Sandown Pier — Attraction in Ryde

The amusement arcade is not a pleasant place, not an whole days fun in one like the advert says.

The majority of the arcade machines go wrong when you put your money in them, the coins go missing or get stuck.

Sometimes when you win eg £10.00, it might pay you 9 x £1 coins and 1 x 10p piece (so you are out of pocket)

I can only imagine some of the staff who fill the machines mis-fill them.

When the machines go wrong it is not easy to get help or assistance being the majority of staff spend most of the time standing outside the pier smoking.

There is only 1 change desk open, if they are counting up, they close the desk and you have to go back when they have finished counting.

The same desk also takes bookings for the crazy golf so you have to wait quite a while to be seen, so if the machine you are playing as gone wrong you have a long wait for assistance.

When you finally see someone they say they will send someone along to fix the machine but you end up waiting ages, no apologies when they finally arrive.

(Customer service skills are poor and too be honest always have been)

Many of the machines reels are out of line so when you win they don't always payout and if you inform the staff they say the reels are out of synch, so you don't get your wiinnings or all the money you have put in them (not a fair system), only 1 winner them!

The Monopoly machines top centre game reels are totally out of synch, so when you get the game you have no idea how much you are winning.

The Double Decker party game machine very top centre game reels go wrong so the party ends early.

The 2p & 10p pushers have hardly any prizes on them, and I have seen employees move items back that are close to the edge so players have to start from scratch which costs them more money (not fair at all).

Many of the machines are dirty. I am not too sure if they ever clean them.

Unlike some seaside arcades, the pier charges customers £1.75 to withdraw cash, even though you are spending the money in their business.

I am surprised the owners let the staff get away with it, from what I see when on the pier it's the owners son doing the majority of the work. Whilst the staff are standing outside smoking they could be repairing machines or assisting customers and filling up empty change machines which are mostly empty on a daily basis.

A lesson for the future, remember it's the customers who are are paying your wages, employees seem to forget that.

No customers...

I've come to sandown amusement for years and can say that ends this year, manager felt the need to send staff over to accuse me of being a business when changing up a note for pound coins to use the machines. I was spoken down to and belittled and in more words accused of lying and told to 'tell my boss i cant do this' when I insisted I had come to use the amusements the staff member also felt the need to smirk and asked if I was sure and if I 'promise' to remain in the amusements.

I eventually did leave with most of my money and move on to a different amusements as the staff member felt the need to quite blatantly follow me around to 'make sure' I was playing on machines and not some mystery business stealing their pound coins for some nefarious deeds.

I see from other reviews I'm not the first person with this complaint either. A shame as the place used to be wonderful but this strange paranoia about people changing up their money...given arcade machines take various coins, has created a hostile and uncomfortable atmosphere.

Perhaps the amusements should consider a return to a manned booth if they don't trust patrons to use...

The posters say you can spend a whole day on the pier, but if you did decide to do so then do remember to bring loads of cash beforehand. They have one ATM (that charges) and it wasn't working, so off up the hill into town and back.

The arcade machines don't give tickets but charge the same as those that do. You're playing purely for amusement here, but many older machines didn't work properly so the other fun game was finding an attendant.

Coin pushers are always cheap fun, but with no tickets and barely any gifts resting on the coins to win you will soon wonder how much fun you can have with no chance of getting anything more than dirty fingers.

Maybe the footfall isn't high enough to invest in better equipment, but another cash machine would definitely be a good idea. And perhaps not charging 20p for the toilet (which has to be a 20p, as it won't take any other coins and the change machines don't dispense 20ps either....)

First World problems for sure, but I am sure people won't rush back when there are other places that do try harder to give people some entertainment...