President Hotel, Valamar Collection — Hotel in Dubrovnik

It was my fifth stay at Valamar since the first one in 2018 year on my honeymoon. At the time the hotel overall experience was great. The hotel smelled with some expensive fragrance which was it’s landmark. This fragrance still linger sometimes on long corridors among the smell of broken air condition and the odor of poorly maintained plumbing, reminding of hotel’s lost glory. |During this period the service was getting worse and worse but personnel was still nice and the food was excellent. We always liked hotel’s location and the magnificent windows views. ||The point of our further analysis will be the current price point of the hotel. We paid 5000 Euros for 11 days. Is this the price that lets you expect a decent service? We live in expensive times but I think that the answer is “yes”.||During check in at the reception the receptionist was rather nervous and in a hurry. When I said that I want to see the room he said that he can’t before I’ll pay and looked at me like I would like to steal something. I paid 5000 Euros with my card, the transaction was successful. But after that receptionist said that he cannot give me the key card to my room because it’s not ready yet ! After another hour or so we received a key and were allowed to the room but I considered this check in procedure slightly disrespectful. ||There are minor and major drawback at Valamar these days. Minor ones include: aging hotel infrastructure, smell of cigarettes in the spa (yes the masseurs are smoking !) and the “visa or mastercard” nonse in every hotel corner. The later requires some explanation. You can no longer pay cash at the hotel when you order drinks or services which was ok to me but strange. But every time I was ordering something the personnel asked whether my card is “visa or mastercard”. I tried to ask at the reception what’s up. The same guy who was making my check in tried to tell me that this is “normal procedure in UE”. When I told him that it is nonsense because we also live in UE and I never experienced anything like this he could not answer anymore. The only reasonable reason why hotel uses different cash registered for Visa and Mastercard is that the company registers their income in two different countries….||The major drawback was the personnel in general though. Acting slightly unpleasant and unproductive with the “I am paid well enough to listen to you” faces they showed some passive aggression effectively ruining our holiday experience. For example the boys at the pool. The pool and the personnel’s shift is till 8 pm. The magnificent sunset which is one reasons we chose Valamar another time was in August about 7:30 pm. But we were not allowed to see it in the peace and quiet. Boys from the pool were making noise deliberately by moving beds and slapping mattresses starting from about 6 pm to finish the shift early and AWOL. When we talked to pool manager about it it helped for one day only then I had an impression that they were acting even worse.||Another drawback was a food quality. While it was good on breakfast (if not counting hard boiled eggs not being washed before boiling and therefore stained with feces) it was below average od the dinner for which we paid extra. The meals were fresh at monday then everyday the have boon heated up. So the beef on Thursday had a consistence of sole and the taste of a carpenter’s glue. Freshly fried meals – pasta and some oriental cuisine were prepared by young men completely unprepared to do the job. They didn’t know what ingredients are they cooking – so the pasta witch spinach was regularly lacking spinach. We were experiencing stomach problems during whole stay and I think it was food related. |Regarding the waiters: there were young ones – very competent and pleasant and the old ones – usually less dedicated to their work. ||I noticed that children were in the places in which they should not be allowed including indoor pool and spa area.||Seeking the reasons for this situation while watching the hotel’s declining quality over many years I hypothesize two things. First is the lack of medium grade management supervision. They sit in their rooms and the personnel is completely out of control. The second, sadly I think is the lack of cash transactions which make it unable to fraud the cash anymore by some of the personel. ||In conclusion I regret to say that after many happy years of great vacations in Valamar I cannot recommend this hotel to anybody. Especially...

This is the perfect place if you are looking for a chilled and relaxing holiday. You have the indoor/outdoor pool, spa (comes at an additional cost) and the beach. From speaking to most guests they have been staying for 2-4 nights and are moving onto other places in Croatia. We will probably do the same next time as there’s little to do in Dubrovnik for 7 nights. Most of the Hotel staff are delightful and very warm, will help you with any enquiries you have too. They were very accommodating to my food allergies too which I don’t get much of in the UK so I was beyond grateful that I managed to eat most of the food they cooked. The breakfast had lots to choose from too! The beds are very comfy and lots of space in the room and balcony. We had a bath and shower too which was lovely. The opening times for the restaurants fitted our needs and can imagine it would fit most other guests needs too. The bus stop is also outside of the hotel which goes directly to the Old Town which is ideal. The entertainment at night is very good too!||There were however a few things that for this reason I’m giving 4 out of 5.||* As much as our room was checked everyday, they didn’t change our sheets the 7 nights we were here, we also ran out of toilet paper near the end of our stay. We have had to ask a couple of times to re stock our coffee. There also is a mini bar in the room. We didn’t use this but we bought some drinks back to the room from the shop and had to ask for a bottle opener which you’d think they would supply with having drinks in the mini bar you’d need to open with a bottle opener. You also don’t get supplied milk, we had to go to the mini market to buy some for our tea. They do supply crème for the coffee. We were told when booking we would get a bathrobe and slippers, we didn’t get supplied those either as well as a pillow menu. Another little note which wasn’t a big deal to us is that the majority of guests who were staying were English spoken and there was only 2 channels that were English. Might be good to invest in a few more channels that are English spoken :). I also had a headboard that was worse for wear. Hopefully this doesn’t impact other guests when they stay in this room! |||* At Breakfast all the drinks were included but at dinner be warned that you have to pay for all your drinks, even the water which is €7.60 which we were shocked at when we first came. We didn’t mind paying, but the drinks are very expensive and if you don’t feel like you’ll be able to afford €40-50 per night I would avoid staying here! The other bars in the hotel are just as expensive too, but there is a mini market 5 minute walk from the hotel which you have a selection of different drinks there. You can sit in the bars without a drink but a few of the waiters we came across weren’t very happy when we said no thank you to getting a drink, so felt a little pressured to buying a drink. |* |* When we arrived at the hotel our room wasn’t ready yet. This will be a issue for a lot of holidaymakers who are getting early morning flights to Dubrovnik as there is no stated time on the package holidays what time check-in is (We arrived just after 1pm). But you can still walk around the hotel and use the facilities. |||A little note for those who want to go and explore the old town via the Bus, the buses get very packed to a point that it’s very overwhelming, one of the buses got terminated due to a woman collapsing. We ended up getting Uber’s due to this which are only £7 one way from the old town. If you don’t deal with public transport well or have claustrophobia I wouldn’t recommend getting on these buses especially the No 6 bus as it’s a nightmare. ||Overall it was a nice stay but I wouldn’t say it was 5 star. Most likely 4 Star, I noticed when reading other reviews too that others guests have had similar experiences to us. I would really recommended sorting these issues out or you will start to...

First thing I am going to say, that this is not a 5 star hotel, rather far from it. It's wierd as Google says it's a 4 star facility, even TripAdvisor in details of the hotel says it's a 4 star facility but In the title of the hotel it says it's a 5 star. Anyway, I will mention the good things first about this hotel it's not a nasty review but it's a true one. People who travelled a lot around the world will know what I am talking about.

Pros:

• Food is really good • The pool and outside seating areas with views are really nice. • Room air-con was quiet. • Staff at the buffet is nice (especially girl named Mia, her colleagues should learn how to treat people from her). • The Drink Bar has a really clean wine glasses and Tena is another person that other people should learn from how to treat the hotel guests. • Evening entertainment was good. • The best feature of this hotel is the Spa area, it's clean, quiet, the atmosphere there is great.. relaxation area is great with water beds included. • Hotel is positioned perfectly with breathtaking views.

That's all.

Cons:

Rooms:

• Rooms are dated, the decor is from the late 90s, it's not a 5 star room. • There is no coffee making machine (Nespresso at least). Even a 3 star hotel in Monte Carlo has one, but I guess they got different standards there. • The furniture are tired and old looking, I put some pictures and you will see what I am talking about. • We stayed on the 3 floor and the smell in the hallway was awful. • The pillows are not comfortable, even when you put 2 of them together you still lay flat. • The cleanliness of the rooms after they are cleaned it's far from clean, every day we had some sort of an issue. Bins weren't emptied, stains were left untouched, not enough towels provided, once I had to go and grab one myself from the maid cart, not enough toilet tissue. Bed sheets were only changed twice during the whole stay. • When you arrive at the hotel you need to ask the staff at the reception for you room to be cleaned daily.

Buffet:

• Not enough staff around (Managers fault) guys are running around bloke crazy. • You need to wait for the table few minutes as you can't find the clean one. • There is no coffee machine, staff will come over and will pour the coffee for you. • You need to come early otherwise the food will be gone and cold • Drinks at the HB are expensive.

On-Site Restaurant

It's not an exclusive restaurant at all, we waited 15 minutes for someone to come around and give us the cutlery, food is very mediocre. In other words don't waste your time. You will be better off in a place in the Old Town. We got some apologies from the staff that we had to wait that long as he said that they are very busy, actually the place was half empty.

Hotel Overall:

They seriously need to up their game to be a 5 star hotel, or at least send their manager to see 5 star resorts around Europe. We paid £160/per night to stay at this hotel and it doesn't even compare standard wise to the Novotel in Monte Carlo were we paid the same price per night and it's a 3 star hotel, we can't even fault it. This Valamar hotel needs a proper refurbishment to match other 5 star facilities around Europe. Lower levels of the hotel have unpleasant smell in the hallways, they are looking old, some of the walls need a paint job etc etc.

We raised the complaints with the Hotel Manager and it worked only for 1 day, just can't be bothered to keep asking the same questions all the time, we came to enjoy our holidays without all the hassle. Oh and our luggage wasn't taken care of after we arrived late (around 11 o'clock), everybody else's luggage, guess what? It was taken care of.

The only thing I can't fault is the food and staff and the cooks at the stations, really lovely people.

Don't go to this hotel if you expect 5 star treatment, choose something else,...