Hotel Born Palma — Hotel in Palma

WASTE OF MONEY - ROOMS ARE GRIM AND NOISY, WATER FAILED, STAFF HOSTILE Have never been so disappointed with a hotel. Photos and website descriptions are misleading; room was hugely overpriced, poorly furnished and noisy; water stopped working; lack of privacy; receptionist extremely unhelpful and rude.

ROOMS ARE POORLY FURNISHED, DEPRESSING AND NOISY Their website states the hotel has 4 stars. It describes the basic double rooms as being well decorated with parquet flooring and typical Mallorcan furniture. Their pictures show this too.

Our room was extremely dark (even with lights on) and dingy feeling. It had very basic flooring, a modern leather chair, an ugly heater and a clothes rail from Ikea.

We were also only provided with a duvet - no top sheet. So we had to have the air conditioning on, which was also noisy.

There was building work going on much of the time, and no sound insulation in the rooms. We were woken up every time someone passed our door. There was also lots of noise from the street.

Given the price and what’s on offer in Palma for the same amount, I expected the room to feel comfortable and welcoming. Ours was far from it.

SHOWER / WATER FAILED Given its 4 star claim, we did not expect to have any problems with the water in our bathroom (we also found that it wasn't possible to get cold water at all).

On our first morning, the water stopped when I’d been in the shower less than 5 minutes. I waited a few minutes but there was still nothing. As I was covered in shampoo, I tried to rinse my hair in the bidet. That tap worked at first then stopped. Same with the sink. The toilet wouldn’t flush either. Although the problem was sorted within 10 minutes of us ringing down to reception, I still had to get out of the shower while covered in soap to do this and I ended up wasting about half an hour on the first morning of our holiday.

SERVICE As it was late when we arrived and the receptionist who checked us in had been nice, we hadn’t complained about the room straight away. But given the problem with the shower the next morning, we decided to go to reception to discuss the problems.

The receptionist was antagonistic and dismissive. He suggested that I was only complaining about the shower because I didn't like the room (given that I hadn't even mentioned the room at this point, this must be a common complaint). He laughed when I said I was unhappy about the shower not working. He told me that it was not a big deal - only an inconvenience of 10 minutes. He would not listen when I tried to calmly explain.

Given how confrontational the receptionist was and how upsetting it was trying to talk to him, we decided not to make what was already a bad start to the holiday worse. So we stopped trying to get the receptionist to listen and instead contacted the hotel by email, twice. I received no reply.

UNDERWHELMING BREAKFAST The breakfast was really nothing special, and we also had to wait a very long time to be served – probably 15 minutes. We had actually come to the conclusion that the cooked breakfast wasn’t available. When the cooked did come, the portions were small and not very tasty.

All in all a total disappointment and outrageous they can...

We travel around the world, trying out new hotels for our clients to make sure they are satisfactory before sending them there. We took the opportunity to try out Hotel Born while we were attending a friend’s wedding nearby. We really wanted to like Hotel Born since the photos online looked like our style; however, this was not a great hotel experience.

LOCATION The location of Hotel Born is very good. It is super close to everything in the town center. If you are driving a car here, the area is restricted so you must call the phone number posted on the street signs to make sure you aren’t fined. The street going to Hotel Born is VERY narrow. There is No Parking on site. Parking is several blocks down & then you must walk. Parking is about 24 euros per day. Hotel does not have an agreement with any garage for a lower rate.

CHECK-IN Check-in was good. Kindly note that there is NO ELEVATOR. So, if you are physically handicapped, this may be a huge problem for you. Luckily, the reception was kind enough to help me up the stairs.

ROOM If I could give the room 0 stars, I would. We booked on Expedia as we are Gold Members & made the booking for a Double Room. Do not be mislead by the pictures, this is an EXTREMELY small room. It is only a little bit bigger than the bathroom. It is also EXTREMELY loud. You can hear every single person who is walking up the stairs to their rooms or back out as the doors to the room have a lot of holes. Since our room is facing the street, you can also hear everyone who is walking on the street. This includes normal conversations, drunk people at night, cars, everyone. I can imagine since the breakfast is served in the interior courtyard that the rooms facing the interior are also loud. The room is very dark. We could not even see what was in our suitcase as there is not adequate lighting in the room. The bathroom shower is poorly designed and floods the bathroom every time you take a shower. You are then forced to walk through a flooded bathroom until the staff can clean the next day. The water they give you for free says its filtered, but it tastes exactly like the tap water & is not good. We were never given a fresh top sheet on the second night. I know because I accidentally made a very small stain on the sheet the night before & it was still there the next day after they made up the room. We were also bitten by something constantly in the night.

FOOD/RESTAURANT The breakfast is outstanding. Probably the only good thing about this hotel. I had the avocado toast with poached egg & it was excellent.

FACILITIES As this is a 3 star hotel, no facilities on site. The interior design for the common areas is beautiful.

CHECK-OUT This was fine & no comment either...

HORRIBLE! DON’T GO THERE! There’s a bar and restaurant in the courtyard with CONSTANT MUSIC all day til very late. Making it impossible to relax and sleep in the rooms. The rooms have simple thin glass windows so you hear everything as you were in the courtyard. When I complained at the reception I learned that I was not the only one to complain but the owner of the hotel prefers to keep the restaurant ( the restaurant opened since COVID, so it s probably to make money despite knowing it will obviously bother the hotel clients). Before COVID there was not the restaurant and music, which was logical and guaranteed a nice stay. For 315€ a night this is unacceptable but I would never stay in the hotel even if it was 50€. You re just simply not gonna have a nice stay!!! Plus the bathroom floor would get inevitably flooded when having a shower no matter how careful you are because the shower is just very badly built. This is ridiculous for such an expensive hotel, it could be easily fixed if only the...