The St. Regis Osaka — Hotel in Osaka

Family of 4 (kids 12 and 16). Osaka was the tail end of our 2 week visit to Japan.||Overall...||Enjoyable stay. Beautiful well located property. Would certainly look into staying again next time we find ourselves in Osaka and would happily recommend to friends/family/other TA members.||Pre-trip...||I contacted the property to mention that my daughters both had their birthdays. Concierge was responsive with suggestions and end result was great. ||I also had asked as to securing tickets to Universal Studios Japan which the were arranged for a reasonable service charge. Universal Japan has different type of timed passes so it was nice to let the hotel handle it. which they did nicely. We were given our tickets upon arrival and enjoyed the park the next day.||Arrival...||Porters grabbed the luggage. We were escorted up to the 12th floor reception. Impressive spacious lobby with high ceilings. Well decorated. Plenty of seating. Nice first impression. We arrived a bit later (1900) so there was no wait to check in and head up to our rooms. ||Rooms..||Spacious, well designed, well furnished, nice layout. Obligatory mini-bar in one corner and a desk area along a wall. Beds were large and comfortable with lighting control and charging enclosed in the bedsteads. We had a nice enough view from our rooms on the 22nd floor (but obviously can't speak for all rooms). ||Bathroom was spacious as well with double sinks, larger bath/shower area, and walk in closet. Shower has 4 jet nozzles and an overhead that make for relaxing time (a rain shower would have been a nice addition). Of course there's the high tech Japanese toilet..always a curiosity to us westerners who are just hoping not to hit the wrong button in the middle of the night. ||Welcome drink was a bit boring...juice or water...maybe jazz up the orange juice a bit with some grenadine and call it a mock tequila sunrise? Maybe throw some strawberries and ice in a blender? Something with a bit more wow than what I have in my backpack from the corner 7/11?||Birthday surprise was set up and ready in the girls' room upon arrival (towel swans set into a heart with a card in the center). Which was shortly followed by a small cake for the girls to enjoy (while the parents watched on in envy. lol). Both girls enjoyed...so nicely done on the part of the St. Regis team||Rooftop Garden/smoking area...||Pretty nice in October though smokers might not agree in winter and monsoon seasons. Perfect place to end a hectic day of tourism with a coffee and cigarette. ||F&B..||The Teppanyaki restaurant was closed 2 out of the 3 days of our stay..and full the other day. I didn't come to Japan to eat Italian or French..so the property's other 2 restaurants didn't fit our needs either..||I'm going to state my dislike for their breakfast "platter" concept. Perhaps they find it advantageous for presentation? Out of the 8 or so items on the pre-set platter, I don't want half of them and want to change another 2. So now I'm stuck explaining what I don't want versus what I want (but still having to explain what I want). ||I understand that different interpretations of recipes exist but wasn't a fan of the hard little waffles or the French toast that was cooked on the outside but little beyond soggy uncooked egg mixture in the centre. ||The bar looks really nice and offered live music. On family vacations I prefer to wrap up my evenings with a bit off peace and quiet, but I could imagine it would make for a pleasant couple hours.||Staff...||All interactions with staff were friendly, professional, and courteous. ||Porter staff was always right there to call us a taxi and open the doors for us with a "welcome back". Reception staff when not occupied always acknowledged you as guests as well.||Location..||Pretty well located for our needs such as being just a few Km from the train station and Osaka castle. Lots of shopping in the surrounding areas. Universal is about 10Km and was a quick taxi ride. It's pretty much a straight 2.5 km walk through the covered market across the street from the hotel to the busy lit up Dotonbori district (shops and restaurants near the hotel seem to close early around 2100, the closer you get to Dotonbori the more shops and restaurants you'll find open late ).||End of trip..||I asked the hotel to arrange a large van to get us to the airport which they did with no issues. Check out was the usual scan the invoice and pay the bill (though there was an error neither caught. My guess is that after the night auditor was revived from their heart attack, reception was charged with emailing me the details to quickly resolve the issue). Either way, van was there on time and already loaded by time we got downstairs. We were offered water for then trip by the concierge/porter staff, and off we went.||Conclusion...||Impressive property with lovely spacious rooms and a service level as could be expected from St Regis tier hotels. We all enjoyed our stay and of course the St Regis will play a positive part in our Osaka memories. I'd certainly be happy enough staying there again next time we find ourselves...

Upon arrival, we were told our booked and confirmed room rates would be higher because my wife is staying in the room. Then where else do you expect my wife to stay? Get an additional room? We never had to pay any additional charges ALL these years. Be it me alone or with my wife or kids when we stayed at SPG or any other hotels!

Upon check in we were briefed by the check in staff that DOMESTIC calls are complimentary. To a foreigner like us, when u mention Domestic. It means anywhere within Japan. Who would think that Tokyo is not DOMESTIC? Then what would you deem Tokyo as? International? To our horror when we checked out, we were charged 7,500 for local Domestic calls made to Tokyo! The staff that checked us out, Ms M T showed us the fine prints that DOMESTIC calls are calls starting with "06". One should not expect the guests to know 06 is Osaka just like I do not expect you to know 65 is Singapore. You should just say free calls ONLY WITHIN OSAKA! It is a substantial amount for a few minutes of call at 7500 excluding taxes. Had I been briefed properly, I would have used my Mobil phone which would be much cheaper or free if I used whatsapp. The charges were unjustifiable and we felt cheated!

When we returned from dinner, we realised that the room was NOT turned down for 2 although we were told earlier we had to pay an additional 9k for my wife. AND the Nepresso coffee machine was not working. BUT the Butler saved the day by bringing in 2 cups of hot coffee.

We did our checkout at 4pm although out flight was midnight. Our request for a 2 hours' extend was not accommodated. We settled the bill by cash. We left our luggage at the concierge and head off for early dinner at 4pm. The staff that checked us out and took the 78k cash was Ms M T. At 6pm, we returned to the hotel to collect our luggage. Concierge told us that we had to go back to the check in counter to sign the receipt before we can collect the luggage. I signed and took the luggage.

My wife took a second look at the signed receipt, with an amount of 78k. Upon further questioning, Ms M T told us its a credit card payment for our stay!! We told her that we have already settled everything by cash when we checked out at 4pm! But she claimed that she did not receive it. We were lost momentarily. We showed her the stamped "Paid" invoice but she claimed that she did not collect the cash. It's so humiliating. My wife told her to check the drawer again as she remembered seeing her put away the cash in the drawer. To our relief, the cash were there. Ms M T apologized and reversed out the visa charges.

We were very disappointed with the service standard of the hotel. She took our cash and still charge us again. Had my wife NOT pointed out the mistake, we would have paid twice. How can we claim reimbursement when we are back in Singapore with the bill arriving a month later. The cash would have been gone! She made me signed a receipt meant for the luggage that turned out to be visa charges. As a loyal, Platinum SPG customer, we were really disappointed and disgusted! We had high regards for the integrity and service standards of SPG Hotels. BUT...

Concierge:

We emailed the hotel weeks in advance of our stay to assist with bookings. Weeks would pass before they would respond, and multiple follow up emails were required to get a response. They did successfully book one 3 Michelin star restaurant to which we owe them significant credit. However, when we arrived and asked basic requests, such as where to find restaurants, laundry, or novel shopping, the concierge was usually very terse, bordering on rude, and had no substantive suggestions. We were better off consulting Google maps. And this for a 5 star concierge service? In addition, the English skills of many of the concierge staff were extremely limited. While I know some Japanese, it should not be required at a hotel of this calibre. In fact, when visiting Japan, a 5 star hotel should have fluent English speakers for most front facing staff.

Breakfast:

The breakfast for Titanium was generous; however, there was always a significant wait to enter or be seated— at least 15 minutes to gain access which is bizarre given there were numerous open tables.

Hotel Condition:

The hotel has significant and noticeable wear and tear. We were in a Grand Deluxe Suite and when I arrived, a man was literally gluing on a piece of the exterior door that had torn off. The woodwork throughout the suite was heavily scratched and dented including tables. The carpet was worn thin, and the sofa's velvet exterior was worn. In any event, for a hotel suite whose copay was $500+ per night, this was disappointing.

Check out Process:

The check out process was extremely troubling and disappointing. We asked for a Butler to assist with bags multiple times, and even after 45 minutes they did not come up to our room to collect our bags. This resulted in us having to drag our bags down to the lobby ourselves, as we were rushing for a Shinkansen train. Normally, this would have been fine, but we had a lot of luggage. The significantly long wait time for luggage assistance is not characteristic of a St. Regis.

Hidden Taxes and Final Folio Provided Very Late:

The hotel has some hidden taxes associated with rooms that have copays for upgrades. While we expected to pay 50,000 yen per night + about 37,000 yen in total taxes (about 5600 yen per night in tax), we did not expect too many additional taxes. Yet there was another 6500 or so taxes per night in taxes we were assessed. The hotel finally sent a final folio about 4 days after my request.

General Impressions: The hotel seems poorly managed with a "choatic" vibe in which there is not only no personalized service, guests are vying for the attention for concierge staff who are stretched too thin with minimal English skills. There are only two desks for check in, which is nowhere near enough since many of the guests who check in are very demanding and take a significantly long time to finish their check ins. While I understand this was a busy time for the hotel, the hotel should not be having any difficulty meeting basic demands of elite members even when they are at capacity. The hotel felt more like a 3-4 star hotel than a St. Regis. Among St. Regis hotels, this one was a major...