Vivanta Kolkata EM Bypass — Hotel in Kolkata

I happened to stay at Vivanta Kolkata EM Bypass with my family during my visit to Kolkata, from 29th Nov, 2019 to 03rd Dec, 2019. I have previously stayed and often stay in the Taj group of hotels properties for many years now. But to my disappointment Vivanta Kolkata Em bypass was no no-where near to ‘Taj Vivanta’ brand. This is an ultimate case of deception where the hotel management and administration even on enquiring (before we booked our stay considering it to be the same Vivanta by taj brand) did not tell us that the Vivanta brand of the Taj group of hotels has been degraded to a lower level in spite of the per night tariff being the same/ equal to the erstwhile Vivanta by taj brand. There were many incidents that happened during our stay that made our experience an unpleasant one. Some of which are:

At the time of my check-in, the lady staff, expected to escort us to the room, just handed over us the keys, while entering the lift with the expectation that rest of the things would be managed by us and did not even bother to escort us to our room. This rendered us completely clue less as to in which direction to go for our room and how to deal with the technicalities of the room. On complaining, the same fact was even confirmed by the administrative staff by referring to the relevant CCTV footage and accepted of such lack of hospitality on their part. Such has never been the case, whenever I have stayed in different parts of the country in Taj Vivanta properties.

The room’s interior was disillusion. It was not even close to the room a taj hotel is expected to have. The room size and the interior were much below a five star hotel standards. That feeling of staying in a taj property was absolutely missing.

Even the washroom was not up to the mark. The shower did not sprinkle hot water. On a day, it was adverse to the extent that we had to call the housekeeping and show him that water flowing was not adequately hot. In spite of his assurance, nothing improved.

The experience at travel desk was also unpleasant. The person at the help desk lacked the awareness about the the places in and around Kolkata. He often gave us wrong information.

One day, the housekeeping staff left the soiled towels on our suitcase and also forgot his cleaning spray on the table of our room. On returning we found that the room was not upto the mark or even worse than the condition before the housekeeping did their job. We had to call a senior person of the housekeeping who then took note of it by taking photographs.

The staff was not well trained. In the restaurant, while cleaning the table, the leftovers on the table were thrown on the floor below the table itself, In spite of our repeated requests to not do so. It felt really uncomfortable and filthy to even sit there and have the meal while the food leftovers were spilt on the floor.

These incidents compelled us to talk about these issues with the general manager of the hotel at that time, who later told us that Taj is repositioning its brand, ’Vivanta’. The same was not informed to us by the hotel administration/ management even on enquiring, before booking.

He offered us to compensate for our unpleasant experience by offering us a dinner which we clearly refused. As the Same could not have compensated us the huge monetary loss that we suffered because of this unpleasant stay and more so the trust we lost in the Taj brand.

The standard of the hotel was much below than one can even imagine. And being a taj brand it came to us a shocker. I have a great respect for taj as a brand and I have stayed in various taj properties through out the country but such incidents have never happened.

I had even dropped an official mail regarding my concerns about my unpleasant stay at the hotel’s I’d. However, they did not even bother to reply let alone an apology.

It was one of my worst experiences I have ever had while staying...

I booked this place for a long stay with my family. There were many things which went wrong here, starting from the checkin process - you have to wait for a long time to get yourself checked in due to lack of employees. Also the entire process ran by them is manual. ||||We paid the same amount for 2 rooms however one room was smaller than the other and did not have basic amenities like mini fridge, kettle, small table. Which was there in the other room. We had to constantly call the reception and ask them to send it over, after multiple requests they finally sent the kettle. Rest they chose to ignore. ||||The bedsheet and towel was dirty (red stains all over the place). We said nothing which was our biggest mistake. We requested housekeeping and once it was done - we were surprised that they told us - "since you guys stained the bedsheet and towel (red stain that I mentioned) you'll have to pay 500 INR." The behaviour of the staff was poor. The way they put the allegation on us was very rude. When we told them that it was from the beginning they started ignoring us like we don't exist. I had never seen anyone from the hospitality business to behave like this. It was insulting to stand there and trying to talk to them and getting ignored flat on our faced. All they could tell us at the very end, talk to the manager. We then spoke to the manager, I wasn't surprised that he was rude too. He was simply putting the blame on us quoting " we don't provide stained linens to anyone". That very day we got a stained towel after housekeeping (image is attached). He was shook as he proved himself wrong. He continued to argue and said you'll have to pay since you did it, pointing to the lipstick I was wearing that day. The audacity was sky rocketing. We were adamant since we had not done anything wrong. After a long argument he said "please leave and relax in your room" and this he said only because 4-5 customers started listening to the conversation and realised that these guys are goons. ||||What surprises me is that none of them don't know how to behave, they really need to learn basic etiquettes to run a hospitality business. They are looting people to get their crap hotel fixed. ||||Now coming to the food, they don't serve good food, the chicken sandwich just had Mayo and some over chewy and stale chicken (refer to the image). Similarly the breakfast which was complimentary only had banana, bread, tea and either of poori sabji, omlette toast, veg sandwich (just Mayo again), noodles. The breakfast area had many flies and was very unhygienic. Cups had spiders. So if you don't look carefully you might end up in trouble. ||||Please be sure before you invest your time and money here. After all this, we were super cautious that they might charge us for everything that's wrong in...

I'm going to divide my review in two parts! Good & Disappointing based on my recent stay.

Good: From the gate itself the staff had a welcoming vibe overall The overall food quality was really amazing -The ambience of the property is vibrant and the property layout matches to other Vivanta 's across the country. Room was spacious, clean and comfortable.

Disappointing: During check in the reception told me "I can pay for room service at the room itself because mine was a pre paid booking" This was never communicated as a mandate but more as a suggestion. However the room service was very adamant that I pay upfront which was pretty irritating to deal with, especially at 11pm in the night. Everytime I mentioned I'll pay at check out all together because I was staying for 2 days, they refused saying NO. This is the 1st time I've encountered such a behaviour at any TAJ among all those that I've stayed in other cities. I would expect such a behaviour from a cheap OYO for once but definitely not a TAJ.

-My check out was at 12:30, they called me at 11:30 asking if I'd like to extend or leave soon. Earlier that morning their manager had given me an extension till 2pm after I highlighted the paying on door frustration to her. The reception however wasn't aware of any such manager and they had me describe her and still were lost on who was it. I was fed up with their attitude so I left at 12pm regardless.

-On day 1, nobody from the reception it otherwise came to show the room. Which I have never encountered at any other TAJ or a 5 star. Throughout both the days, my keycard had issues and it wasn't working from time to time which made me do multiple trips to the reception asking them to help with it.

-Room service barely picks up the call, not unless you make multiple calls or ask them reception to intervene.

All of the good things (& 3 stars) mentioned in this review is due to the infrastructure, maintenance of the rooms and the chefs. BUT They definitely need to work upon their basic hospitality. I am not going come back here, this ruined my...