Hotel Living Apex Edinburgh

I am just back from a couple of days at a very interesting conference in Edinburgh which was lead by a professor from the J F Kennedy School of Government Harvard. While the conference and discussions were very interesting I must say that my experience staying at my hotel confirms once more for me that all that glitters is not gold when it comes to Hotels.

The Apex International Hotel in Edinburgh sits right beside Edinburgh Castle and is, like most Apex hotels, a modern design hotel with top clash furniture and decor. I couldn't really fault them on that count. What I have found though staying at Apex hotels is that they seem to employ a much younger staff group than many other hotel groups. I am not sure if this accounts for the sometimes slip-shod service but I suspect it is one of the factors.

Having left home around 6 am to get to the conference and then had a long day at the conference itself I decided that I just wanted to eat in my room and get an early night ready for the next day.

I was thwarted in this by the fact that no-one had bothered to leave a dining menu in the room and there was no note of the hotel reception number. So, still in a relatively benign mood, I made my way to reception and pointed this out. No problem. They would take my order there and that would be it sorted they said.

So I wearily made my way back to my room. The clock ticked on. I think I fell asleep for a while and on waking realised that it was no over an hour since I had given them my order. I wondered of course if they might have come while I was asleep but I am not that heavy a sleeper. Oh, well they are just being a bit slow I thought. So, in a slightly less tolerant mood I waited. An hour and a half had now gone by and no sign of my food.

My dilemma now was that I would have to go to reception again to check what had happened and they might try to bring my meal while I was down there. Hmmm. Wait a little longer. Approaching two hours in and I am no longer in a very tolerant mood and I go back to reception.

Ah, so sorry they say. We forgot all about your order! Give us 15 minute and we will have it with you. Some twenty minutes later and my food arrived , together with a complimentary bottle of wine.

Now I am not trying to be unreasonable here. Mistakes do happen. The trouble is that they seem to happen regularly at Apex Hotels. this is not the first time this sort of problem has occurred when I have stayed at Apex hotels. It has been a much rarer experience at other hotels.

I wonder what other peoples experience of hotels is like? How frequently do you come across this type of shoddy service?