Sandals Royal Bahamian — Hotel in New Providence

I will share a VERY condensed version of my review, which can be found on the website that is the advisor of trips:

• Transportation: Rolls-Royce transportation from the airport to the resort, while luxurious, is not up to current standards of luxury due to road noise and potential neglect. • Check-in Experience: Check-in at the Nassau airport involves a small lounge with limited seating and a wait for transportation. • Check-in Experience: Smooth check-in with staff assistance, bag delivery, and butler introduction. • Butler Service: Two butlers per day, one in the morning and one in the afternoon-evening, to assist guests. • Activities: Dolphin excursion on Saturday morning and dinner on Tuesday. • Excursion Paperwork Issue: Guests felt rushed to sign paperwork for excursions, including a candlelit dinner and a dolphin excursion, despite being on property for a short time. • Dolphin Excursion Cancellation: Guests canceled the dolphin excursion due to bad weather, but were informed they would not receive a refund because they were within the 24-hour cancellation window. • Confusion Regarding Rescheduling: There was confusion between the excursion office and butler team regarding the dolphin excursion, with guests being told it was rescheduled for Monday despite canceling it. • Weather Conditions: Unsuitable for water activities on Saturday morning due to 62°F temperature and 15-20mph NE wind. • Butler Service: Useful for securing poolside/beach spots and restaurant reservations. • Massage Experience: Delayed ferry ride to the private island, but the massage itself was excellent. • Service Issues: Frequent instances of forgetfulness and inattention to guest requests, impacting the overall experience. • Culinary Excellence: The culinary team consistently delivers high-quality food, with standout experiences at Kimono’s, The Blue Food Truck, and The Pink Food Truck. • Price Sensitivity: The reviewer acknowledges the high price point and suggests that the service issues might be less noticeable at a lower cost. • Coffee Quality Issue: The coffee machine at the Pink Food Truck is malfunctioning and serves incorrect orders. • Recommended Coffee: The Jamaican Blue Mountain Blend coffee is spectacular and available in-room. • Positive Staff Interaction: Tevin from the West Bay Poolside bar is friendly and welcoming to all guests. • Room Size and Layout: The Honeymoon suite is not as spacious as advertised and lacks separate sleeping and living areas. • Noise Level: The West Bay Village Butler suites near the pool and coconut grove can be noisy due to music and entertainment until 11 p.m. • Odor Issue: A musty smell permeates the building, although it’s not overpowering. • Alcohol Consumption: Sandals is worth it for regular drinkers due to the generous pours. • Butler Service Tips: Use pre-arrival website to set dinner reservations and preferences, and request poolside seats for maximum sun exposure. • In-Room Breakfast: Preorder breakfast the night before with detailed instructions. • Check-out Experience: The butler team was unaware of the custodial staff’s actions, leading to the removal of belongings and the need for an unexpected check-out while still damp from the pool. • Hospitality Suite Arrangement: After check-out, the butler team escorted the guests to a hospitality suite, first on the third floor and then on the sixth floor, for preparation before departure. • Overall Experience: Mixed experience with praise for butler service and spa, but criticism for outdated transportation and inflexible excursion policies. • Resort Amenities: Enjoyable amenities like the private island and restaurants, but felt rushed into booking excursions and encountered confusion regarding cancellation policies. • Value for Money: Value for the price paid was not on par with the service and experience received, with too many avoidable errors occurring.

Edit: A stereotypical response is listed below. Obviously they haven’t read my TripAdvisor review which is far less kind and over 3,000 words in my lambast of their...

I would not recommend this resort to anyone. Not even close to worth the money you’re gonna spend. We a special rate- spent less than one-third what a friend spent for the week, and I am questioning whether my rate was even worth it. Service is non-existent. Frequently waited 15 to 20 minutes just to be seated and then were consistently ignored for the next 15 to 20 minutes until somebody came around with water. Waited another 15 minutes to order. It takes forever to get your food and after it is dropped off you are studiously ignored until you get up and leave. If you want a refill on a drink you have to try to flag someone… good luck with that. We had our meals forgotten about twice. Once at breakfast at the French restaurant where we sat for an hour waiting for a food and finally asked somebody. By the time we got it, it was cold, but I could see her literally walk behind the partition, open up the tray and then come and bring it to us. Spoke to several other couples who said the same thing happened to them. Who knows how long it had been sitting there. Then on our last day at the island, we sat there for over TWO HOURS before we got our food. They forgot our order completely. We had to verify our order four times with four different people and they still forgot one of the items we ordered. Meanwhile they bought our 4 of the plates we ordered to other tables that had been seated well after we were. Literally the worst service I have had at any restaurant I’ve ever been into in my life, all-inclusive or not. It was an absolute joke. The only exception to this was the Hibachi place (Kimono’s) where the service was fantastic. Butch’s wasn’t bad (though the food wasn’t great), and though it took a while for our waitress to finally come around at dinner at Plume, it was good when she finally did. Everywhere we went the food was hit or miss. The cocktails are watered down everywhere but the piano bar. Some places were really good some were… ok. Went to Calico one day and it was one of the best meals we had. Went back two days later and it was not good. We were told we would get housekeeping services twice a day. We had to call three days in a row to get housekeeping services as our room wasn’t touched until we got back and requested it. By the third day I called before we left to request it and they asked if we had turned on the housekeeping light. I told him that we had already told five different people, five different times, that the doorbell and housekeeping light were broken and making a really annoying clicking noise the whole time. Nobody ever fixed it. We were there for a week. We also told the front desk 3 times about the slider to our patio where the lock was broken. Nothing was ever fixed. The resort is beautiful and the location is good. The beaches on the private island are amazing. The ones on the mainland are not. There’s one nice beach. The other two coves are completely socked in by seaweed, none of which was removed, except for one poor guy with a 5 gallon bucket trying to do it by hand. It got worse every day we were there. If they put as much effort into their service as they did into harassing you about the spa services, it would be a great experience. Unfortunately, it was not. Sorry to say we will definitely never be back. We had already booked a Beaches resort in a few months and are now considering changing it to somewhere else, though I did have a few people tell me that it was a lot better there. The day before checkout, we requested a 30 minute late check out. The front desk said that would be no problem and she had added the note. We went to the beach to spend some time there before we had to leave. We made it back to our room at 11:03 and the door was locked and we couldn’t get in. It made us late to our shuttle back to the airport, which we just barely made. Our room was nice (we had a villa), and a handful of the staff was great (shoutout to the bartenders at the piano bar and the pub). Unfortunately the handful of great employees weren’t enough to make up for the plethora of...

TLDR; Very mediocre resort. Rude staff. Underwhelming experience.

Room: We stayed in the butler private villas. Our first experience with the sandals butler elite. We were greeted with an unreasonably dirty room. The floor was covered in dirt/dust/sand that stuck to the bottom of your feet if you were barefoot. We were also greeted with a hair ball tucked away nicely in our bed sheets as if they didn’t bother to change the sheets and just made the bed. Both of our bathroom windows were broken and could not be open or closed. The screen was also busted which let in a litany of bugs during our one week stay. Our bathroom door was broken and was difficult to open and close. If you accidentally closed it all the way while inside, it would pop the track and essentially lock you in with the toilet. It was also cracked and we would periodically find little glass shards scattered in the area. The sink in the bathroom drained insanely slow and would fill up with just one faucet running. The bed was by far the squeakiest bed I have ever seen in my life. Any little movement is for sure waking up your partner. The mattress at this, self proclaimed five star resort, is kin to sleeping on a NYC sidewalk. The soaking tub on the patio looked like a public dog wash tub that hasn’t been cleaned since it was installed. The rest of the furniture had various staining which resembled bodily fluid from previous guests. The lock on the door was broken and essentially needed to be forcefully manipulated to completely lock.

Staff: We had butler service but it felt like an inconvenience any time we attempted to use them. We were even hung up on twice by our butler during our last full day at the resort. We informed our butler about our concerns the very first night and he basically shrugged it off. Out of our three butlers we had one that was exceptional and that embodied the experience you’d anticipate for an all inclusive/elite service. Unfortunately we only had her for one day out of our seven day trip. I’d say it’s a coin flip for how you’re going to be treated by staff. Some are very pleasant and others are not. Most of the bar staff we encountered seemed to be bothered by your presence. They seemed to ignore you almost as if they just expected a different bar tender to deal with your drink request. They also frequently took tips despite the sandals policy of no tipping accepted. Restaurant staff were equally as random. Some were pleasant but most seemed upset you decided to show up for your reservation. My order for food was messed up a couple times, which by itself isn’t the end of the world, but it all adds up.

Food: Kimonos and Soy were the highlights of the trip. Everywhere else seemed to be reheated sides with a poorly cooked protein. Steaks and meats were routinely over cooked and underwhelmed. The mashed potatoes were 100% instant despite claiming to be “homemade.” Breakfast was breakfast. Nothing remarkable. Lunch meals were solid but very limited in selection.

Resort: The resort itself was fairly decent. All of the public spaces were relatively clean and there was ample space at the beach and pools. The beaches had an uncontrollable seaweed issue that no where else around the resort seemed to have. There is a strange sewage smell that appears to come from an unknown water source from underneath the main dock. None of the pools are heated. Some will say that the “loud” pool is heated but it’s much more active and the theory is it feels warmer because everyone is treating it as a public toilet. Not sure on the accuracy of this statement but it’s a thought that hasn’t left my head since hearing it. Speaking of restrooms, there are no where near enough in the public areas for the amount of traffic.

Summary: Overall, a very poor experience for the price. Sandals oversold and under delivered at this resort. We have stayed at Sandals Royal Caribbean and had the best time which is why we rebooked with them. If this was our first sandals experience we would never return. We spoke with numerous couples who had similar...