Premier Inn Glastonbury hotel — Hotel in Great Britain

Racially profiled by the staff at Glastonbury.

I arrived at the Hotel on 20 August 2021 just after 12pm following a 4.5-hour drive from London to take my son to a camp at Millfield School. The plan was to stay overnight to relax, work on Friday afternoon/evening, then have a look around Glastonbury on Saturday before returning home. The overnight stay would have also enabled me to find an electric car charger so that I could get back to London.

As I was tired and had a conference call scheduled for 1pm, I thought I would ask at the Hotel if there was an off chance that my room would be ready or whether there was somewhere on site that I could take the call and/or work from. I use Premier Inn regularly and last hotel on 10 July 2021 where they were kind enough to allow me to check in slightly earlier as my room was ready.

On arriving at the Reception there was someone there called Steve who was on a call. I waited several minutes (without him even acknowledging me) for him to finish before asking if the room was ready. Without even looking up or checking the system he said no, and so I should come back at 4pm. I explained what had happened in Walsall and asked if he would mind checking and he refused. I then asked if he was not prepared at least look could I speak with the manager.

In between time, a woman called Kerry came along and rudely stated that she was the ‘room checker’ and that no one would be assigning rooms without her checking them first. I explained the situation and she was not prepared to listen, she talked over me and then walked away laughing under her breath.

The manager came along afterward and without speaking with me first, told me that she did not want her staff stressed out and that she too was not prepared to even check. I explained that I was not happy about the service I had received and that Kerry in particular had been rude. Kerry then comes from behind the back wall and starts shouting that I was the one being rude. By this time, I was seriously annoyed and said that she had no customer service skills and should not be ‘exposed’ to the public.

Rather than dealing with the matter, the manager told me to leave the premises. I said that I wanted a refund and that I would find accommodation elsewhere. This was refused and I was told that I would have to contact Head Office.

Steve then chipped in and said that I was very ‘aggressive’ when I first spoke to him. At this point I took offense primarily as I am sick and tired of people using the ‘aggressive’ word to describe people of colour who are confident and assertive. The word was used to stereotype me as an angry black woman simply because I asked Steve to check the system. I said that I was not happy with being described in this way and at this point, and interestingly enough each one of them almost simultaneously incorrectly assumed that I was calling them racist. They all pretended to be horrified and the manager even said that she had ‘half-caste people’ in her family (her words not mine!!).

The manager then told me that she was refusing to ‘serve’ me. I then said I wanted a refund and that I would take my business elsewhere. This was refused and I was told to contact Head Office as they were now refusing to speak to me. She then told Steve and Kerry to ignore me, and they all walked off into the back room.

I sat in Reception and called Customer Service which took 45 minutes to get through. Whilst I was waiting to get through, I did not see either of the 3 members of staff for at least 25 minutes.

It took 45 minutes to get through to Customer Service after explaining what had happened, I was told that the complaint could not be progressed until after my check-out date, and then only after I had...

This is the worst Premier inn I have ever stayed in due to the most disgusting and appalling attitude of several of the staff members, and I would never stay there again!

As soon as I arrived and had to press the buzzer twice before the Manager came out to check me in, I was refused top floor when I politely asked due to being alone, as she stated the upstair rooms are reserved for Business men, how rude, am I a nobody!

For 3 days I endured constant noise from above my room, all night long, walking about, banging doors/drawers, dropping things, I felt a nervous wreck, I had to keep my coat on as the heating was blowing out icy cold air, the shower just dribbled out Luke warm water as it was leaking from the top, and trying to change room is when the fun began!

No one at reception again, I used the buzzer twice and this arrogant/rude/unfriendly young lady came down the stairs and asked what I wanted, I told her the shower needs fixing, also the heating and that is was displaying an error message, plus the noise is unacceptable above me, I asked to be moved, she said leave it with her, how long am I going to be out as she leaves at 3pm, I said a couple of hours.

I arrived back, she was at the back of reception, I asked has everything been dealt with, then all hell broke loose as another lady came from this cupboard and started shouting at me that I put the shower on that setting and its my fault the shower is how it is, I was so shocked, I didn't know what to say as in this time the young woman thought it funny, I thought an apology was more suited and a change of room, I found myself walking away as her outburst upset me.

I went back to the room, the heating had not been dealt with, the shower was better, but terrible water pressure and not very warm, I just put up with the cold, and the unbearable noise by going out, but when I returned, still nobody on reception, plus I heard other people complaining nobody's there again.

The morning I left, this young girl was in the upstairs room with all the housekeeping Dept again laughing and fooling around, when she saw me, she just stared, then while i was waiting for the lift, they all run down the stairs like children, nobody was there to give my key in to, so I decided to put my luggage in the car first, when I got outside all of them were smoking right by reception at 11am on a busy Saturday, somebody needed to be checking the guests out!

I came back, pressed the buzzer twice, she eventually came down, I said I was checking out, she replied just leave the key on the desk, no smile, no apology, nothing, not even a goodbye, sorry but some re- training needs happening at this hotel, as the staff are negligent, rude, cold, unhelpful and are letting down the Premier inn brand name, and reputation, an utter...

This was an awful stay where 3 out of the 4 of us in a family room had no sleep for 2 days.

Firstly the positives....

Location : Perfect for Glastonbury. Very short walk to the Town Centre.

Staff: Very friendly and try to be helpful despite silly company policies.

The Negatives.....

The hotel is advertised as having aircon. Whilst that is technically true the hotel has it on a timer so you can't control it for very long during the day which isn't really a problem but at night it stops at 11pm.... That is a problem. The hotel is hot and stuffy anyway but in a room with 2 adults and 2 teenage boys it's unbearable. 3 out of the 4 of us in the room had hardly any sleep for 2 days. After the 1st night I went down and spoke to the staff who were very nice. He said that he would try and sort it out whilst we were out for the day. By the time I came back it still wasn't sorted so I went back downstairs and asked. They reset the Aircon in the office and everything was tickety boo for a while.... After we all went to bed the Aircon turned itself off. I woke at 2am covered in sweat. My wife and 1 one of my sons did also. I tried to turn the Aircon back on. It said it was on but didn't work so eventually at 3am I went downstairs and spoke to the staff. Again very nice. He said he reset it and this worked. I said to him this seemed suspiciously like an exercise in money saving but he did if it was the staff hadn't been told. Neither my wife, son or I had any sleep after that point . 1 of my sons did but he can sleep through anything.

There is a window but this is sealed. There's no air in the room. It's horrible. The window had also not been cleaned in a long time. There was black mould growing on it. Lovely.

It looks like we weren't the only ones to have a bad stay. I spoke to a couple opposite us who said they had complained after finding faeces on the toilet seat and a torn pillow on the bed.

We complained online and have been given our money back which is great however we've been staying here on and off over the years and it used to be worth paying a little extra over the Travelodge closeby but not now. The company has definitely gone downhill. The Aircon thing seems to be company policy of prioritising cost savings over customer satisfaction which is a dangerous game for a hotel chain to play. I've stayed in 3 around the country fairly recently and not one of them allowed use of the Aircon. The cleanliness thing seems to be local.

I wouldn't not choose to stay at the Premier Inn again. We may have no choice in the future but that'll be the...