Ionian Emerald Resort Hotel — Hotel in Sami Municipality

We booked our stay through Jet2 and had an excellent Private Transfer from the Airport. Upon arrival, sadly Reception could not locate our booking - a Superior Seaview Room, but after a few minutes called us over to inform us that they were upgrading us to a Superior Room with Private Pool free of charge - great we thought as we never get upgrades!|The room benefitted from a lovely large terrace with a comfortable sofa and two chairs, a further raised terrace with two very comfortable sun loungers and beyond that an approx 12ft x 12ft pool. |Now the draw back - the terrace with the sun-loungers on, only gets the sun until about 11:30am when the sun then drops down behind the room block, only to reappear about 4:00pm….so no sunbathing on your own terrace for long. Sadly, you are also in full view of the balconies above you, which does make you slightly conscious of turning the beds around to face the sun and anyone sat on their balcony. |That said, it wasn’t a major issue to us as you can easily access the main pool area from the back of your pool, so we just had a couple of sun-loungers up there and swapped to them when we lost the sun. However, if I’d paid the extra £300+ for the room with a Private pool, I think I would have been disappointed.|There are only 4 of these Private Pool rooms and the others were empty most of the week. When we did get ‘neighbours’ whose booking could also not be located, it suggested that these rooms were kept back for such eventualities. ||Tip - don’t book these rooms as we felt they weren’t worth the extra cost.||I also agree with other commentators, who felt the hotel was a little tired in places and in need of a bit of TLC. In our room, the bottom of the bed upholstery was torn on the corners, the hydra bath did not work, there was a hole in the wall with a SCART lead sticking out and the entrance door frame to the bathroom, which was papered rather than a continuation of the internal water proof wall covering (??) was torn and hanging off. I know these rooms have a lot of through put, but it’s not what you’d expect for what’s supposed to be a Superior upgraded room!|Another tip - There are 3 floors. From what we could see, the only rooms with a true unobstructed sea view are the deluxe rooms on the top floor. Ground floor rooms, which are slightly sunken, have no view or a garden view and the next floor although called sea view, because they are at pool/ground level, largely have their view obstructed by the pool parasols etc.||Now for the positives:| The location and surroundings are beautiful, but a little isolated if you don’t want the 20 minute walk along the sea path into Sami to eat in an evening, where there are a fantastic selection of Tavernas. There is only one Taverna close by. However, we enjoyed the evening walk after eating!|The staff are wonderful, still always smiling and helpful despite it being the end of the season. |We only booked Bed & Breakfast, so we can’t comment on the evening meals, but our breakfasts were excellent with plenty of choice with lovely staff, especially Rulia who also doubled up as our room cleaner as well!||Tip - as tempting as it may be, don’t sit outside unless you want your breakfast bothered by very persistent wasps!||Never any issue with obtaining a sun lounger in a morning - so nice to be at a small hotel where you didn’t have to get up at the crack of dawn to secure a bed.|Overall, a very enjoyable week and the fact that we would definitely return again shows the above points did not detract from what was otherwise a lovely hotel, but sadly couldn’t quite give it a 5...

We booked 4 nights in a superior room with sea view (with a request for a Queen bed) at the Ionian Emerald Resort on Kefalonia 10-14 September (at a cost of £677.52) through Expedia. On arrival we were shown to our room which was in the basement without a sea view. (The disappointment wasn't helped by the room not having been cleaned properly - coffee stains, crumbs and an information folder covered in mould.) We immediately phoned reception to query our room allocation and were informed that there was no room with sea view available at the time. The sea view was a critical reason for choosing this deal and so our booking had not been honoured. No one had explained that we were not being allocated the room we had booked (ie a superior room with sea view) when we checked in on our arrival; it only became apparent when we were shown to the room. No attempt was made by the hotel to remedy this situation nor to compensate monetarily or otherwise for the situation. There was no apology. This is really a very poor attitude and service for what is purportedly a 5* hotel. In the end we spent very little time at the hotel because of the unsatisfactory situation. We might as well have stayed somewhere much cheaper without a sea view.

We tried to contact Expedia through whom the booking had been made, on our first day at the hotel by phone and online form, to which we received an email of acknowledgement. Further enquiries to them during our stay and following our return home revealed that they were unable to get through to the hotel by email or phone in order to resolve this failure to honour our booking. Therefore we contacted the hotel directly by email on 14th November. Having had no reply by 20th November we sent a registered letter (as advised by the European Customer Centre) explaining our issues directly to the hotel. This was tracked as having been received by the hotel on 30th November, but we have received no response from them. On 11th January the case was passed to the European Customer Centre in Greece but we have not had any response from the hotel by any means of communication. We have delayed submitting this review in view of the chance we were giving the hotel to address our complaint, but after 6 months with nothing at all from them, it is now time to give our feedback online. I think there are other comments in some of the reviews questioning whether this can really be described as a 5 star hotel and I would go along with that. Apart from the dreadful service we received as described above, there were other things that seemed less than 5 star eg the breakfast buffet was pretty underwhelming and not sufficiently staffed ie frequently the tables had not been cleared and relaid and there would be quite a delay before this was done. So yes we feel ripped off and...

The view from our room was 5, it was disappointing to find that half board certainly wasn't. We were presented with a menu on our first evening and discovered that it remained the same for the duration of our stay. The food was fine albeit poor erratic service. However after 3 nights it became monotonous and the main course choice in particular bland and boring. The hotel was unwilling to improve or alter the restricted menu so we gave up and walked 20 minutes along a stony path to Sami where there was a vast array of restaurants to choose from. We felt hard done to as there was an a la carte menu for b& b guests to select from which had much more choice. The restaurant and bar lacked atmosphere and guests were few and far between on the nights we were staying.|The pool was good with comfortable beds which had stained mattresses and we weren't impressed by the neighbouring guests at a cheaper hotel using the facilities for which we had paid a 5 price. W3e used to watch them first thing in the morning making a bee line for what they considered to be the beds in the best position.|The room could have had more storage and there was little point in having a safe that wasn't attached and could have been picked up and carried away.|The bathroom needed a refurbishment. Each time the shower was used water ended up over the floor causing a puddle in front of the toilet.|Thank goodness for the view we really enjoyed that but won't be returning...