Zedwell Piccadilly Circus — Hotel in London

First off, the beds are relatively comfortable and so are the sheets. But other than that, it’s barebones. If you want a barebones hotel room with a bed and adjoining bathroom, this is your best bet. If you want unnecessary things like a nightstand, reading light, chair, phone, clock, desk, television, art, dresser or anything with which to unpack clothing, or any surface at all with which to place your wallet, phone, watch, glasses, etc, then I suggest you stay somewhere else. My mobile phone is on the floor charging. My wallet is on the floor. My clothes are in my suitcase. My travel companion’s glasses are in her purse, which is on the floor.

Additionally, what little technology they do have, the usb charging ports above the beds, was not working above one bed, so we had to share. The lobby of this hotel has like 20 or more tablets with which to check in. Those represent practically the only technology in this hotel other than the free WiFi, which is not password protected (meaning you don’t have to be a paying guest to use it). This is a security threat for any paying guests using the hotel’s WiFi. Other technologies include a lift, or elevator as we would say across the pond in the states, as well as a tap to enter keycard system. They also require an active room keycard to access the hallways containing the rooms after using the lift from the lobby. This is an added security feature for guests.

The air conditioning works well. But it’s extremely strange to walk into a room with no surfaces at all. The room, by the way, does not look like the photos I saw— photos that had strange-looking modern bunkbeds with nice wooden frames and ambient lighting was not my room at all. There are multiple light switches but they are switches that control the same lights, not any sort of ambient lighting. The beds are on a normal frame and you can’t see the frame. There’s no headboard, which doesn’t really matter. The point I’m trying to make here is that the nice modern-looking wooden bed frames from the photos I saw of this place are not in my room.

When I went to check in, it was 20 minutes to 1pm and they said I had to pay 40 pound for early check in and that my room would be ready in 5-10 minutes and that they would come get me in the lobby and give me my room keys. An hour later, since nobody had come up to me, I went up to the front desk and they said my room was ready. But I felt like I had been bamboozled out of 40 pound at that point. I could have simply waited another hour in the lobby until check-in time at 3pm and saved the 40 pound.

I thought the star system for hotels had something to do with guest amenities and either I’m wrong about that, or this place is not a 3-star hotel. Don’t be fooled by the Zedwell because the Zedwell is all about the minimum and you’ll notice this not in the lobby, but when you enter your room.

Having said that, the sink and toilet are fairly nice, but how much time is spent in there relative to the amount of time spent in the room? The bathroom is actually slightly nicer than the rest of the room. If I wanted to, I could use the sink as a surface for charging my cell phone. I could even use the toilet as a chair and turn it into a disgusting little office. Obviously that’s sarcasm but seriously though, should I leave the bathroom door open to make the entire hotel room seem nicer?

The best aspect about the Zedwell has nothing to do with the hotel itself. It has a good location in Piccadilly Circus and that’s why I ultimately chose this hotel to stay in. But it’s a barebones hotel, don’t be fooled into thinking you’re getting a good deal in terms of amenities. The room is a box with a bed, no window, and an attached bathroom.

And when I say, “don’t be fooled by the Zedwell,” I don’t mean that it’s a gross hotel or anything like that. It’s certainly nice enough for me, and it’s clean. I simply mean that there is a representation of the Zedwell out there with photos that is completely unlike my experience at the Zedwell, meaning that I didn’t get exactly what I...

Buckle up, I'm about to take you on the roller coaster ride that we had staying in this hotel. This hotel was awful and I would never recommend it.

Here's what happened:

When we checked in, there was a man half naked, in his underwear, in our room. I literally opened the door and yelped, quickly closed the door and ran down the hallway. We went to the front desk to obviously ask what was going on. They were apologetic and sent us up to the wrong room. We were given a different room. But the crazy part, is that when we checked in, the man told us to wait 5 minutes while he personally checked the room. And he left. Then came back, telling us everything was good. So which room did he check??? I did not feel safe after that, staying in this hotel. I felt bad for the man sleeping too! He's never going to know that someone was able to get into his room.

An alarm apparently goes off inside your room, every Monday afternoon. No one told us this. There is no signage anywhere, alerting you to the fact that they test the fire alarms at this time. And it doesn't just go on for a few seconds. It's LOUD and it lasts a while. When this happened I ran out of my room, I was barely dressed. I had my backpack and shoes in my hand and no socks on. I genuinely thought there was a fire somewhere. I ran down to the front desk and realized no one else was panicking. I asked what was going on, only to be told that it's an alarm test. This is insane that the hotel is not at least warning guests. There should be signs up all over the lobby telling people what to expect. The kicker is that I met a janitor in the hallway when it started happening and asked him about it, and he had no idea! So the staff are not educated about their alarm tests and he could not help me.

The gym is ridiculously hard to figure out how to sign up for - you need to download an app to schedule a time to use it. But then you also need a second app to unlock the gym door. And you need to pay for the gym. I will say, the gym is very nice. But the staff are not very helpful when you ask them any questions about it. I had to ask 3 staff members before I actually figured out I needed to download an app to schedule a time to use the gym. They are not educated about basic things in the hotel.

The bathrooms in your rooms have see-through glass, which means anyone else in your room is going to watch you poop, pee, or shower. It's slightly blurred, but it's quite obvious. Yet on the web site it says very plainly that it's perfect for families with kids. That's gross. I've seen reviews of this place talking about this exact issue - a family had a son and daughter in their teens. They couldn't even shower comfortably because the whole family had to leave the room while one person showered. I love my fiance but I don't want him to listen to me poop. Or the other way around. I don't understand who thought transparent glass in the whole bathroom, was a good idea.

When you shower, water gets all over the floor due to the way the shower is designed.

In the rooms there's no windows so the ventilation is not the best. If you have allergies you may have issues.

Staff don't clean your room. I was told to just take off the do not disturb sign and they'll clean it. Nope. We stayed at this hotel for almost three weeks. They didn't clean our room once. I politely asked once to the front desk, for them to clean, and then they didn't come so I just didn't feel like complaining a second time and wasting my time.

The main light switch by the door started making loud crackling noises whenever it was on - this can be indicative of a fire hazard so I ended up leaving the main light off for the duration of the stay. At this point I did not even ask the front desk to fix it because there were just so many other things that they had not followed through on, like having our room cleaned. I highly doubt they could get an electrician to fix it in time. Therefore we only had the bathroom lights for the rest...

I am not the kind of person to leave negative reviews. When I encounter a poor experience, I typically move on and take it as a lesson learned. But this was just ridiculous. And the fact that some people here dealt with worse than I did? Lord.

Despite the great reviews on Expedia, I tried to cancel my booking after hearing about an ongoing issue with bed bugs. My friends told me to go and see how it is anyway, and to talk to the reception desk if the room I got had issues otherwise I’d be out hundreds of dollars if I ended up with a room that was fine. Of course I was not so lucky.

It was bad enough that I was told my booking was cancelled when I arrived, even though I was never able to go through with any cancellation without loss of funds. Then when I finally get a room, I made sure to go check it out for myself while my sister waited in the lobby with our luggage. I didn’t want to risk anything after all the reviews and photo evidence I saw from other people. The hallways themselves were like a maze, the lighting was dim that you couldn’t even see the signs that pointed you where to go. There were questionable stains on the carpeting everywhere. Lo and behold, after finally making it to the room, I found what appeared to be dead bed bugs on the mattress, along with stains on the bed and linens, and other dirt on the floor in a room that looked nothing like I originally booked. I immediately went downstairs to talk to the front desk, and a bald man who appeared to be the manager said they would investigate right away with their “expert,” give me a new room that he guaranteed would be “spotless,” and throw in a free breakfast with “the best view of London.” None of that mattered to me. I’ve completely lost any confidence in this establishment and how they ran it. I just wanted a refund. But they refused, saying they’re “not trying to make war” with me and a refund is not possible because of their policy. How can they expect anybody to want to stay in a place with bed bugs? The manager went with me back to the room to see for himself but he insists it was just dirt. Okay, and? Whether it be bed bugs or dirt, shouldn’t you be ensuring that the rooms are clean and sanitized for each guest prior to their arrival? You claim to be a 4-star hotel but clearly it’s not.

After receiving the card to the next room, I went to check it out and there were huge stains on the mattress. I was just done with it. I booked a new hotel immediately (Page8 Hotel, which gave us our room immediately upon check-in when we arrived 30 minutes later despite the last minute booking), and high-tailed it out of there with my sister, but not before returning their room card to the front desk and telling them I refused to stay in a place with bed bugs.

If that’s not enough to turn you away from this place, then check the reviews and see how they respond to other guests. They do not care about the state of their hotel or what they’re putting their guests through. They are apathetic and completely aware of this ongoing bed bugs issue but will do nothing about it despite claiming to. Not only that, they’re even sarcastic in some of their responses to people’s reviews. Is that professional? No. I’d give this place 0 stars if I could. Currently in the midst of getting my money back. Absolutely horrible hotel with horrible unhelpful staff to boot. Do not stay here.

I would recommend Page8 Hotels, which was about 5 minutes away by car, and is also in a beautiful convenient location as well. They provided everything we needed and their cafe in the lobby had delicious food. People deserve better than Zedwell Piccadilly Circus. It’s a poor excuse of a business. Do yourself a favor and save the stress, book...