Hotel NH Collection Brussels Centre — Hotel in Brussels

when I checked out of the hotel, i left my cash and passport behind in the room safe. Only realised I left it behind when I was checking into my hotel in Dusseldorf. I immediately called NH Brussels Centre to inform them that I have left my items behind in the safe and if they can retrieve it and mail them to me at my hotel in Dusseldorf. They wanted me to do it in writing by emailing them and there was a bit of to and fro emails for the paperwork for payment of mailing the items to Germany.

Two days later, my hotel in Dusseldorf notified me of the arrival of a package for me. The package was sealed and I opened it in front of the front desk staff. I was extremely relieved to find my passport. My spare phone and credit cards were also intact. However, my cash of 350 Euros were nowhere to be seen.

I knew that I will never be able to see that cash again, but I wanted to inform NH Brussels that this has happened to their guest so that they are aware such a thing has happened and perhaps conduct an investigation and tighten up their in-house procedures when opening a room safe (such as sending two persons where one is a supervisor or manager) so that will reduce the likelihood of theft by staff. Im sure they also have cameras in their corridors to see which staff was sent to retrieve items from the safe.

They should understand and see this incident from the point of view of the guest, where from my understanding, the most likely reason the cash was missing is that a hotel staff who retrieved my items from the safe took it or the staff who packed my items for postage; unless it was the postal service staff who packed the items.

Hence I emailed the hotel about my missing cash. There was no response from the management for two days for such a serious matter. I had to email a second time to see if they can look into it. Only then did i get a reply to ask for my contact number so that the manager can reach me. I gave them my phone number and waited.

Two weeks went by. No phone call or email from them. Again I had to email them to check on their follow up. The reply was the most shocking response Ive heard from any company I've dealt with.

The reply was in poorly written english with grammatical errors and spelling mistakes and in different font sizes which made me wonder about their pride and professionalism in corresponding with their guests. He brought up the hotel policy that the hotel is not liable for things guests leave behind (which I agree) and that he is proud of his hotel staff and have complete trust in them. But just as I do not have concrete evidence that the staff took my cash, he also does not have concrete evidence that they did not steal.

Instead of being empathic to my loss, he further rubbed salt into my wound by turning around and saying I am falsely accusing his staff of theft! I am a very busy man, I do not have the time to cook up stories of theft. I travel extensively and this is the first time I've experienced this kind of service and response from a hotel. I do not usually write reviews unless they have provided exceptionally good or bad service.

I am not trained in hospitality, but as a decent human dealing with a client, I would have said that I am sorry for the guest's misfortune and thank him for letting him know such an incident has happened at his hotel and that he will look into improving protocols for similar incidents in future so that it does not happen again. Instead, not only do I get an apology, I have been made to feel I am a villain falsely accusing his staff of dishonesty. So now I know this is how NH treats treats their guests and I will ensure that my extended family and friends and hopefully anyone who reads this will think twice about staying at an NH hotel where the guest is seen as the bad guy when the guest is...

We stayed for two nights (August 7th to August 9th) in a suite with an extra bed. We arrived early for check-in and were told that the room was not ready yet. We agreed to come back at 14:00, which was the stated check-in time, but, even at that time, the room was still not fully ready: the third bed was quickly brought in the room, as we were waiting in front of the room, ready to get in.

Shortly before, as we were getting our keys, we were told about the cleaning policy of the hotel: we would get a free drink from the reception (only when we asked for the drinks two days later we were told that there is actually no bar at the hotel) if we agreed not to have our room cleaned the next day. What made us unconfortable was that we had to immediately tell whether we wanted the room to be cleaned the next day, even before seeing the room itself.

Indeed, we were told that the staff needed to know whether we wanted our room to be cleaned at least one day in advance. This was unprecedented in our experience, and, in that particular situation, we felt under pressure to agree not to have our room cleaned the next day. Yet, that policy, together with the rush to get the third bed in, did not leave us a good impression of the organisation of the cleaning staff and of the cleaning tasks.

The room was very spacious and generally well-cleaned. The bathroom was however disappointing: it was small and the tap of the bath tub/shower was defective.

In the second evening, no hot water was available due to a fault with the centralised boiler. Even if the staff was apologetic, our overall experience was negatively affected and no compensation of any sort was offered.

Overall, the experience of our two-night stay was below our expectations. On the positive side, I would like to praise the location, the kindness of the staff (the receptionist Jonathan, in particular), the size of the room, and the breakfast service. On the negative side, we were disappointed with the bathroom, the cleaning policy, and the handling of our check-in. The hot water issue, although unexpected and in part excusable, could have also been better dealt with.

UPDATE

Although with some delay, I have been contacted by Arnaud Guyon, who has provided an apology and a detailed explanation of some of the issues we encountered. As a result, I have raised the original rating...

I booked this hotel for a 3 night stay for my partner's birthday and was really looking forward to it after a really enjoyable stay at the NH Arenberg Brussels hotel last year.

The hotel was immaculate and the lady on reception was extremely friendly and enthusiastic (but not over the top!) . She explained that they had upgraded our room free of charge to a deluxe room! We were thrilled and couldn't wait to see it. We were on the 2nd floor and had a lovely front facing view with french doors that opened out onto a mini-balcony (only big enough to stand on). The room was an impressive size with a queen-sized bed, two armchairs, two wardrobes, desk and large flatscreen tv. The bathroom was equally impressive with a shower, large bath (bonus!) and a large sink area complete with a great quality hairdryer (not one that felt like someone was just breathing on your hair).

On looking around the room we also stumbled upon a little box of chocolates from a local chocolatier, which we assume was a little gift for my boyfriend as it was his birthday. Later that evening we got a call from reception explaining they had a gift for us and would it be ok to send someone to our room...of course, we agreed! I sent my boyfriend to the door, again assuming it would be something for him and he was greeted with a gorgeous fresh fruit platter. It was such a lovely surprise and was presented beautifully!

The hotel itself is in a great location and only about a ten minute walk from Gare-Centrale and a very short walk to the Grand-Place. The De Brouckere metro station is right outside the hotel making onward travel very easy and there is also a pharmacy just beside the hotel which is good for peace of mind.

The only downside was that the rooftop terrace is only accessible for guests who have paid for breakfast which was disappointing as were hoping to relax up there one evening whilst soaking in the view. We didn't have breakfast at the hotel as we felt 23 euros each was quite expensive, especially when neither of us eat much in the morning so we opted to have breakfast at local bakeries instead.

Overall the staff were extremely helpful and our stay couldn't have been any better. Everything was so clean and well maintained and even though our room faced out onto a busy street when we closed the windows, there was minimal noise. A...