xar

Hi Everyone,
Just completed my weekend stay at this property and sharing my thoughts here
Had the following 'benefits' as a Marriott Gold member (crossover from SPG Gold)
1. Managed to check in at 8am. (I used a mobile check in and received the alert at 730am....)
2. Secured a check out of 4pm the following day. (Better than Your24 heh heh)
3. Because of the early check in, I enjoyed 2 FULL days of executive lounge (Breakfast, Afternoon Tea, Evening Cocktails)
4. Studio > Deluxe Room, i.e +1 Category room upgrade. (As the folks here mentioned previously, anything more than +1 is lucky. Given the super early check in i didn't want to press for a further upgrade.

What i loved about the stay....
- Friendly lounge staff that is somehow able to remember your name despite having 50+ other people moving in and out of the lounges. (Shows how many other members are there these days...)
- They have 2 pools. the one located on the 6th floor had sufficient sun to keep the water at a bearable temperature unlike the 18th floor which was a chinese torture chamber.
- Nice bath amenities which made me feeling fresh like a bag of green tea.
- Lounge is nicely stocked with all drinks (Coffee, Tea, Pepsi, Soda Water, 7 Up) with pastries to go along with during tea. They serve hot finger food (nuggets, pizza, chips) and cold cuts from 5.30pm.

What i didn't like / somewhat disappointed:
- they "forgot" my birthday despite leaving the comments that this was a birthday trip.
- The rooms were really small. Seems like this will be a "new norm" for newer hotels here in Singapore.

Overall I would rate this stay as value for money (i paid S$280 with taxes) Decent lounge and facilities. View of the evening fireworks from the 18th floor pool a bonus too.
Not sure if i'll come back given that my Marriott Gold will be nerfed from 1st Aug which means no more lounge and 4pm check outs

bennos

I recently completed a 6 night stay here. It's clear that the hotel is trying to improve itself (starting with the JW rebranding a year ago), and overall I'd call it "very good", but not quite "excellent". According to the front desk staff, the hotel had a hard time positioning itself as the "South Beach Hotel", and brought in Marriott to help with branding, marketing, and operations.

Check-in was a bit of a mess. The lobby is narrow and poorly laid out. From the car drop off, you first pass a desk with some bowls of candy, then the "Marriott Rewards" desk, then the main desks, and then (on the opposite side) the Mobile checkin desk. Which one was I supposed to use, and where was the queue? No idea. I just wandered around aimlessly until someone came over and directed me. Unfortunately, there's not much that can be done here without a lot of physical restructuring, as the floor is long and narrow.

The actual check-in was fast and efficient, though they delivered the wrong welcome gift. I was given a one category upgrade on 13F (the hotel goes to 21), from a deluxe room to a premier room. As has been discussed upthread, this is within Marriott policy (which vaguely says the hotel can more or less do what they want), but is a bit disappointing when the room key comes in a folder that says I've been upgraded to the "best available room". It should really say to the "next available category". That said, it was pretty clear that the weekend crowd does pay for suites, as there was extremely limited availability during the stay (according to marriott.com), and the suites on my floor were in use, and not by the Elite Member type. Lots of paid lounge access, too.

The design of the hotel is definitely a love it (if you like ultra modern) or hate it (if you don't) kind of thing. The "rocking desk chairs" mentioned upthread have been moved out of the way and replaced with a slightly more functional, but not ergonomic, desk chair.

During peak times, the elevators could benefit from a destination based calling system to optimize dispatch.

The bathroom overall was very nice, with a large soaking tub and separate shower and toilet. As reported upthread, the Toto Washlet was nonfunctional. In fact, it didn't even have power. I'm not sure why they'd install Washlets but not wire up the power.

The housekeeping team here are ninjas. They didn't miss a single regular or turndown service, no matter what time I left the room. Furthermore, I don't think they missed a single minor detail over the stay. Definitely one of the best housekeeping crews I've ever experienced.

As already mentioned upthread, the lounge staff are also great. The lounge itself is quite large, and even when fully busy there were always a couple of tables open. The spread at breakfast was one of the best I've seen in a lounge, and we didn't bother going downstairs to the restaurant at all (offered in the platinum welcome letter). Tea (the one time we made it) was basically a proper high tea, with finger sandwiches and baked goods available (though not served in a three layer presentation). The evening spread was also quite expansive (it ruined my dinner once or twice), with free booze recently extended to run 17:30 - 21:30. Sadly (but not uniquely to this property), the desserts are put out at the same time as the rest of the food, all of which ends at 19:30, so if you come back after dinner there are only drinks available.

Since one or two posters in this thread continually complained about the wifi, I ran some tests. I pretty consistently got 19.4MB down/19.0MB up with 3ms ping times, no matter where in the hotel I tried. These are good (not great) speeds that will feel fast enough under most circumstances. However, I did notice two failures: once DNS resolution got real slow (data transfer rates were unaffected, but this could make web browsing feel slow), and another time the transfer rate plummeted to 1.2 down/0.9 up with 222ms ping times. I suspect the problem isn't the physical wifi network but the upstream ISP.

The gym is pretty well equipped, but 3 of 4 times I couldn't get a bench. (The treadmills never reached 100% utilization while I was there.) There were a few other minor quirks, such as the TV blanking out as though it went into sleep mode.

The hotel location is pretty convenient, with a bunch of stuff within walking distance, the Circle Line basically in the basement, and three convenient shopping malls containing most of your current Singaporean fads. You can also walk to the City Hall MRT station, though I'm not sure I'd do it with luggage (ie: from the airport; transfer at Paya Lebar is probably easier).

Overall, with expectations appropriately set and at an appropriate price point, I'd definitely come back to this property.

Kacee

IMO St. Regis is a considerably better property, surprised the rate is the same. Platinum gets full breakfast at SR.

The locations are very different. Orchard Road vs. CBD.

hockeyinsider

It has worked when I stayed. Maybe it was your room.

yurtripper

I think I might take this property off my list for SIN. They keep sending me SPAM.

bennos

Um, click the "unsubscribe here" link at the bottom of the message?

ATWBY2020

All
Planning for 3 adult ( myself , wife and adult son ) for december 28 thru Jan 2

JW Club Premier room - exec lounge access - larger guest room - 1 king - $850 + 200000 points
Tang Plaza - Premier Deluxe Guest room - city view - 1 King - 200000 points

1 Is it worth $850 additional for JW ( i am platinum elite so should have access the lounge anyway in JW or Tang Plaza )
2 Does it make sense to book thru vacation points - 4300 in total for 5 nights ? only JW / Tang plaza doesnt have 3 person availability for the dates mentioned
3 if i use the vacation point do i get access to lounge ?

I assume i have to pay additional for rollaway bed ( SGD ranges like 120/140 per night ) using marriott reward point or vacation point.

Any help / suggestion / comments is much appreciated
Thanks

hockeyinsider

I would save the $850 and stay at the Marriott, if only because there might be more for your wife and kid to do near there in terms of shopping and so forth. Plus, $850 is a lot of money. I'm sure she would appreciate you spending all of that or some of it on her for dinners, shopping, etc.

ATWBY2020

ha ha , i guess so , thanks for the good suggestion .

Kacee

I agree the JW is not worth an $850 premium.

I would also look at the SPG options.

ATWBY2020

Thanks Again , and sure i will look into SPG too .
Also i guess Tang Plaza is closer to most of the attractions ( JW is more closer )

Regards

C17PSGR

But ... the JW is worth some premium. Just not $850. A nicer property and a better location even though it has some flaws.

Kacee

Better location really depends on what you want to do.

hockeyinsider

Exactly. Yes, it's closer to the art museum, some of the colonial-era heritage sites, and the casino but the J.W. Marriott is further away from the shopping that a wife might want to do.

And I don't think any under circumstances it's worth $850 more than the Marriott Tang Plaza.

joakgarp

The JW South beach has some advantages like location, close and walking distance to the Waterfront Parade and the Marina. The building is also newer and it's very close to a shopping mall Suntec City. You probably have everything you need if you stay at the JW. Orchard road isn't that special IMO after you have seen it once and it's also walkable as well from JW. I'd pick walking distance to the Waterfront every day. Pretty nice to walk around during evening.
If the rate would simliar to Marriott Tang Plaza I'd stay easily at the JW again. Their base rooms in JW (Deluxe) are pretty neat and we liked the bathroom and the japanese toilet. Just not 850USD more.