The Residence Maldives at Falhumaafushi — Hotel in North Huvadhu Atoll

We stayed at the residence on Falhumaafushi mid August to beginning of September for our Honeymoon. We had an amazing time, the staff treat you like royalty and will do anything to make your holiday perfect and are so kind and friendly. Special shout out to Ishan in the dining room who was so kind and professional each day. ||The resort is stunning and kept in perfect condition. We saw turtles, rays, dolphins, reef sharks and we are certain a whale. We stayed in 302 on the sunset side which was amazing as most nights we sat in our pool and watched the dolphins swim by, the sunsets are breathtaking. In the room you get given to keep a Residence tote bag that most guests used during the day on the beach, we also got give two lovely sarongs (This was also to be used by men who don't wear long trousers for the Li Bai restaurant) ||You also get a mosquito plug in for the room and a mosquito body lotion to use. Our lovely housekeeper each night around 5pm also brought us shortbread which we always looked forward to. ||You're allowed one visit to each specialised restaurant (which I thought was a shame as some all inclusive resorts allow you once per week per restaurant and the resort was only a quarter full) they did let us go to the Chinese twice but you do feel like you are getting a favour of good will from the hotel. ||The Li Bai restaurant has two menus - one Chinese and one Italian (you're allowed twice to try one of each menu) also on all inclusive you're allowed to go once for lunch here. The Falhumaa restaurant is French cuisine which was ok but we preferred the Italian and Chinese. Then there is the dining room on each island. ||The hotel was very quiet as mentioned before, only a quarter full so there was always seats on the beach/ by the pool no matter what time of day. But it was very quiet, there were guests mainly from Italy, China/Japan, Germany, USA and only a couple of Brits. ||The buggies were invaluable. I have feet issues and the islands are huge, you're allowed to phone reception and request a buggy which only takes around 10-20 minutes to arrive to anywhere on the island, some nights you share with other guests. If you are going across the different islands (so for us we went from Falhumaafushi to Dhigurah, you get taken to reception then you swap buggies. ||There is a gift shop on each island but prices as you can expect are high so take enough suncream with you before. Mosquito repellent was important as the nights I didn't apply I did get 1-2 bites, but they weren't bad or itchy. ||The speed boat to the hotel is only 5 minute ride, coming back the weather was stormy so that was very very choppy. On the boat on the way there they give you lovely little juices for the boat ride. The hotel is great though meeting you at the Male and then at Kadhdhoo. So make sure to look out for the hotel representatives as we didn't realise they would meet us at the different airports. In Male we got taken to an airport lounge where we were allowed one meal and one drink from the menu. We just had a drink. ||Check in was very quick, they put each guest family on separate buggies then you are all whisked away to the relevant island you're staying on and we had a dedicated check in at the library bar with a lovely peach tea drink which was refreshing before being taken to our room where our luggage had already arrived. ||We went with Emirates and didn't realise our 30kg luggage allowance is reduced to 20kg with Maldivian air for the flight to Kadhdhoo. The airline let it slide the way there but they said make sure its under for the return, so we went mad using creams etc to get it below 20kg, but on the return we were over expecting to pay, but no one cared and we went over.||Some minor points we wish we knew before arriving - ||- when you arrive you are asked to pay a deposit per night of your stay, we went for 15 nights so it was $100 a night which amounted to a large amount of $1,500 before you've even started your stay. We went all inclusive to avoid any extra payments behind held like this. ||- When leaving and checking out, we left the hotel at 3pm. We were told we are only allowed lunch in the main dining room if we didn’t have lunch on the day of arrival. Which luckily we didn't as we arrived 3-4pm. We had a late check out room also which was great but I thought if you're still checked into a room you should be allowed the facilities and a lunch before 24 hours of travelling back to the UK, and not only allowed lunch if you didn't get lunch when arriving. ||- We went standard all inclusive but there was quite a lot of items on the a la carte menus that were additional charges which was a shame as we went all inclusive to avoid extra fees. The dining room is the standard restaurant and there is one on each island (menus slightly differ) you get an iPad and for lunch are allowed 2 courses and for dinner 3 courses. Sometimes at lunch though if you wanted a starter and main it's then a shame if you wanted one mouthful of chocolate for example you're not allowed as you did your 2 courses. All restaurants operate through using the iPads to view food. The breakfast is the only buffet food option. ||- A slight niggle was every single time you drink or eat, you have to sign a receipt which we were new to having to do especially for all inclusive. It was ok but sometimes when you want to get up and go you have to wait for the receipt. I asked what this is for, and reception said its to keep stock of supplies. ||- We struggled at night with our water villa, I completely appreciate it was monsoon season we went, but we noticed the floorboards outside on the decking and the gaps in the roof/doors let in a very very loud howling/whistling noise from the wind all night. Also the villa being on stilts meant the waves slapping against the poles all night long was very loud. I had to ask for ear plugs which they provided. ||- At dinner in certain restaurants you aren't allowed to keep a bottle of their water left at the table which was a little annoying, it was very humid and I wanted to have our water on the table and not be reliant on the very very busy staff who have to keep running around and checking when guests have their water glass empty to then refill. I would have preferred to pour my own water, but as mentioned it was only certain restaurants for some reason when the water bottles are taken away from you. ||- At every restaurant the food is very very very quick to come out. Which is great with your first course but the second you finish your mouthful, your next course is behind you waiting to land on your table. So most nights we felt we ate way too quickly. 3 courses within an hour. ||- In your room you do get 3/4 bottles of water a day but this does quickly go. I took a Stanley cup with me and used the refilling station by the pool during the day to have a nice large bottle of water with me. ||- The curtains in our room broke quite often as they're on a large plastic pole that you have to pull to draw the curtains but it kept coming off the rail so you have to be careful with them.||-When having a bath there was no soap next to the bathtub. The only body wash is in the shower room in a separate room in holders that you cannot take the bottle out of the holders. So I ended up getting a dish, going to the shower room, filling the dish up with soap then going over to the bathtub in a different room then putting that next to the bath to use. ||- Wifi, the wifi is very hit and miss, it was temperamental and quite slow in our room, we tried using our laptop and found we could not have both our phones connected at the same time as the laptop. By the pool the further away you sit from the bar the worse the wifi was, we found the wifi didn't work at all when sitting near the bathrooms in the shade. ||- We were told when arriving as we were on our honeymoon we were allowed a breakfast in the room, which the hotel did an amazing job with, but it took speaking to a few people as some people said it wasn't featured on our booking and they struggled to understand why we were allowed this, but we got there in the end. If you are celebrating this was a lovely thing to do, we had to just go to the dining room and grab the form to fill out. ||- Entertainment was none existent which was such a shame as each night we did get bored, you didn't see any guests apart from dinner then everyone goes to their rooms. We went to the bars and where they have a resident DJ but we were the only people there. Any entertainment would have been great and would have drawn more people out of their rooms. They did have movie night and karaoke but this didn't appeal to other guests I feel.||- In the room the mini bar consists of - 2 small Pringles, soft drinks and juices, some small beers, and wine. I don't drink beer or wine so I was on the soft drinks instead (1 or two spirits would have been nice in the room as the bar is miles away) ||Overall this was the honeymoon of a lifetime, it was incredible and I will never forget our time here,...

UPDATE: I've contacted the hotel several times since returning home and they only responded once. They said this stuff happens and that there is nothing they could do to help. How about refund some portion of the thousands of dollars we spent at their hotel to make up for the 10k+ that we had to spend as a result of their negligence. My tripadvisor review disappeared, which tells me they have found a way to get bad reviews removed. Our situation happened to several others the day we were traveling, so I'm sure it happens on other days, too, yet you don't say those reviews, which is concerning. Seriously, stay away....

REVIEW: It pains be to write this review because the staff at the resort itself are lovely, but the resort management is horrendous and we are out $10,000+ because of their negligence. This resort offers better prices than other resorts because it is SO FAR AWAY. You need to take an actual domestic flight (Maldivian Airlines), not a sea plane or high speed boat like the other resorts. This means that you are at the mercy of the tiny airline's delays, cancelations, and other issues. The hotel books the flights for you (you have to pay) and you have no control over the schedule or anything. They booked our return flight to Male way too close to our international return flight. That flight got so delayed that we missed our international flight. The hotel representatives handled this in the worst way possible. They initially said they would help us with rebooking and costs incurred, but once we got to Male they said that could not help us in any way. They made us no-shows for our international flight, which meant we couldn't get the money/credit for it, despite it not being our fault. They had reps at the Male airport and had our passport information and knew our flight was delayed, yet, they weren't competent enough to speak to our international airline and make sure they knew we were NOT voluntary no-shows. They cherry on top is that we later learned our international flight was also delayed and we could have made it on the flight if we had gone straight to the ticketing counter. However, the hotel representative told us we missed it, there was nothing we could do, and to go wait in a lounge while they helped us (no help was given). We are still waiting to hear back from them and I will provide an update if so, but so far, they have not taken any accountability.

We live in the US so getting home from the Maldives is not easy, so to have been left stranded there with no way home was horrifying. We ultimately found new flights, but very expensive and out of the way. This was entirely their fault, I would have never booked a domestic flight connecting to an international flight so close, yet they did not allow me to pick the time. They had our international flight information from the time we made the reservation more than six months in advance.

Besides the awful and dangerous return experience, our arrival was also unpleasant. Again, they had our flight information for months. Yet, they booked us on the domestic flight from Male to the resort to be six hours after we arrived. There is nothing to do at or near the Male airport, so we just had to wait six hours and waste an entire day. We got to the resort at night.

The domestic flight is on a small, very old and uncomfortable plane. You can't even fit a regular sized backpack in the overhead bin to give you perspective.

Like I said, the staff that work day-to-day operations at the resort itself are kind and helpful. They took good care of us during the heavy heavy rain and winds that we encountered for most of our stay. They resort is beautiful and spread across two private islands. However, it was not worth the awful travel experience there and back. I hope to hear from them and receive some sort of compensation for their negligence because it is still hard to wrap our minds around how much money, time, and wellbeing we lost as a result of...

Context: booked as a Discovery Titanium Member. 2 bedroom pool beach villa. 2 adults 2 children

Reservations: 1/5 poor experience. They are slow to respond to emails and also sent me the wrong amount by overcharging me for flights and transfer that were meant to be inclusive. Rectified only when I highlighted to them. Email enquiries are very slow response so ended up calling them. 0/5. After all details provided fhey still got the bookings wrong for the transfer flights. Booked as child instead of adult. Was rectified but still an error.

Check-in: 1/5 did not get offered any Titanium level benifits or explaination of member benifits. Not much walk through of resort annemities or features. Had to ask and still not explained or offered anything memeber status related. check-in staff had English comprehension issues. I said I need to fully pay for the hotel accomodation and offered to do that however check-in staff only took a deposit. Mid-way through my stay they were chasing me for the full payment of hotel which is annoying.

Rooms: 5/5 2 bedroom, infinity pool, living room, beach front rooms were very large and comfortable. Perfect for 4 people. Having a decent size pool was great with beach. the sink was clogged and needed maintenance. beach umbrella on deck was broken and needed repairs supplied with 4 adult bicycles even though it was booked with 2 adults and 2 children. had to swap for 2 kids bikes so hotel could have been a bit more attentive.in preparation.

Resort and location: 3/5 there wasn't much to see from a snorkeling perspective. It states their are reefs but most of it was sand, weed and rock. Hardly saw any fish. Of my many visits to Maldives and this was the most disappointing when it comes to beaches and snorkeling to see reefs and fish. It's mostly sand, stony beaches lots of seaweed. Not much of any reef where you can see tropical fish on the island. location requires a domestic flight and a 20 minute boat ride. not the easiest to get to so consider time, effort once you land at Male airport, and the same when you need to head home.

Food overall: 3/5 overall ok but inconsistent. Also not many food options.

The dining room on Falhumaafushi: 3/5. Tried both ala cart and buffet. Taste is ok, selection is average. Deserts look better than they taste.

the dining room on Dhigurah: 5/5 is significantly larger with more variety and better food. Recommended to go to this one instead, and not the the dining room on Falhumaafushi island. Worth the travel if it's not raining.

The Falhumaa: 2/5 - requires booking.

Had dinner there. Had high expectations but the food was quite average. Nothing special for the price. Location is nice as it's right on water. Not many fish around to see especially at night even though water is lit up with lights. My seafood meal was actually missing clams which were part of that dish. Service was average, wasn't asked about how things were or everything was ok. I would have given feedback but wasn't given any opportunities and staff didn't seem to want to engage with diners.

Long Island (Li Bai): 5/5 requires booking. This was really good food. Every dish was a pleasure with great presentation and taste. Definitely Worth a try. Staff and service was engaging and happy.

Overall Service experience: 3/5 very nice as included and organises a birthday cake and bottle of wine to celebrate. we had to call the doctor a few times due to one of our children being sick and they were very quick and attentive. just inconsistencies with service was the only let down. you have very high expectations with the high resort reviews, rates and reputation. I did feed back to the hotel manager but there was no service recovery attempt during our stay. Unfortunately fell a little short of the amazing experience we expect and in comparison to other luxury Maldives resorts we...