Kutaraja Hotel — Hotel in Jakarta

Over the past seven years I've had the pleasure of staying in over 70 hotels in 37 different countries and I have to say this one really takes the crown in terms of bad service. The person who decided to rebrand the rooms to ZenRooms Menteng Gondangdia a while ago, instead of keeping to the original hotel name of Amazing Koetaradja, obviously didn't consider what troubles this would pose to newly arriving travellers. Our taxi driver was unfamiliar with the name, no one of the people he stopped the car for to ask had ever heard of it, and the fact that the name isn't visible from the street naturally didn't help either. After going around the block a third time we had to rely on obscured and badly visible house numbers in the end to find the entrance.||Upon checking in we were greeted by someone who spoke very bad English and after ten minutes still had not been able to find our reservation in the system, even though I had the confirmation with me and had presented it to him. Someone else had to come in and help, and 30 minutes (!) after arriving we were finally shown to our rooms even though there were no other guests checking in that could help explain the hold-up. ||When booking this hotel, I specifically searched for an accomodation that offered free wif in ALL areas, which ZenRooms has said it does. So imagine my surprise when I entered my room and found exactly zero wifi signals within range. Upon complaining at the reception desk they pointed to another employee of the hotel and said they would send him up to my room immediately. Fifteen minutes later he arrived. Again, the hotel was almost completely empty, so why the delay? This employee subsequently first wanted to take a look at my phone to see if he could connect - by all means, try for all you must, I'm not lying - then proceeded to tell me that I had reception in the hallway. Awesome, was planning to spend my evenings online in a non-airconditioned hallway anyway! In the end I was moved to a different room that was about six square metres smaller, had a way worse view, and was lacking the two luxurious chairs and coffee table that were in the other (deluxe) room. No apology or refund for this downgrade whatsoever. ||Cut to 7.05am on the following day, when I was rudely awoken by a very loudly ringing room phone on the nightstand next to my head. When I later went down to reception to ask why my phone was ringing at 7am, they told me it was to ask whether I wanted to receive my breakfast in my room, as there were not enough guests to accomodate a buffet breakfast. Unbelievable that they would call a guest at SEVEN AM in the morning to ask this when said guest had just asked, during check-in the previous day, what the breakfast arrangement was and had at that point been told that it would be ready for us between 6 and 10am on the second floor. The time to inform guests that it would a room breakfast due to the low number of guests would have been then, not by waking them up hours before they planned to. Highly inconsiderate, especially to arriving long-haul travellers suffering from major jetlag and needing a good nights rest. When I complained about this I had to repeat it three times in increasingly basic English and in the end all I got was a basic "Sorry mister" rather than a "You're right actually, perhaps we should leave it up to the guests to decide until what time they want to sleep, what a novel idea!" In the end we were able to have breakfast on the second floor after all, but a la carte rather than a buffet. Completely fine by us and considering this it was all the more astounding that they called us awake to arrange a room breakfast when that wasn't even the only option and we could have still just made our way down to the second floor around 9am. The omelette I received (after ten minutes of waiting, again, empty hotel, no other people having breakfast at that time) by the way, was watery and at times crunchy because two pieces of eggshell had been left in. ||When we got back from our day exploring the city (which is great actually, don't let anyone tell you that Jakarta isn't worth a visit because it is) we asked the evening shift at the reception for a room breakfast the next day at 6.45am, as we had to leave at 7.15 sharp to take a taxi to the train station. When we said we'd like two Indonesian and one American breakfasts, which were our choices of the day before, he said he didn't know and we had to ask the restaurant. What do you mean you don't know?! You work front office for this hotel, you should know that the two options that you offer for breakfast are American or Indonesian! He wrote it down, including our respective choices, breakfast, and said it would be arranged. ||Cut to 6.45am the next morning: no breakfast. 6.50am: no breakfast. 6.55am: no breakfast. 7.00am: no breakfast. 7.05am: the phone rings. Whether we would like an Indonesian or American breakfast. Is this a joke? What kind of hotel is this? I said it would be too late now for breakfast as we had to leave in ten minutes, three times, the person on the other side of the line obviously still didn't understand it, so I hung up. When we made our way down to the reception to say that our reserved 6.45am breakfast had not been delivered and that we had to leave now, they said they would immediately prepare a take-away breakfast. Almost ten minutes later the man who was sent to fetch it still had not returned and we REALLY had to leave for the train station now so we just left.||As the above recount of our experencies shows, the staff failed consistently on their comprehension of English, their customer service and their internal communication. Besides this, the water pressure in the showers was very bad, the cleaning lady forgot to replace one of the towels the second day, and parts of the top layer of the floorboard were missing. Was it all bad? No, the beds were quite good and the view was fantastic, but that's about it. And if you think I'm exaggerating or someone who easily complains, I invite you to take a look at my review history and see that I hardly, if ever, score below 3 stars. Oh, and I'm mad now, but up until check-out without breakfast this morning I kept my calm and remained polite to the staff, so it definitely...

Booked 1 night through Agoda for MYR113 with bfast for 2 adults. Reasonable price as the location is not far from city centre & near Gambir. Yes, some drivers do not know the location. We ride bajaj (for fun) from Gambir & he was clueless but still wanted to sent us (need to mentioned the price was ripped off!). You have to mentioned "Mess Aceh by Amazing" (the signage is too small) or "Kantor Pemerintah Aceh" (something like that). The hotel is at the back of an office building. You won't hear noises from the street, but only little noises from the train. Around 100m, is the Menteng Huis, small mall with some restaurants & shops. Jl. Cikini Raya is in walking distance & more eateries available. ||||Our Superior room is large with king size bed & fitted for 2 adults & 2 children comfortably. Room & bathroom was clean. They provide toothbrushes too. Air-con & water heater worked well. But no coffee maker/water bottles. You may request warm water to be delivered to your room. TV only with local channels & blurry. WIFI was bad at first, but once you get the strong signal from the lounge area, you may retreat into your room. Front desk was friendly & helpful. But they do not understand English well. Requested an extra towel by phone & never delivered, because they did not understand the word "towel" (handuk in Indonesian). They can call a taxi for you. From hotel to Grand Indonesia with traffic jam can cost you Rp30,000 to Rp50,000. ||||Our breakfast was sent to our room, choice of Nasi Goreng with fried egg (very tasty!) or toast & coffee or tea. they have a restaurant at Level 2 but didn't managed to check it out. Overall was a pleasant stay & would recommend for...

Amazing Kutaradja is ideally located in Menteng area, which is central, and nearby everything.||||The venue has of several conference and meeting room, so it makes it a good place for business travelers. It ain't a quaint hotel indeed.||Though, rooms are spacious and well furnished, those on upper floors offer a great view over Jakarta at night, beds are huge and the overall stay is rather nice.||But I have been extremely annoyed by the smell of cold cigarette smoke in the room. It's very strong. So here is a big big big minus.||||Breakfast is included, but there is no proper breakfast/restaurant area ; you'll find a small buffet and conference table/chairs laid out a bit randomly on the 2nd floor.||||But hey, rates are very low and staff is super kind. So you get what...