, when we arrived at 4pm our beach casita wasn’t ready, we had to wait 6:30pm. (Hopefully we slept one night in HK, as there is no direct France-Manilla but still we woke up at 6am to do HK Manilla so we were tired and just wanted to have our casita ready to relax after 12hrs flights). They gave us a tree casita for us to wait.
The beach casita was ok, felt a bit dated, but the island and the beach were amazing... the next 3 days there was a tropical depression so it was kind of rainy (not their fault though)
We asked our GA to do some activities and all her answers were sorry it s fully booked , she never propose us any other activities and we barely saw her during our stay but she was very nice.(when at Park Hyatt Maldives we saw our GA every morning and every night to schedule activities or just to check if everything was alright). The activities reservation person was the same always saying it’s fully booked and never propose anything else, we wanted to do the seabobs as we did in Amanyara but we couldn’t as it was fully booked for the week... our ga never told us it was so popular and that it needed reservation
The fully booked thing went as far as they refuse us at the beach club at 1pm as it was fully booked , never an hotel restaurant ever refused us before, it was a first.
Then it was very rainy and as the island signaletic isnt that great, my friend had an car accident, the car slipped with the rain on a bump and crashed on a tree, the GM assistant (who we saw every day) gave us a bill of 800$ saying we had to pay for the car damage. We totaly understood that we had to pay but they could have use their insurance. They agreed to reduce a bit the fees of 150$ for the manwork.
The service at the restaurants was VERY long, sometimes we had our coffee in last, after the meal for breakfast, we waited 1hour to have some sushi on our last dinner (a guest went very angry to a waitress as he was waiting for ages) the next morning the gm assistant said they were overwhelmed because it was full and they hired an extra chef at the japanese restaurant, funny because just after we ordered lunch and we waited 45min to have a club sandwich and the restaurant was empty.
+ they asked us if we wanted to book for NYE and never told us there was an other restaurant opened for those who didnt want to book (we discovered this after), the NYE dinner was 700$ without the party and wasn’t great and overpriced (as all NYE), the animations were not what we excpected, not very discreet and private, singers singing on the pool current song like Bruno Mars, and pink lights everywhere... they made people coming at 8pm but at 9:30 everybody had finish to eat and had to wait for the fireworks at 00am, hopefully we saw it from the beach... but maybe clients likes those kind of party. The dinner was a buffet (not great, not a lot) and you had to wait in lines to have your meals, not what we excpected.
What was weird was that everybody was nice, not helpful but nice and kept asking if we will come back, it sounds like a joke how can we come back after this level of service after having paid 20k + 8200$ of extras?!
I don’t think we ever go back to any Aman after this, we didn’t understood why no one cared about us as we could be potential recurrent clients and we did 4 Amans this year. It wasn’t that bad but for the price and all the fuss Aman is doing about their level of excellence it was not that great.
Just found this thread as I was looking online some reviews, and surprisingly all tripadvisor ones were good... we were feeling a bit alone
We just left the resort and we re so disappointed... I don’t know how it was before or anything as we’re new to Aman. Everybody was saying Aman is the best service blablabla it was everything except that. We did 4 Amans this year (I think it’s quite a bit for new consumers. We never went to Aman before this year) and only Amanjena was this bad. We were very excited about Amanpulo as everybody said it was better than the Maldives etc and it was our only big vacation in the year.
First of all, when we arrived at 4pm our beach casita wasn’t ready, we had to wait 6:30pm. (Hopefully we slept one night in HK, as there is no direct France-Manilla but still we woke up at 6am to do HK Manilla so we were tired and just wanted to have our casita ready to relax after 12hrs flights). They gave us a tree casita for us to wait.
The beach casita was ok, felt a bit dated, but the island and the beach were amazing... the next 3 days there was a tropical depression so it was kind of rainy (not their fault though)
We asked our GA to do some activities and all her answers were sorry it s fully booked , she never propose us any other activities and we barely saw her during our stay but she was very nice.(when at Park Hyatt Maldives we saw our GA every morning and every night to schedule activities or just to check if everything was alright). The activities reservation person was the same always saying it’s fully booked and never propose anything else, we wanted to do the seabobs as we did in Amanyara but we couldn’t as it was fully booked for the week... our ga never told us it was so popular and that it needed reservation
The fully booked thing went as far as they refuse us at the beach club at 1pm as it was fully booked , never an hotel restaurant ever refused us before, it was a first.
Then it was very rainy and as the island signaletic isnt that great, my friend had an car accident, the car slipped with the rain on a bump and crashed on a tree, the GM assistant (who we saw every day) gave us a bill of 800$ saying we had to pay for the car damage. We totaly understood that we had to pay but they could have use their insurance. They agreed to reduce a bit the fees of 150$ for the manwork.
The service at the restaurants was VERY long, sometimes we had our coffee in last, after the meal for breakfast, we waited 1hour to have some sushi on our last dinner (a guest went very angry to a waitress as he was waiting for ages) the next morning the gm assistant said they were overwhelmed because it was full and they hired an extra chef at the japanese restaurant, funny because just after we ordered lunch and we waited 45min to have a club sandwich and the restaurant was empty.
+ they asked us if we wanted to book for NYE and never told us there was an other restaurant opened for those who didnt want to book (we discovered this after), the NYE dinner was 700$ without the party and wasn’t great and overpriced (as all NYE), the animations were not what we excpected, not very discreet and private, singers singing on the pool current song like Bruno Mars, and pink lights everywhere... they made people coming at 8pm but at 9:30 everybody had finish to eat and had to wait for the fireworks at 00am, hopefully we saw it from the beach... but maybe clients likes those kind of party. The dinner was a buffet (not great, not a lot) and you had to wait in lines to have your meals, not what we excpected.
What was weird was that everybody was nice, not helpful but nice and kept asking if we will come back, it sounds like a joke how can we come back after this level of service after having paid 20k + 8200$ of extras?!
I don’t think we ever go back to any Aman after this, we didn’t understood why no one cared about us as we could be potential recurrent clients and we did 4 Amans this year. It wasn’t that bad but for the price and all the fuss Aman is doing about their level of excellence it was not that great.
I feel your pain, FlyP, as one of the people who did post a rave review on TA and, then, a few pages upstream, had to report on a miserable honeymoon experience there, booked and paid for by me. I can tell you that Audeline has done little to make me feel better and, in fact, seems a bit tone deaf. As reported, our first response from her was along the lines of "gosh, so sorry, can't go back in time." I did ask her to look after a couple at festive, which she did,
but as they are known in entertainment circles, they would probably have been VIPed anyway. She also said she would write a note to the honeymoon couple, which did NOT happen without a reminder from me three weeks later.
I made it clear to Audeline that I wanted absolutely nothing from her, but a platform to share my observations and the promised apology. She said we could have a beach casita for a few days gratis off season with many limitations which is truly an empty offer as the flight to the resort, meals, and other expenses would likely accrue more benefit to Amanpulo than us during the off season. As well, despite living on the East Coast and saying VERY clearly that we
would never return, guess what her surprise was? Yep, 4 days off season that we explicitly did not want. A heartfelt, specific apology with some random item from the gift shop at the proper time (i.e., when promised),
would have closed the loop but this need to remind her to get anything rankled. Of course, it is unfortunate that this couple did not speak up more assertively at the time, but none of this should have happened in the first place and the ongoing nature of the promised apology, etc. has intensified the negative feelings about the property for them and me. For those who are planning to go, I wish you the wonderful experience we had but, if things start to go
south, speak up.
but as they are known in entertainment circles, they would probably have been VIPed anyway. She also said she would write a note to the honeymoon couple, which did NOT happen without a reminder from me three weeks later.
I made it clear to Audeline that I wanted absolutely nothing from her, but a platform to share my observations and the promised apology. She said we could have a beach casita for a few days gratis off season with many limitations which is truly an empty offer as the flight to the resort, meals, and other expenses would likely accrue more benefit to Amanpulo than us during the off season. As well, despite living on the East Coast and saying VERY clearly that we
would never return, guess what her surprise was? Yep, 4 days off season that we explicitly did not want. A heartfelt, specific apology with some random item from the gift shop at the proper time (i.e., when promised),
would have closed the loop but this need to remind her to get anything rankled. Of course, it is unfortunate that this couple did not speak up more assertively at the time, but none of this should have happened in the first place and the ongoing nature of the promised apology, etc. has intensified the negative feelings about the property for them and me. For those who are planning to go, I wish you the wonderful experience we had but, if things start to go
south, speak up.
Current & previous GM specialise ( d ) in lip service , at best , it seems like .
Perhaps seek out a long time senior team member of more than 10 years , discreetly , they will get things done & sorted well .
Sad how things are panning out . Have decided against staying this month .
#584
I feel your pain, FlyP, as one of the people who did post a rave review on TA and, then, a few pages upstream, had to report on a miserable honeymoon experience there, booked and paid for by me. I can tell you that Audeline has done little to make me feel better and, in fact, seems a bit tone deaf. As reported, our first response from her was along the lines of "gosh, so sorry, can't go back in time." I did ask her to look after a couple at festive, which she did,
but as they are known in entertainment circles, they would probably have been VIPed anyway. She also said she would write a note to the honeymoon couple, which did NOT happen without a reminder from me three weeks later.
I made it clear to Audeline that I wanted absolutely nothing from her, but a platform to share my observations and the promised apology. She said we could have a beach casita for a few days gratis off season with many limitations which is truly an empty offer as the flight to the resort, meals, and other expenses would likely accrue more benefit to Amanpulo than us during the off season. As well, despite living on the East Coast and saying VERY clearly that we
would never return, guess what her surprise was? Yep, 4 days off season that we explicitly did not want. A heartfelt, specific apology with some random item from the gift shop at the proper time (i.e., when promised),
would have closed the loop but this need to remind her to get anything rankled. Of course, it is unfortunate that this couple did not speak up more assertively at the time, but none of this should have happened in the first place and the ongoing nature of the promised apology, etc. has intensified the negative feelings about the property for them and me. For those who are planning to go, I wish you the wonderful experience we had but, if things start to go
south, speak up.
but as they are known in entertainment circles, they would probably have been VIPed anyway. She also said she would write a note to the honeymoon couple, which did NOT happen without a reminder from me three weeks later.
I made it clear to Audeline that I wanted absolutely nothing from her, but a platform to share my observations and the promised apology. She said we could have a beach casita for a few days gratis off season with many limitations which is truly an empty offer as the flight to the resort, meals, and other expenses would likely accrue more benefit to Amanpulo than us during the off season. As well, despite living on the East Coast and saying VERY clearly that we
would never return, guess what her surprise was? Yep, 4 days off season that we explicitly did not want. A heartfelt, specific apology with some random item from the gift shop at the proper time (i.e., when promised),
would have closed the loop but this need to remind her to get anything rankled. Of course, it is unfortunate that this couple did not speak up more assertively at the time, but none of this should have happened in the first place and the ongoing nature of the promised apology, etc. has intensified the negative feelings about the property for them and me. For those who are planning to go, I wish you the wonderful experience we had but, if things start to go
south, speak up.
Would not visit Pulo as long as the current administration is in charge.
Last edited by Aventine; Jan 7, 2019 at 12:50 am
#585