Waldorf Astoria Shanghai on the Bund — Hotel in Shanghai

Grandeur of luxury place stunning with “Please Queue Here” sign board. what level of luxury? Waldorf Astoria?? In Shanghai, I have just checked out from W Shanghai at The Bund, it has been much better experience of service and obviously much better service level. The only better thing at Waldorf Astoria Shanghai is heritage building, architect, interior and craftmanship in all works. Poor lighting design in the lobby and in the room though. I had booked a suite for this stay. At check in the front desk tried to upsell for the hotel to get additional revenue of 1800 RMB for river view. He mentioned that the suite I booked has not nice view and not ready to check in. It is crucial rather than hospitable. I do not experience this often when chose other super luxury brands especially suite type of accommodation. Most of the staff I encountered were like malfunction robot: -The door keeper lady at heritage building never smiled, never greeted, not even eye contacted. -The control panel at bedtop could not work. Light and air-conditioning system could not be adjusted. I called for staff to fix it. A lady dressed in smart costume came with an engineer told me, nothing was wrong and requested me to use the light switches and air-conditioning control unit on the wall instead. This is very unacceptable. I had to insist and the control panel was reset by plugged out an plugged in again. -I went down for a refreshment at the lobby to enjoy the beautiful design of the Peacock Alley. I contacted a staff for table for two. She set me to sit in front of a fighting between a guest and her team for some unpleasant service. A glass of bubbly Moscato from the drink list was ordered. After a while the staff who took the order came to tell that my drink was finished and requested me to order some other thing else. A glass of champagne could be ordered but I started to hesitate whether this is a pleasant situation I can enjoy. She also said, “Or You go to drink this at the Long Bar.” I wondered if she knew this product was available at another outlet of her hotel, why didn’t she went to get it and make it available per the Drink List of her outlet. To refer a guest to enjoy a basic service somewhere else is totally low level of service. I did not to ruin my holiday mood this way and simply stepped out of the outlet and try the Long Bar. -At Long Bar, there was not such product – No Surprise. I ordered A glass of wine on promotion of happy hour. The wine was not bad. In the middle of drinking wine, I was offered a short glass of cocktail together with a Tripadvisor card with a request for me to review on Tripadvisor. After I sip, I knew I did not like that cocktail but the staff had gone somewhere – no more wine service after the empty glass. It was a bit hard to get staff attention and all my mood to enjoy the place had totally gone. It’s such a pity – such a beautiful place is occupied with this Waldorf Astoria service. In my suite accommodation the light in the room could not be adjusted. Switch on some lamps were adjustable but the use of bulbs prevented the light to be dimmed down. Full bright or black out was only the option in the suite in the age of entering 2019. In fact no Bluetooth connection on any speaker. The old mini-compo only accepts CD and AUX which only links to the TV (All TVs are also small compared with any TV in other hotels I have experience this year.) When I came down for the restaurant food, Ceasar Salad, Foie Gras, and basic pasta Cabonara were not bad but they did not understand the way the would serve Hendrick Tonic. Also Cosmopolitan was ugly. Breakfast has wide selection with some a la carte. The coffee and espresso was very good but Buttermilk Pancake served per my a la carte order was very poor. The pancake texture and the buttermilk was bad. The menu mentioned Maple syrup but they served with fake honey. This really shows lack of knowledge of the basic dish and no one paid attention to do business correctly. I will never return to this hotel and Waldorf Astoria brand from this...

We stayed here for 1 night and overall we were very impressed. The room was lovely with an incredible view over Pudong. Aesop toiletries which are our favourite. A spacious and comfortable room.||The building is beautifully designed & we especially loved the old building at the front with the original decor and the Long Bar. ||Breakfast was very nice with a choice of buffet or some a la carte food from the menu. Eggs Benedict was great. ||This would have been a 5* stay if not for our delayed check-in. Check in is advertised as being from 3pm and we arrived at 4pm to be told our room wasn’t ready and they didn’t know when it would be available. We were told this was because the hotel was very busy and a high turnover, to which I replied that is absolutely no excuse. ||Staff took us to a ‘lounge’ which I was informed was for premium Hilton rewards customers and also guests could pay 350yuan to use it. To be honest I’d have been very disappointed if I paid to visit. We had the choice of ginger beer or lemonade, a bowl of fruit and some cookies in a jar. Happy hour at 5pm meant wine was available for an hour, which despite being made to wait for our room, they wouldn’t make an exception and serve us before 5pm. ||Staff in the lounge did their best to keep checking on our room but in the end we didn’t get up to our room til 5.15pm, over 2 hours after the advertised check-in time. Given we had to check out at 7am this was over 10% of our entire stay. There was no mention of this at check-out and no attempt to offer any compensation - for example we had 1 drink each in the Long Bar. The bill for this could have been cleared as a gesture of goodwill. ||This was clearly not an infrequent occurrence as 2 other couples were waiting for their rooms alongside us, and the staff told us that the lounge is where they always bring people who are waiting for their rooms. It’s completely inexcusable and speaks to the Waldorf prioritising profit far above guest experience. If you can’t cope with guest numbers, you either reduce your capacity or employ more housekeeping staff to clean the...

My stay at Waldorf Astoria Shanghai on the Bund has been such a disappointment. Having stayed at W and Ritz-Carlton Pudong before, I had high expectation for Waldorf since it is supposed to be a more luxurious hotel, yet my experience has been completely the opposite.||Before I arrived at the hotel, I had requested assistance with SPA and restaurant reservations, via both in-app message and phone calls. In both of my attempts, I was told "No" for laughable reasons: The hotel agent informed me in the Hilton App that the only way to make SPA reservation was to call directly, so I called. Then the concierge team on the phone told me that SPA was closed, and I need to call back when they are in operation hours. Excuses me what? This is an unacceptable response from a concierge team at a property of this caliber. If the staff refuses to handle such simple guest requests, it raises serious concerns about management oversight and training standards, which became more evident during my stay.||The hotel lobby remained noisy and chaotic, filled with large tour groups, and guests shouting across the space. A scene I have not seen in a long, long time. To me, it almost feels like a countryside Carnival was taking place in the lobby with kids running around while influencers were streaming. Service during breakfast was also painfully slow and inattentive, further diminishing any sense of luxury from property's gorgeous architecture. I later learned that certain travel agencies had purchased bulk packages at less than half the price I paid. If this is the direction Waldorf chooses to take, no wonder it attracts crowds that compromise the overall guest experience.||Overall, Waldorf Astoria Shanghai on the Bund is unworthy of AMEX FHR program, as it fails to justify its reputation and price. Despite the poor service, its room condition and SPA experience was quite good; therefore, a 2-star review...