White Sands Resort & Conference Centre — Hotel in Dar es-Salaam

Most horrible service received at this hotel. We arrive on 25th December 2023 and understood that because the hotel was busy, we may not get the best service, however on the 26th, 27th and 28th, it had less than half of the occupancy.

The front desk: The lady that checked us in could not even welcome us with a smile! We checked in, in the evening at 4pm, for 3 rooms, yet 1 room was not even ready! As per check in terms and conditions, check in is at 12 (noon) so how can a room not be ready by 4pm. We had to take our own bags from the car to the check in area as there was no one to assist us and when we got to our rooms the person who opened the rooms for us requested for a tip??? Yet could not help us with all our luggage?

The Restaurant: We fortunately only stayed on Bed and Breakfast Basis! The waiters did not want to serve us tea/coffee, there were never any sugar packets on the table, no glasses, no cups.. When we asked for cups, we were told to go and pick them up from another table! The restaurant manager could not smile or greet any of the guests and didn't seem to be bothered! When we requested for milk for our 1 year old child, the request was ignored and had to buy milk from the supermarket. The breakfast was also short on food, we would have to wait and complain for food to be refilled in their buffet lounge and they still wouldn't do it to a point you just eat what you see on the table.

The rooms: Rooms were cleaned once a day in the morning.. we thought! Tissue paper that had fallen on the floor in the bathroom was never picked up, for the full 4 days we were there! If we move the sofa and table, it was never moved back to the original place. Tea / coffee sachets were never refilled. We constantly had to remind them to refill water bottles in our room every morning. We had to remind them to give us clean towels in the morning. We had to remind them to add in a body wash bottle in the morning as we only got 1 tiny bottle per day, between 3 people!

The Management: By day 3, we had had enough of this services and decided to complain to Maua, the sales and marketing manager. We sat in her office for at least 20 minutes with our complaint. She wanted the restaurant manager Deepak to come in to listen to the complaints, but he brushed her off and said he was busy. She then told us she will speak to her director and get back to us with a response once they have discussed our issues! She did not get back to us till we texted her. The response we got was: ' we will offer you a 20% discount on dinner tonight'. If she had bothered to check on our booking, we were on B&B basis not FB and would not want to eat at their restaurant anyways as food was not great! There was no apology from Maua or the other managers on the same. When we responded back to say we will not be eating here and this is not an apology or a way to sort out the issue, we were ignored.

We did inform Maua that we will definitely post a review on Trip Advisor as we had paid a lot of money to stay at this hotel. She didn't seem to care to be honest. The next morning when we were to check out at 6am there was nobody to carry our luggage from our room to the car, also to note the rooms are nowhere close to the reception or the parking lot. We had been told by their restaurant manager the day before that they would arrange packed breakfast since we had paid for it this as usual was not communicated with the chefs and no food was done for us. The manager came in his shorts running around to make some breakfast for us which only delayed our time to leave.

In all over travelling whether it is budget hotels or 4/5stars I have to say WHITE SANDS HOTEL TANZANIA has to be the worst hotel we have been too. Never again would we step in that hotel. People please be aware that if you book don't have any expectations of getting any...

24 hours at White Sands

Where do I even start………..

Ok let’s start with the 4 star rating and their positive reviews.

When booking hotels online, we all depend on up to date customer reviews for a heads-up on the level of service that can be expected. I can only assume that White Sands have many fake reviews.

The room was dated with shabby curtains and upholstery. It could not possibly be graded as 4 stars, even if the room had a well overdue makeover, it would not make the grade.

When we went to have dinner, we found a very limited choice, more so when what we ordered was not available. What I was presented with - mutton was so tough it was barely edible and distracted from the nice flavour of the sauce.

The table cloths were all stained, and the staff were not at all attentive. I would like to be fair to the staff, and make it clear that a lack of good management and leadership that is the issue.

It seems there is no team spirit that bonds them with the goal of looking after their guests and providing an experience that makes them feel special.

Back to the room;

It is clear that there is a lack of maintenance, with the air-con only working on the highest fan setting and so loud it was impossible to sleep.

Breakfast. After the worst nights sleep I have had in years, I was not holding up much hope -This was the best position to take. The breakfast was awful, sausage as tough as the previous nights mutton, bacon I cannot even describe, the scrambled egg was the only nice thing on the plate. All to the back drop of the JCB digger churning the sand.

We had booked for seven nights, but after the first night and breakfast it was time to go! We checked out a few alternatives near by, and settled on the Ramada. We walked there first to check it out as it is only 15 minutes to walk.

On inspection it was a simple decision, we booked it immediately, went straight back to white sands and packed our bags. We booked an Uber and went to reception. Not wanting to have an awkward interaction we hoped to just check out and politely say that it was not what we expected.

The shocking thing is that we were not asked if there was anything wrong, or anything they could do to make things better for us, just thank you and good bye. We took our bags out ourselves with no assistance.

We paid for a 7 night stay in advance, on Agodo, which was non refundable. So one night cost us around £750.

We had arrived at White Sands having previously spent 3 nights at the Four Point Sheraton in town, a superb 4 star Hotel with excellent standards.

We escaped White sands to the Ramada, again, an excellent 4 star hotel with everything you would expect, and service to make you feel special.

Here’s the thing, how is it that White Sands can have 4 stars, we know exactly what that should mean, we are lying down right now on 4 star beds, having just had four star lunch with four star service.

And just in case the owners or management want to reply, don’t bother, just come down to the Ramada and see what 4 stars look like. Oh and if you have any shame maybe return our money which was obtained through false advertising.

To anyone thinking of booking White Sands, don’t! Ramada is advertised in the same price range and worth every penny. We chose to lose over £700 rather than spend another night at White Sands, don’t make the...

We stayed for a week during Easter 2013. Negotiated the price down a bit and all in all it was OK. Rooms are spacious although with basic equipment. Hot showers with poor presure (quite common in simple hotels in developing countries by the way). One night we could hardly sleep because there is -at least once a week- a kind of reggae party in the etablisement next door down on the beach: extremely noisy until early in the morning. Rest of nights it was more or less silent. It is right on the rocks beside the beach, which is at widest in this point, much better than further north in Nungwi, and is permanent even at high tide. Probably the best beach on the whole island. This is the strongest argument of this hotel. The hotel owns also excelent free sun shelters (nice African style) on the beach in front, with beach loungers.||||Breakfast (included) takes place at their own restaurant (nice palm leaves shed) down on the beach, with excelent views. Exactly the same every day, quite basic, but OK. Unfortunately this restaurant -at an excelent position- seems not to open for dinner, but there are many more down the beach, a short and nice walk direction south.||||We traveled with our 3 children, took 2 rooms, and they enjoyed the place very much. Easy to stroll the beach up to the point of the cape in Nungwi. Would return to this place without any problem, it is probably the best budget alternative in Kendwa and Nungwi, which is being transformed -by the set up of very nice ressorts- in a more and more expensive place in recent years. White Sands is one of the few good places for the independent traveller with a moderate budget, like in Zanzibar's good old times, before the almost mass-tourism of nowadays.||||We didn't have any security issue, left wallets and valuables hidden in the rooms and cleaning staff never touched anything. But there is a public access to the beach through the hotel garden, and you see constantly locals crossing the premises, with no hotel's watchmen at all, day or night, apart of the person sitting in the reception (during the day only), cooperative and friendly to us all the time. We did not make use of the "safe" service offered by the reception the first day: we did not trust the system of simply putting your things in a kind of safe, without counting the money. We thought the level of the etablisement was not high enough for this, preferred to...