BreakFree Capital Tower Canberra — Hotel in District of Canberra Central

Well the view as always was absolutely fantastic, however the apartment was a little sad. I have stayed here probably 6 or 7 times over the past 25 years. I always come back because of the view. This time I arranged to meet 2 girl friends from Sydney. I'm from Bega, Canberra is a good halfway point. As we were 3 mature women, we requested beds for 3 adults. A queen and 2 singles. I don't know why but the queen bed in the very small 2nd bedroom was made up as 2 singles. These 2 beds were hard up against each other so you may as well have just shared a queen bed, and because of the bed sizes you could not access the wardrobe so open luggage bags had to be left in the hallway. It would have been a far better idea to have divided the bed in the master bedroom into 2 single beds where the large walk through wardrobe and ample floor space would have been far more comfortable for us. In the unsuite of the Master bedroom, the water in the hand basin drained extremely slowly, I'm sure the front desk will receive a call telling them the drain is blocked probably by the next guests who stay in this apartment, #1505. The shower head in the ensuite needed replacing a long time ago, it is well past its useable life, you can no longer adjust it so the flow stays and the water just falls out of the head, you may as well be showering under a hose. The shower screen in the main bathroom is well past it's use by date. But most importantly, and this is probably a health hazard, in the kitchen, I think there must be a water leak from the dishwasher. The baseboard of the cupboard next to the dishwasher is saturated. When you open the cupboard door it stinks. Brown moisture seeps through this board and against the bottom of the cupboard door from where it drips onto the floor leaving smelly brown drip marks. Cutlery needs addressing as there were not even 4 place settings. The glass on the balcony is so filthy it's impossible to ignore as you take in the view. It is quite probably past being cleaned and in need of replacing. Look, I just love the view, and this was why I suggested Capital Tower to my friends, but as they pointed out, it is very much in need of someone really inspecting it, doing some maintenance and more than just a vacuum and dust. I really hope you will have someone look at these things I have brought to your attention, I don't like to sound so negative about my stay, but I think you need to be made aware. Sadly, my friends are in no hurry to come back and have suggested that next time we stay next door. Please have someone check what I have reported to you and if you feel I have been unfair in this report to you I would be happy to chat....

We stayed in room 1803, a 2 bedroom 2 bathroom apartment with a lake view. The apartment was extremely clean, spacious with a beautiful view (from every room) of the lake and mountains in the background. It was lovely. Reading some of the reviews of certain apartments on these premises i had concerns coming in. However the apartment turned out to be great. The interior was very clean. The only bone I would pick would be the cleanliness of the external glass balustrade of the balcony and the balcony furniture. The external balcony glass doors too could do with a clean. It didn’t really bother us but had that area been as clean as the interior I would give the apartment a 5* rating instead of a 4.

The checking in was quick and easy. The lady at the reception was helpful allowing us to change our room to a lake view and higher floor at the point of checking in. At an extra cost but was fully worth it.

The AC worked extremely well, the oven, microwave, iron and hair dryer all worked just fine. We didn’t use the washing machine and dryer as our stay was only for 2 nights.

There is a corner store and 2 coffee shops just opposite the towers. Very convenient to grab essentials without driving out. The lifts to the 18th floor were fine. We never had to wait more than a couple of minutes. However i am not sure if this is because there was less crowd when we were there. The undercover parking at $12 per day was convenient. We always found parking either on B1 or B2 levels. The parking is a little tight for larger vehicles but nothing too hard a semi decent driver can’t manage to negotiate. Last but not least the location of the premises is great. Very quick access by car to all places of interest. We managed to visit everything we planned to visit efficiently because of the convenient location. Even sometimes popped back to the apartment for toilet breaks as my youngest is reluctant to use public toilets! I would certainly return if the quality of the apartment is the same as 1803. Reading some of the other reviews i get the impression the quality of accomodation differs greatly from apartment to apartment. That’s the reason I qualify this review to the apartment we stayed in - which was excellent- home...

I stayed here for two nights in the penthouse suite and on the second night my partner went home before me and took the hotel key. When I got home and went to call him he had fallen asleep, so I couldn’t get in. I rang the hotel and spoke to Praveen, who repeatedly told me that there was nothing he could do to let me in because I couldn’t confirm my partners credit card number that he had booked under. I asked Praveen several times to please either call the room directly (assuming my partner’s phone was on silent but that calling the hotel phone would wake him up), so that he could confirm that I was staying there, or to come and let me in physically, so that my partner could confirm on arrival at the door that I was staying there. Praveen (after hanging up on me twice) told me on my third distressed phone call to him that their policy is to “not disturb guests,” so there was nothing that he could do. I asked Praveen what I was supposed to do because it was 1am and I was stuck sitting outside the front of the hotel. Praveen said that I had no choice but to keep trying to call my partner and hope that he answered. I asked Praveen if I could just book another room at the hotel so that I had somewhere to sleep for the night and he said no. So I sat in the gutter out the front of the hotel for about 40 mins, thinking about my options whilst looking up other last minute hotels to book near by, as this seemed to be the only alternative to sleeping on the literal pavement out the front of the hotel. Thankfully, my partner finally woke up just by chance, saw all of my missed calls and let me in. Had this not been the case I would’ve been completely stranded. I am still shocked by the whole experience. What’s the point of having 24/7 reception contact if you refuse to let your guests in. I would never stay here again. If you lose your key, or go home separately to the other guest/s that you’re staying with, that’s it. You cannot get in to your hotel room at all. We paid an extortionate amount for the penthouse suite, assuming that at least half decent service would accompany this, but that was not the case at all. The whole ordeal was and still is completely insane to me. Steer clear...