Rheinfelderhof — Hotel in Basel

AVOID this hotel

I made a reservation 6 months prior to my mum travelling. I explained to the hotel that she was an elderly, 84 year old, travelling solo. The day before check-in, they sent me a "reminder email about the booking" and in the email it stated " Please note that the lift will be out of service from 5 August to 20 September as it is being renovated.

Please note that the restaurant will be closed from 28 July to the end of September due to kitchen renovations. Guests with half board can have dinner at Restaurant Alexander, a 5-minute walk away"

Her reservation was for the night of the 24th August. None of this was an emergency - planned renovations - I have had multiple communications with the property, and never once did they mention these planned renovations !

Only as I advised my mum, when she arrived at the hotel, to a huge noise of building works, did they offer to move her to a "sister hotel" - they didn't offer pro-actively, and seem to still be trying to take money from any guests that they can.

The room in the Hotel Alexander that they moved her to was nothing like the room I'd booked. It was really really small, no table, no coffee making facilities, no AC ! With 36 degrees C temperatures !

This was an awful experience for my mum, who is travelling in Europe for the first time in many years, and as a solo traveler, who wanted everything booked and secured for her peace of mind before travelling.

No compensation was offered to her, and they didn't even bother to provide her at lease a similar, or slightly improved accommodation, after the inconvenience of her having to move at the last minute.

Terrible customer service, and terrible customer...

It was super nice to get an upgrade to a double room at checkin though the room for me isn't a thing: I just want clean, quiet and secure so small doesn't matter. But this was nice especially as I ended up spending most of Monday in the room due to weather and the fact that most museums in Basel are closed on Monday.

The location is great. It's right next to a tram line and close to Claraplatz. There are plenty of restaurants nearby and you should try The Pub right up the street. A full supermarket Coop is across the street. I did not try their restaurant (CHF18 for breakfast!).

Pluses... The hot water is HOT and the shower worked well. Small, but at least I was fully surrounded by glass. Not the "half-glass" thing that seems so common in Europe. Heat worked well. Too well, the second night and I had to open the patio door and let some 5 degree Celsius in for a bit to balance. Yes. there's a patio door with two chairs and a tiny table overlooking a courtyard. That was quiet to enjoy coffee. A little bit of hallway noise and a slamming door or two but not enough to be a problem.

Complaints... The first room I was shown was a smoking room. Really bad. But the clerk at the counter immediately reassigned me to another room on the same floor without a problem. The coffee machine is the strangest thing I've ever tried to use. I wish I'd brought my hot water kettle with me. This machine was odd and I only managed to get one half decent cup out of it. There were nearly enough power outlets and none at the desk. Wifi was slow. Okay for browsing but the upload speed was terrible. I did not manage to write many reviews during my stay!

Overall, decent. It's fine for...

No parking. They were 'out' of parking by the time I arrived (8 pm). This meant that I had to street park, and wake up at six am to put an hour and a half (the Max time allowed) worth of money in the meter just to (potentially) have enough time to shower, breakfast and get ready for the day. Then, I would have had to either relocate the car to a new spot (an exercise in futility apparently) or find a public garage (the nearest is three blocks away). The public garage was also an option overnight by the way, which could have prevented the early morning rise, but would have required a much later night, not something I was looking forward to upon late arrival.

Truthfully, the room is smaller than a cruise ship room and contains a single sized bed that takes up more than 50% of the space. The bed itself was far less than spectacular. The mattress bowed in the middle like a hammock - not so good if you intend to do more than nap.

That being said, the staff is great, the room was spotless, the bathroom was clean and modern, food choices in the area great, location great, city great, and anything not mentioned was good enough for me not to mention it!

I'm pretty easy to get along with and understand premium city space issues. But these limitations should have been noted somewhere in the advertising so that I would have had a choice, or at least an awareness of space and parking constraints before booking. Good thing I was alone! Two people would not have fit in...