Radisson Blu Hotel, Edinburgh City Centre — Hotel in City of Edinburgh

TL;DR: The hotel was great, but I got charged twice and can’t reach them through any of the email addresses I’ve tried.

INTRODUCTION The hotel itself was very decent, as I expected from a Radisson property. The staff were polite, the breakfast was tasty, the pool was awesome, and the location – absolutely perfect. Just two minor issues: the sauna was a bit too cold, and the AC/heating on the 4th floor wasn’t working. So why is this a 1-star review?

PART I – RESERVATION I made my booking using the Radisson app, as it offers a special rate with additional discount. Moreover, it was a prepaid reservation, as it's slightly cheaper than paying at arrival. My first attempt supposedly failed, so I tried again with a different card – and that booking was successful. Later, it turned out both reservations went through, meaning I ended up with two bookings and was charged £1,740 for four rooms instead of around £880 for two. After sending several emails (most of which went unanswered), I finally received a reply and one of the bookings was cancelled and refunded.

PART II – ARRIVAL On the day of arrival, I discovered that both reservations had disappeared from the app and website. At check-in, I was told they had been fully cancelled and I should see a refund on my credit card – but I hadn’t. Fortunately, the manager was able to restore the reservations. Unfortunately, we had to pay for the rooms again (as a walk-in), with a temporary hold of over £700 per room instead of £436. Maybe it was my mistake to agree to this, but I believed it could be resolved later – I wanted to double-check my bank statements before making a scene. Before I could follow up, the manager had already left.

PART III – TEMPORARY RESOLUTION The next day, I was informed that they would honor the original rate and I would only be charged for breakfast, with the hold being released. I was satisfied and considered the case closed.

PART IV – CHARGED AGAIN Back home, I noticed that one of the temporary holds – over £700 – had turned into a regular payment of £560. I should have only paid £90 for breakfasts. I’ve tried contacting the hotel through several email addresses, but haven’t received any reply since May 6th. If their financial records are correct, they should see that both rooms were prepaid. Honestly, I’ve had enough. Today, I contacted my bank to start a chargeback process, though it may take some time.

I didn’t include every single detail, as this review is already quite long. I don’t really care what went wrong or why – it's not my fault that their system has issues. What matters is that I was charged £436 more than I should have been, and I can't resolve it with them. “Why don’t you just call them?” – someone might ask. But why should I pay for international calls to fix...

5 star hotel at this price I would expect so much more but instead there is mold everywhere in the bathroom, the most horrible bathroom in any hotel. I just hate this hotel. Reasons as below:

1, The bathroom has the most stupid design I have ever seen and the bathroom experience is the worst in the world. 1, half glass door can’t seal shower and water splashes everwhere, causing flooding in the floor thus mold around the bathtub and along the walls. Disgusting mold everywhere, in a five star hotel, really? Check pictures.

2, shampoo and body wash bottles are so stupidly designed that they either won’t press or squirt powerfully to the wall, I wonder if any hotel staff ever tried to use these bottles? Testing if these really work?

3, Conditioner bottle is broken, won’t press, had to ask front desk to fix it.

4, shower water temperature is never stable- I stayed three nights and had shower several times at different times but temperature is never stable for once.

5, bathtub is just stupid- it is so narrow, no way an adult can stand comfortably in it and have shower; if I stand in the middle, sink plug will be stepped on and closed then I have to turn it to open the sink, just stupid design.

6, during my shower I found out the bodywash bottle is completely empty! Does this hotel ever consider to fill it in at all? Does this hotel expect me to call them in the middle of my shower naked to wait for them to fill it in? Ridiculous!

7, Then this 40 GBP breakfast, definitely not worth it, even the service is bad- they just ask me tea or coffee but don’t even bother asking sugar and milk; food variety is poor, there is even no grilled tomatoes. Try any other breakfast locations in town, I bet any will be better than this one.

8, Then the meeting room, one day there are tea bags on the table but the hot water and coffee machine was not turned on, we had to walk several minutes downstairs, then again downstairs to get water, then upstairs then upstairs again back to meeting room, without spilling, horrible service, if you don’t plan to serve hot water, why bother putting tea bags there, expect we eat tea bags raw?

9, My room is facing dance clubs on the street which are open until 3 am so there are crazy people yelling and screaming all night, luckily the hotel gives me earplugs which helped a lot.

10, Then, horrible wifi, I can’t use it in bathroom in my room, even in the center of the room the video chat will break off because of poor wifi.

Again, this is not cheap budget hotel, this is five star expensive hotel, this mold and poor experience is definitely not worth it. You are not getting what you pay for...

Beautiful hotel in superb city centre location bang on the royal mile.

Rating 4 stars as there were in my opinion some minor additions that could bring this up to 5 stars.

Walking into the hotel it’s modern bright and welcoming. Staff were friendly and helpful.

The room was very comfortable with most of the facilities you would expect from a hotel of this level. The addition of a small fridge, bathrobes & biscuits on the tea trolley would have really brought it up to a superb standard. However daily complimentary bottled water and a tea menu is a great touch.

Unfortunately the room we were allocated had a problem with the heating system, and given it was a cold day in January we had to request someone take a look at it for us. Within 30 minutes we were offered a room change by the receptionist who came to our door with the new room keys and allowed us the rest of the evening to move.

We Ordered soup of the day (ginger & sweet potato) and the beef burger from room service; both of which arrived piping hot and absolutely delicious.

We Didn’t have breakfast included in our room rate, but outside the breakfast room and adjacent to the entrance to the spa, every morning there are some mini pastries and hot beverages which is a really nice touch. A nice hot water with lemon to take into the spa in the paper cups provided is ideal and a perfect wake up in the morning.

The spa was good, clean and very peaceful (or at least it was until 4 kids turned up and starting dive bombing), however the sauna temperature was very low (60 degrees) and therefore unusable. the steam room was great and the swimming pool perfect for a small swim. The changing rooms were clean with lockers that you don’t need a coin for, towels and hairdryers.

I would recommend that perhaps there could be a set time for children to enjoy the facilities, so that adults can relax before and after spa treatments.

Overall we received an excellent service and high level of professionalism from all staff members we encountered.

I would recommend this hotel given the facilities and location for the...