Safestay London Kensington Holland Park — Hotel in London

I arrived to this hostel on May 22/24 in the early afternoon, I checked in & went to my room, it was a 10-bed dorm room even though I swear I paid for a 15 bed dorm room, it must be a screwup on the hostelworld website when I booked it; the room had lots of purple from the sheets to the privacy curtains. ||The first day I didn’t notice plugs in the room, the only place I noticed plugs was in the hallway about 10-15 feet away from my room, the room & bed was fair, decent otherwise. There were cages under the bottom bunk for bags & such.||Bathrooms were on the main floor, 2nd & 3rd floors, with showers on the latter 2 floors, there were issues with the bathrooms in particular, multiple groups of schools were staying at the hostel & there was a sign on both 2nd and 3rd floors stating private toilets, school groups only, now that said I as a person that paid like the groups if not more to stay here I have a right to use the bathrooms & showers as these school groups do so I just went in there when there was no one else using them, though one morning I took a shower around 630 AM thinking that I could get in & out before any of those kids needed the bathrooms; after my shower someone was there so I grabbed my clothes, got dressed in the shower & quickly left, I showered a few more times afterwards though there were people in the 2nd floor bathroom so I had to go to the 3rd floor, so annoying that I had to use different showers.| |The bathrooms were decent & fairly clean on the 2nd and 3rd floors, though the shower wasn’t that great for pressure but I was still able to shower despite that. The other issue with allowing the groups to have the bathrooms is that the only other bathroom is on the main floor which they only clean once a day in the morning, I happen to see them clean it one morning, but with many, many people using the bathrooms daily it gets dirty & gross very fast. It could be cleaned more than once a day.||As for the plugs in the bedrooms actually had plugs when I looked closer later on in my 4 days here, there was one across from my bed behind the other bunk and several other areas near the bunks which made it a little harder to plug my electronics in.. I had to bring them there, plug them in & wait till they were fully charged to use them. ||There was a minor situation before I noticed the plugs in the bedroom where I was sitting in the hallway charging my computer & IPAD, so I was chatting with my family & this guy that worked there I had said hi to him earlier when he comes up to me and asks me to move because I was a tripping hazard & I was too loud when people in their rooms would like quiet, I obliged but I thought to myself that when I was there earlier charging my items, those groups came stomping through the hallways, talking loudly, going down the stairs for like almost 10 minutes which was way louder than me on the computer & I don’t think anyone said anything to those groups about being loud. That was the annoying part. ||One thing that I noticed in that hallway was the there were lockers & the one set of lockers they put a wall that looked prefabricated, it was put there to bring out the wall which made the space tighter, they could have made the wall thinner to increase the space which I didn’t like about that spot.||Later the same day (day 2) the guy that told me to move from the hallway saw me having issues trying to open my bedroom door with the key card which took me at least 4 times to no avail, he came to open the door when someone inside opened the door so he ended up leaving, a little later it happened again but it took 6 times scanning to open the door so I went down to reception & told them the room door wouldn’t open twice when I tried 4 & 6 times, I mentioned to the guy as he redid the new card that in all of the hostels I stayed at in Europe this was the first time this type of issue happened, not being able to open the door when it scanned on the keypad. I noticed many others were having the same issue with the door not opening on the first scan so it wasn’t just me.||Breakfast costs 8 pounds, you can purchase tickets at reception, the kicker is they only accept credit cards. Breakfast was served on the main floor next to reception and there is plenty of seating. There is bread, meat, cheese, cereals, croissants, yogurt, fruits, coffee, water, juice.||Breakfast was decent but repetitive so by day 3 I was sick of eating meat and cheese specifically. The cost here was more expensive than Wombats hostel and I thought they were expensive at 7.40 pounds, with the exchange rate due to making me pay by card it’s around $14+ CAD.||The area this hostel is located at is at 10-15 minute walk from the Holland Park Tube (even though the directions I had claimed a quicker walk and a tad confusing, it took me that amount of time, the pathway Holland walk is sloped when walking from the tube to this hostel which makes it a bit of a hike), the area is a beautiful park named Holland park & also the hostel had a nice courtyard with several fountains, that helped to make me like this place a little bit more.||They need to improve the cleaning because being a busy hostel the main floor bathrooms are so gross later on in the day, and they need to fix the room doors when I told them it took multiple times scanning the keycard to open the door. My room number was 110 so fix the door lock so a person doesn't have to scan their card 4 & 6 times to get in.||3.5 out of 5 for being close to tube station|4.5 out of 5 for convenient location to HOHO bus|4.5 out of 5 for being situated in a great tree-lined park|2 out of 5 for expensive breakfast|3.75 out of 5 overall for...

The good things are really good, but there is definitely some work that needs to be done to manage the place more efficiently. Thankfully there is a new manager so he is working on fixing the issues.

The good: *The area is amaaaazing for the price. Holland Park is fabulous and one of my favorite parts of London, also it's located a very short walk from Holland Park station *The facilities are new and updated and the color scheme is nice and welcoming. Also the bunks have curtains for privacy which is great and a rare feature in most hostels. *There is laundry and food on site

Areas for improvement: *It's very hard to find initially! GPS isn't very good and they really need better signs as you must enter from Holland Walk not via the regular park entrances if you are carrying luggage (as we all are) *Better bunk bed system. I had the bottom of a three tiered bunk. It was one inch off the ground and I am short but even I could not actually sit up in the bunk it was so low. Since my storage locker was also on the ground level I was constantly stooping/bending over to do everything and after several days my back hurt *Guests NEED a refrigerator and microwave! Yes they sell food on site, but I was forced twice to throw away my expensive leftovers from out in town because they would not store them in the main fridge due to Covid restrictions. By this point Covid is just a fact of life, we need a communal fridge and microwave and plenty of hostels and hotels now have that service. *Stop nickel and diming (or would it be "pencing" here in the UK?) everyone? I wanted to rent a towel and it was £5.50 for a basic towel! They charge you extra for every little thing, including £2 just to store your luggage which is a customarily free service at most hostels) and nothing is complimentary, it feels stingy and miserly, so make some things free or at least cheap, as it customary in many hostels. Even if just free coffee/tea from the machine, it's at least something. *Don't charge extra for the female only dorms (it's sexist) and have more than 9 beds out of 300+ for this purpose. These are VERY close quarters and not all women want to share with men whom they don't know. *Have different sauces for the food, vs just ketchup and mayo, and improve the food quality. No frozen berries for the pancakes, we pay £8 for them, and ensure that fresh juice is always available as it was out and therefore not included in the price. Also healthier options for lunch and dinner such as sandwiches and soups and salads and fruit. Most of the food is very unhealthy and fried. Ensure cooks are trained properly to make the different options such as poached eggs since they are on the breakfast menu. *More hooks and shelves in the dormitories, particularly the bathroom areas, and ensure that they are kept well-stocked with soap and toilet paper as we ran out of soap for 2 days. Set the rooms up so that people can function easier when getting ready for the day. *Ensure that broken washing machines/dryers are fixed much faster when broken. There are only 2 washers and 2 dryers on site, with 300+ rooms, so if one is out and travelers have to leave soon that can cause problems. *Ensure that front desk staff are adequately trained and friendly, at times it felt as though they were feeling put out by being asked to do their job. Few front desk staff smiled at guests and most seem very stand-offish NOTE: This is something the new manager is actively working on. *Try to set up some sort of assistance for guests who need extra help with their luggage if needed as there is a very long and at times slightly uphill walk to the entrance (also needs far better signage). Also help with guests who have luggage but need help up the stairs with it.

Overall the place is decent for the price, I would stay here again, but if the improvements are made and extra effort put into the guest experience it will ensure that it goes from decent to...

Here's our experience after 4 days at Safestay in early August where we were in a private room for our family… we left before our room rental was up due to unresponsiveness of the management over a non-functioning door lock to our room.

• Showers are operated by a button that lasts for about 10 seconds so you have to keep pushing it, good for conserving water, however there are no adjustments for the temperature of the showers… ours was consistently scalding — not great on hot days. • Lockers in the rooms do not work with a lock. Seriously, you cannot put a lock on the room lockers! • For all 4 days we were there our key cards would stop functioning at the end of each day. I saw other people with the same problem. • On the second day we returned in the evening to find our room lock wouldn't work. After they took it apart they said all it needed was new batteries, but they didn't have any. They promised to fix it the next day. Here we go. • The next morning someone tried to come into our unlocked room at 6AM. We then had to explain the problem all over again to the new shift staff and show them the door lock didn't work and go through the process of explaining it needed batteries. They assured us that the "bossman" would make sure it got done, however we had to move everything into their storage lockers for the day for safety (see above note about lockers in rooms not having or being able to take locks). • Arrived back at the end of the day with the door lock still not fixed, plus our key cards again not working, and ALSO a woman unpacking her stuff in our unlocked room. After the person at the desk kicked her out of our room we had to go through the process of explaining to a third shift of workers about the door lock needing batteries. But of course they didn't have any. Oh and unfortunately maintenance doesn't answer their phones at night, so they can't call anyone to fix it. • At 2AM someone tried to push into the room past the luggage I'd piled there. I yelled out that it was a private room and they left. • Next morning… explained the battery problem to a 4th shift of workers. Again had to move everything to their storage lockers for the day. Fun! • End of day… not surprising… no fixed lock. Moved to a hotel. Showers not scalding! Locks that work! A full night of uninterrupted sleep! Is this heaven?

All that being said… everyone was very nice and concerned about our problem and they were all flummoxed as to why the previous people didn't fix it. There is obviously no communication between the shifts or managers.

Our kids were freaked out about the people trying to get into our room — thanks for that, "Safestay".

During our travels in the UK we stayed mostly at YHA hostels, which are terrific by the way. This is not a YHA hostel… so… our mistake. My advice is to only stay at YHA hostels and avoid this place entirely.

By the way… you should put up a sign saying the croissants and coffee in the morning cost money. Everyone was helping themselves freely to it and it wasn't until the last day when I heard a receptionist (who sits next to the croissant/coffee feed zone) telling someone that no they are not free. Here I was thinking it was the one good thing about your hostel.

– For people reading this review, notice they have the same response to every negative review, no attempt to actually remedy...