W Dubai - The Palm — Hotel in Dubai

TLDR: Rooms and service is decent, location is nice, but after 3 days you will want to go to town. Spending 50 min each way, can be tedious at times. Staff is nice and friendly, food is decent. Just too many outsiders compared to those staying at the hotel in my opinion. They host a "Brunch" every saturday I think, where the whole hotel is overrun by drunk tourists.

While the hotel is decent in many aspects, the feeling of being a cash cow is higher here than most places. You’re charged for absolutely everything, and most things have minimum spends such as reserving cabanas etc. that wouldn’t even be the worst part, because, while I get it can get busy at times. Being a resident with absolutely no option to stay at the beach or pool area because they prioritise outsiders to use the facilities, this left us only the adult pool. While this wouldn’t normally be so bad as we’re adults after all, they choose to blast the entire area with music between 12-17, leaving little in terms of relaxation…

The whole point of me choosing this over others was direct access to the beach, but this has been impossible. At 1700 AED per night, I would expect to be able to use the damn beach or at least lay in a chair. But hardly anyone there actually lived at the hotel. The whole reason I choose a Palm hotel was for beach access, and the price would suggest this would be private to the hotel, and not competing for chairs from people throwing a towel and leaving for hours.

The restaurant is also open to outsiders and completely packed at breakfast by people coming only to use the pool and beach…

Residents have absolutely no way of sleeping in while expecting to eat and relax. You will get overrun, you will get hearing damage from the constant DJ blaring, you will hate yourself. I would understand that playing loud music for a pool party or something, where it’s scheduled from Saturday 15-22 or something, but it was unbearable noise constantly. Bring earplugs.

The staff is very nice for the most part, but with so many outsiders they often didn’t believe we actually stayed at the hotel for whatever reason. At one point we were laying on the chairs at the adult pool and we had to pay, and they didn’t believe I was staying there. Kept saying it cannot be true. Like what?

If you really do want to live the Instagram life, just book a cabana and take enough pictures to last you a couple of months posting.

We will visit Dubai again for sure, but I will not return to this hotel in the near future. While I’m not known as being frugal by any means, the experience and price just doesn’t match. There are others at lower prices with much more balanced service level, dedicated hotel pool and beach.

Try it out but don’t expect to be blown away in luxury as the price may suggest. Location is only good for 2-3 days tops, after which you wanna be closer to civilisation.

Overall, the whole thing felt more like a 3/5 for me.

PS: Book a cabana the moment you arrive. Bring earplugs.

Other things worth a mention: Rooms here have very nice controls and AC, and they restock the room daily. Light control was odd, but you’ll figure it out after a while. A small coffee machine and kettle is also present. The in room dining opinions are decent and arrived only 30 min late.

They have a free spa with a separate area for men and women, plus shared bubble bath. It has a sauna and steam shower. Free apples and cucumber water.

The shop in the hotel is overpriced by roughly 10x-20x for all items, a dress costs easily 900 AED and a bag that cost me 60 AED in town cost 500 here. While the convenience is nice and a premium is expected in a hotel shop, damn. Their jet ski price is double as well. And mind you, I am by no means known as being cheap..

The bar is okay, but I believe their drinks are watered down, except for the 150 AED martini I got. Probably so expensive because they know you can’t water it down without loosing its flavour. Again also blasted with music. No casual cocktail party...

I am writing this review both to praise some of the support staff at the W Dubai Palm Hotel and also warn future guests of this hotel.

I stayed at this hotel for over a week while transitioning to Dubai. While the support staff in the restaurants and at the pool were very pleasant to deal with, I have issues with some of the "management" team at the front desk - specifically Ozkan.

I booked through the W hotels reservation department and booked the "Summer Escape" special, which includes a free room upgrade and supposedly a 150 AED food and beverage credit each day. I checked in and opted not to put a card on file, because I do not keep credit cards and I prefer to pay on the spot for budgeting reasons. I do this at every single hotel I have ever stayed at and it has never been an issue.

However, the way the credit worked was not explained to me. I thought just like any other hotel, they just took the credit off the tab and I pay the difference, if any. When I attempted to apply this "resort credit" to room service, they said room service was not included. I said okay that's fine. When I attempted to apply this credit at the pool bar restaurant, they had no idea about it. When I attempted to apply this credit at a restaurant inside the hotel, they also did not have any idea about it. I went to the front desk infuriated, because why am I not able to use this "food and beverage" credit anywhere on property? That's when they informed me that they take it off at the end if anything is owed. I told them I pay on the spot, but that's fine... so there was definitely some miscommunication already.

Then I extended my stay and asked for the "half board" package, which includes 2 meals at select restaurants throughout Dubai. Ozkan made this particular reservation for me. When I called the concierge to check and see which restaurants in Dubai were, they told me to go to the front desk. When I went to the front desk, they also were not knowledgeable about this package that is clearly advertised on their website and told me I didn't have such package. Miscommunication/Bait and Switch tactics #2.

The final straw was when we were finally checking out, I asked my nanny to pack up the room. She thought the items in the minibar were complimentary and so she packed those items up too. Luckily I noticed before we left and we quickly unpacked the minibar items and attempted to put them back where we could remember the items were.

Ozkan later emailed me and sent me a receipt for 475 AED that they "took the liberty to charge my card for", stating that items from the minibar were consumed. When I checked my bank account online, I saw not 475 AED was charged, but rather $477 USD were charged to my card! I tried to explain to Ozkan we did not consume from the minibar, but he insisted that his staff stated that the items were consumed and sent me a picture showing a gap in the fridge - probably because my nanny did not place the items exactly were they were in the first place.

I called W Corporate and they have not helped me since, so I had to file a dispute with my bank.

Long story short - do not book any packages at this hotel - it's a gimmick and be wary when dealing with their front desk staff as they don't have the requisite knowledge and expertise to be on the front-line representing such a beautiful hotel.

Also, please be aware that their spa is closed for renovation.

I do want to end this review on a positive note - the restaurant team in the breakfast restaurant as well as the servers near the beach and pool plus the room service staff were EXCELLENT! Top notch! I especially want to praise the very nice female server at breakfast from Kenya and the breakfast restaurant manager with the glasses - both were superb.

Aside from these issues, we had a great stay. The pool is beautiful and the beach is nice and clean. Room service was also excellent at tidying up the room and delivering...

The biggest opportunities are 1) the service, at the beach and during breakfast at Liv 2) guests coming for the day from other Marriott properties and 3) cleanliness of the rooms.

1. Beach: staff are not friendly, not helpful and with attitude. With the exception of Chris (from SouthAfrica) who made us feel so welcomed so looked after, despite being 6 weeks in the job, well done Chris, the rest were ignoring us, arrogant and at times rude! The whole W water policy is so ridiculous and inconsistent, we were there all day, it’s 40 degrees and there were days they wouldn’t give us water unless we pay for it (outrageous when we have lots of bottles in the room), other days they will give us only 2 bottles per room (and. Ot cold but warm!!!) other days they will bring the water for free. Align the approach and communicate cause it felt we were begging for water when you shouldn’t do this to your customers while being at the beach! Is actually risky of having customers being dehydrated! Totally unacceptable.

Additionally towards 4pm the staff starts closing the parasols like there is no sun without asking and in such of a hurry that again felt weird and removed the purpose of relaxing! I’m giving you my free time to stay there and relax for you to add stress! I suggest you review your beach policy. 2) the amount of guests that are not staying there, they were wearing bracelets as they are staying at other Marriott properties was excessive! Didn’t feel comfortable leaving my belongings next to people that were random coming for the day, everyday different people. Not sure that’s a good approach for in-house customers, I paid a lot of money for 2 rooms for a family of 4 and it didn’t feel good, different type of customers all the time. . 3) Liv at breakfast: every hotel experiences high volume of customers between 9:30-11am you even have a sign at the entrance with colours indicating that 9:30-11 is the busiest time, so prepare for that! It was chaos! Wrong coffees delivered to the wrong tables, lack of communication with the staff, you could see the staff not knowing where to go! You need management there to help servers navigate the volumes and ensure I get coffee! Cause that’s the first thing that everyone wants! You can tell staff is new and young and trying their best, good attitude and smiles and constantly apologising for the chaos! Not fair on them. 3) cleaning the rooms was sooo inconsistent, there were days they’ll do it in the morning, other days they didn’t do it at all and I had to call. The will not clean properly around the sink, sink was blocked and no proactiveness to fix it, now that you don’t have individual toiletries I had to leave few notes to ensure they re-fill items and put more more water so I could take to the beach which again is nonsense!

You are saying this: W Hotels strives to deliver a playful, luxury hotel experience through unique design and entertainment. But to be honest didn’t feel luxury at all! I know the brand and definitely spot on on playful, unique design and entertainment but there is no luxury hotel experience at all! Quite the opposite felt cheap and...