The Ritz-Carlton, Kuala Lumpur — Hotel in Kuala Lumpur

This hotel has no business calling itself a Ritz-Carlton. It is an absolute insult to the brand. Pick anywhere else for a better stay. ||The Good|The location is excellent as it is connected to the Starhill Shopping Centre and only seconds away from the Pavilion Shopping Centre with all the hustle and bustle of Bukit Bintang on your doorstep.||The Bad|Although a Club Wing Room had been booked, I was directed to the normal check-in desk. Check-in was incredibly slow. The two receptionists on duty seemed to be struggling to answer basic guest enquiries, such as: is there a mini bar in the room? Shockingly they didn’t know and had to call someone. A third receptionist did appear briefly but couldn’t be bothered to assist. ||Finally checked-in, I immediately noticed that the room was tired and worn. Light shades were bent out of shape and the bathroom mirrors were suffering clear signs of discolouration. The TV was also prominently displaying an error message.||After 3 calls and several hours the problem was still not fixed thus prompting a trip to reception to complain. More promises were made that it would be resolved immediately before the staff decided it would just be easier to ask us to move rooms. Surprisingly, the identical new room looked a lot less tired, and gave a much better impression.||However, it quickly became clear why no one had bothered to fix the TV. The hotel has a grand total of 6 channels with 1 being English speaking. This is absurd, when even the most basic hotels are offering more choice. Allegedly, you can connect a portable device through Bluetooth to watch your own downloads. However, 2 mobile phones and 1 laptop were all unable to connect. Makes it a bit of a joke that they installed a TV above the bath when there is nothing to watch.||Not that you could soak in the bathtub anyway due to a lack of hot water. I left the hot tap running for a good 15 mins and the water only became tepid. The shower can just about achieve warm water, but if you are person who likes a steaming hot shower, forget it. ||Then we have to talk about the bed. I can only assume that the person in charge of procuring mattresses for this hotel sleeps on a rock. The mattress is THE most uncomfortable mattress I have ever experienced in my life. I like a firm mattress but there is no give whatsoever. You may as well sleep on the floor as the carpet will probably provide a higher level of comfort.||We decided to pop down to the club lounge for ‘evening desserts’. There were only a few people in the lounge but despite this, every single table was dirty, had empty cups, dirty cutlery, leftover food, etc.||As for ‘desserts’, the staff brought out 3 plates of bite size cakes and 1 plate of tasteless fruit. Despite the tiny number of guests in the lounge, there wasn’t enough to even give each person two pieces of cake. If the lounge had been full, most people wouldn’t have gotten anything.||When offered drinks, I enquired as to what teas they might have and there was no choice. Just whatever tea bags they had dumped in a pot. I mention this because this hotel offers afternoon tea and have a beautiful trolley with a big selection of loose teas available. I am not expecting this trolley to be rolled out in the lounge, but surely a small selection of loose teas is not too much to ask. ||At check-out, the Club Lounge reception staff were told about our displeasure with our stay and initially were completely nonchalant and disinterested until I asked to speak with the Manager.||They went to fetch Natalie, the Club Wing Manager, who was the only person during our stay who showed the level of professionalism that you would expect from a hotel of this calibre. She seemed genuinely concerned and unhappy that our stay had been so abysmal. She did her very best to salvage the situation but was facing an impossible task.||With the choice of so many good hotels in KL, I would never...

Period of stay: December, 2019.

Purpose of stay: Leisure, my daughter's birthday.

Our room: Club Deluxe King (Upgraded to Executive), Club lounge access, Guest room, 1 King, City view, High floor.

Introduction: A superb one-night stay!

Pro(s): (Not in chronological order) The Signage outside the road is sufficient. This hotel is actually interconnected with a majestic Starhill Gallery (JW Marriott), one of luxurious buldings in Bukit Bintang/ Golden Triangle Area. Located at the heart of KL city, just steps away Pavilion Shopping Mall KL. I arrived at the hotel's main lobby first and there were many people perhaps wanna check-in too. I requested to be shown the way to the the Club Lounge and the concierge staff mutually helped. I was greeted warmly by a male Club Lounge FDA, unlucky to forget the name. He managed to make my check-in process ran smoothly and quickly. He was so helpful and attentive to my reqeusts. Overall the club room we stayed on was very good. We loved almost all the facilities and amenities in the room. The interior of the room was luxurious and the bed was comfortable. The all-white marble bathroom was squeaky clean. The view outside from the room was quite good, got a view of Westin next door and glimpse Pavilion Mall. The club lounge was elegant and confortable for me to have a rest while having light refreshments with my spouse. Not many people around, therefore it was not that noisy. We managed to have our picture taken by the Mr Sarac, the Assistant Guest Liaison Manager himself. The Cobalt Room on Level 1 offers wide selection of food and beverages. We really enjoyed the breakfast served before going out. We were placed on one of the high floors of this hotel (2nd highest to be exact) and it was excellent, the elevators functioned smoothly we never waited that long to get one. The privacy here is comparable to St Regis we stayed on September. We enjoyed using the private elevator all the way directly to the Club Lounge at the bottom floor. As mentioned earlier, we were celebrating the birthday of our daughter and the hotel has gone extra mile on giving us a memorable decor in the room. Also the Birthday card was really cute and thoughtful! A very good butler service, they came within just a few minutes after my call and really attentive to all my needs. We tried the in-room dining service and we didn't let down by this. The food we ordered was delicious and served within the time required. As part of the room package I booked, I took a 50 min spa treatment with my spouse at the Spa Village located at the Level 4. The treatment was fabulous and service was impeccable! This hotel has Ritz Kids room whereby you can easily let your kids play while you are having your time at the pool, gym or spa at the very same level. So useful! I get acquainted with Mr Florin Sarac, and he was very helpful, warm and attentive. Will surely meet again in the near future!

Con(s): No welcome fruits provided, should provide a bit as this is a Club Executive Room and not a normal room. As I was told that the occupancy very high, some of the services tendered were quite slow (beverage request and some toilet amenities). Understandable for high occupancy though.

Features (Not necessarily specified to be cons) Haven't swam at the swimming pool. Haven't use the gym.

Summary: A great one-night stay, I personally think that one-night stay is not enough. Later will book 2 or 3...

Normally the Ritz chain is a luxury indulgence that I really enjoy, especially the executive lounge. Sadly, our family was not happy with our experience in Ritz Kuala Lumpur. We've stayed in a number of Ritz hotels around the world.||For a super luxury chain, there are expectations and Ritz Kuala Lumpur would do well to remember that it represents the Ritz as a brand. If this was my first Ritz hotel stay, I would never pay for another. Executive lounge is privilege that we paid for 3 executive rooms but this was really hit and miss (assuming you can get a seat) with food (rubber beef and fatty chicken), deserts not great and no sparkling wine for the duration of our stay for 5 nights as they ran out of (but every shop has it and you can buy it everywhere else in the hotel so they just don’t want to service it). We actually ended up buying a couple of sparkling wine bottles, and had to order a Grab each night. The white wine is more like desert wine so wine drinkers may struggle. Lunch serving were sandwiches and salad which weren’t great, my bread was soggy which made me feel ill.||The pool that the kids can go into is very cold so after initial excitement, kids and adults decided it was not usable. Under 18s are also not allowed to use the jacuzzi, steam room or sauna. The hotel definitely doesn't cater for young teens.||The room cleaner comes at random times (I got a knock at 8.30pm??), leaves chocolate in some rooms and not in some others which is odd, given we have 3 rooms, it felt a bit random and not consistent. We had a knock at the door at 9.50pm with some fruit. While a nice gesture, this is not an acceptable time to be knocking on doors.||Orange juice at breakfast does not taste freshly squeezed and I heard a few more people complain. Some smoothies tastes a bit artificially sweet so may have syrup in. Eggs can be done fresh but you have to wait so no table service which is the norm for most 5 star I stayed in. The ready made eggs went cold quickly. The omelette was untidy looking and oily. The rest of selection was decent for breakfast but the salad is a bit basic, more popular dishes such as potato salad and greek salad would be best rather than chicken skin and peppers etc.||Check in experience was a bit random as went to club lounge and they tend to assume you are in normal hotel rather than club lounge bit so it was a bit unwelcoming until we said we were in the right place and they checked our name was on the list. We've had multiple doormen ask if we're actually club entrance members even after check-in.||We thought we would try the free pressing service with a few dresses and was told they'll be returned within 24hrs. They didn't come back in 24hrs and we're still waiting...||Overall, it’s okay hotel but it is not the Ritz-Carlton luxury we are used to and sadly would not come back here again. Don’t bother with exec lounge, they probably won’t have your drink and the food will leave you thinking not to bother...