Villa Copenhagen — Hotel in Copenhagen Municipality

Small room and poor value for money

Our main issue was the very small room. We booked 3 nights at Villa Copenhagen through Expedia at a total cost of £936 – I know it is a lot, but my wife decided to “splash out” for a luxurious 5-star hotel for once. But it was not a 5-star experience. First let me start with the positives: Excellent location next to the main central rail station – easy to get to hotel and most attractions. But cobbled streets and lots of parked bikes - so not easy to drag your bumpety bump cases over them (unless you had known beforehand to get out at the end of the platform). If you end up facing the tracks like we did, just be aware that you can hear train brakes constantly despite the double glazing – tolerable but I suspect it is better on the other side. A beautiful building dating back to 1912 – restored to high standards and quite beautiful from the outside The front desk and breakfast staff – mostly overseas staff but all lovely and kind and helpful Excellent choice for breakfast The quality of the fittings are good

The main gripe: Really small room for the price Even by London standards and allowing for the high cost of things in Copenhagen, our room (3118) was really small for over £300 per night. As you see from the images, you have to walk sideways along the bed (and I am not that large). The room is located in the sloping roof, and the sloping roof inside is a little claustrophobic. Given the size, it could have been fitted a lot more effectively, but as you see it has this wide chez lange right next to the bed (or is it meant to be for cases or just a seat?) that obstructs your path and an enormous mini-bar (does anyone use mini-bars these days?). The distance from the chez lange to the edge of the bed is about 14 inches – resulting me stubbing my toes on the strategically positioned chair legs a couple of times (see images). My pinkies are still throbbing. It was not a good experience, and it meant that we did not want to come back during the day to spend more time at the hotel. We might as well have paid for a much cheaper clean simple hotel to spend the night in. Some of the other rooms in the corridor looked bigger (maybe they cost even more), but I suspect what happened here is down to the manager who made decisions about furniture and ended up choosing the same “one size fits all” for all the rooms to save money. Don’t get me wrong, the fittings are of good quality but they were just much too large for this small room. Thankfully after checking in, Expedia sent me an email asking for feedback on “how was your check-in?” and for me to feedback to the hotel manager if unhappy. Which I did, and ….nothing. Conclusion – the managers can’t be bothered. They have enough occupancy to not care about individuals. I am sure that managers Giannis or Emina will give us a nice “thank you for taking the time to rate and we are sorry etc” but the time for the managers to click into action was after the Expedia feedback was submitted to them after check-in.

Another reason why we booked the hotel was that the long pool looked stunning. But when we arrived on Saturday, it was heaving – more like a plunge pool and no chance of swimming. All the seats adjacent occupied – more like those pools you get on package holidays to Southern Europe with a bar and thumping music. It put us right off and we never used it.

So here are my top tips for travellers: Don’t get out at the main entrance but go to the opposite side of the station (where there is a lift that will take you almost outside the hotel) Ask to see the size of the room before unpacking and try and avoid the side facing the station tracks if possible Remember there is a good underbed sliding storage if you have more than a few items of clothing to put in the small closet Always wear shoes when walking in the room

For the hotel managers: Respond to the Expedia manager feedback loop Rethink your pricing strategy for these small rooms Put some rubber protectors around the toe...

A hotel experience can easily be soured by one bad staff. In short, if you’re Asian, your experience may be a hit or miss. I personally don’t want to be in a hotel where I don’t feel welcomed.

We booked the hotel through AMEX Platinum Portal.

We arrived at 9:15AM knowing that the room would not be ready. The staff greeted us and were professional. They informed us that normal check in is 3PM but the room may be ready by 1PM.

We appreciated the info, left our luggage there and went on with our day.

When we came back around 1:30, the front desk told me, upon checking my name, that the room wasn’t ready, which was perfectly fine. Room availability may vary and is never guaranteed.

I noticed the AMEX Plat Promotional card on the desk and asked about it because I completely forgot if I booked through the AMEX Portal. She immediately grabbed the card and removed it, and said there’s no availability for anything, we’re fully booked. I told her I don’t remember if I booked through AMEX and she said I did, but it doesn’t matter because they’re fully booked.

She didn’t bother explaining any other benefits such as credits, breakfasts and check in check out times.

I informed the lady that my 5 year old son and I would stay in the lobby because he is jet lagged and tired from the morning trip already, so I wanted him to rest.

After being in the lobby for 1.5 hours, at 2:57PM, I came to the frontdesk again, the hotel had been very quiet until now and the same lady “greeted” me after her previous customer.

At that time, the same lady gave us another unfriendly look and repeatedly asked for my name, as if she couldn’t understand Asian names. Note, my last name is incredibly common and she already asked for my last name at 1:15PM. She informed me that “my room had been ready already”.

She asked for my ID, I went to grab it and she immediately took another customer. When I came back within 2 min, she’s helping a white customer with much better attitude while I stand on the side and watched.

Half way through, she saw me standing on the side and she waved her trainee (based on her tag) to transition and explained the situation thoroughly to the white customer. Afterwards, without any eye contact nor gesture, she walked off leaving me standing there next to the desk.

Her trainee proceeded to ask me to wait while she’s helping a customer, as if I was the one cutting the line.

That was our first day at Villa Copenhagen, and unfortunately it left us with a very bad impression.

I flagged this interaction to another staff who helped me with the check in and was offered 3 insulting free drink vouchers.

Writing this after I carried my 5 year old son who passed out in the lobby. No one bothered to tell me that the room was ready.

After getting inside the room, I finally received the text message telling me the room was ready.

Since my son was already passed out, I didn’t want to make a stink about the situation and quickly did the check in. But the more I thought it through, the more I felt discriminated against.

I looked up the hotel availability to see if there were any AMEX upgrade availability. And long and behold, there were plenty of upgradable rooms.

Based on my personal experiences, I can only assume it’s probably reserved for non Asian clients though.

At this point, I’m contemplating terminating my stay early and moving to...

It all started 2 days before our arrival. I got a message from hotel to book our breakfast(Corona stuff) and suddenly also to book our 15 minutes per day to enjoy the pool. First of all, I called right after the new restrictions and asked is the pool still working and how does it work. No one ever mentioned 15 minutes per day. Second of all, 15 minutes? Really? We also travelled with the dog, so we payed equivalent of 500 DKK for dog stay, which I would assume includes cleaning services, dog bed, snacks and bowl. Neither bowl, nor bed was there. I went to reception and asked politely - in 24h bed and bowl never reached us. They offer 24/7 sms service, which as an idea is really cool, but in reality useless. I asked specifically about the bath robes, knowing I have my magical 15 minutes of pool time. Answer came 24h later, when I already have left from my home. Knowing that it is a 5 start hotel, bathrobes did not seem like a luxury thing to ask. Upon our arrival, bathrobes were not there, when I went to ask where are they, I got another excuse and reason that their supplier is late and so on. Have to be honest, could not care less, since for this amount of money, this is really not my problem. Same story with flip-flops for going to the pool, because obviously in the winter you won't be putting your winter boots on your wet legs. Guess what, another excuse about how sustainable the hotel is, but for 120DKK a pair, they will forget about sustainability and provide you with flip-flops. Hotel is located centrally, right next to train station. For us personally, it was not the main reason to book, but there comes another problem for those with cars. So let's start a game of finding a parking lot in Capital of Denmark. Of course you can always pay 500 DKK for valley and this problem will be solved, or park in a public area (as we did) and pay 380 DKK. Luxury in all it's beauty! The best part again, no one ever mentioned that it's either this or that, no tips on a page from hotel, of course, it's made to get as much money out of you as possible. I won't be complaining about the room, it is indeed very nice, filled with expensive Danish designs, comfortable beds, lovely cups, coffee maker, tea can, amazing bath lotions, shampoos and so on. Cleanliness on the other side leaves you hoping for the best. Black hair in our bed(none of us have long black hair), dirty glasses and dirty bowl that has cotton pads and q-tips. There are some great features and an idea, but some of them are either not accustomed to 21st century or are not working because of bad customer service. I do not suggest this hotel for an amount of money we spent. It is NOT worth it. We stayed there from 14.02-15.02 in a room 1104. 1 thing I forgot to mention, because it was our anniversary, we got a nice hand cream as a present, so...