Holiday Inn Express Rotherham - North by IHG — Hotel in Rotherham

First impressions were a clean, professional and impersonal hotel - much the same as any other business based hotel.

This impression changed quickly - this is not a nameless, faceless monolith, but rather a reasonable sized hotel, providing a personal service by enthusiastic staff.

Check-in: Seamless check-in, staff not quite sure where or why they were recording personal details, and unable to identify data usage when asked

Room amenities: Double bed - with a big gap in the middle as the mattress had not been correctly placed and therefore unable to be zipped together. Not quite enough hangers for a week's worth of shirts, but that's ok, as I couldn't get hold of an Iron / ironing board for the first 2 days!

Plenty of sockets Plenty of desk space Kettle, hairdryer, TV with freeview (and an awful remote and no channel guide) Aircon. (as windows don't open)

Bathroom: Shower (no bath) which leaked on to the floor every time it was used. Good shower. Good pressure. Good temperature control.

Dinner: "buffet" style dinner each night - although there is a menu also available. Buffet is a possible misnomer: This simply allows the chef to put plates of canteen style food out on to a hot plate. Italian buffet - 2 x choices and a vegetarian option, along with salad. Indian buffet - 2 x choices and a vegetarian option, along with salad. Pie buffet?!! - 2 x choices and a vegetarian option, with salad Fish buffet - the same.

All left under a heat lamp for too long every night, but if you watch out for the chef coming out to replace the food then you can get some decent food.

Breakfast: Cereals, pastries, coffees, fruit teas, fruit juices, fruit, yoghurts. Scrambled egg, Lincolnshire Sausages, Beans. Toast. Just as you would expect - with the exception of one dodgy serving of scrambled egg.

All of the above is a fairly average review. What made this a memorable experience for me was the staff: If I could remember anyone else's name apart from Jordan and Amy then I would also mention them here: From the individual who was dealing with the whole front desk process when staff hadn't shown up and had already went out of their way to buy extra irons so that I would stop moaning, to the chef who made sure that I had a fresh sauce to go with my fish.

Duty Manager's wild shirt / plain waistcoat combination was an interesting talking point, and was admirably worn 2 days in a row with different patterns.

The staff took the time to speak to me like a human being, and their conversation seemed genuine and their assistance went beyond the "Hospitality Handbook"

I would happily recommend the premises to others staying in the area. There is an Aldi about 27 seconds from the front door on foot. There is a Marstons Pub about 42 seconds away.

Clean. Reasonable priced rooms. reasonable priced food, check with your bank manager before buying a drink, but most importantly, take the time to talk to the staff. They are fabulous....

Stayed at this hotel many times, easily 10 times but our most recent stay has made it be out last. Arrived at the hotel, parking was straightforward and easy as always. Check-in was fast and simple. The hotel is also using good practices throughout these challenging Covid-19 times too. Our room was generally clean and tidy however the bathroom could do with paining as the bathroom had paint falling off in a few places and the toilet flush was somewhat broken. The heavy flush worked fine but if you pressed the light flush the button fell through into the wall cavity behind. These little things didn’t bother us too much, not enough to complain anyway. So myself and my fiancé got settled in the room, she opened her laptop so she could carry on with her work course online. Connected to the wifi fine however once connected it was running so slow it wasn’t even useable. Again not something we would usually complain about, this happens at many hotels so we usually just connect up through a hotspot. We tried to do this and quickly realised neither of our phones would connect to our networks either. We are on 2 different networks so this seemed a little odd. We got signal just fine in the hotel lobby, outside the hotel etc but as soon as we entered the room it just wouldn’t have it. Tried to reset our networks and waited half an hour but still nothing so I decided to go down to reception and explain the situation that my other half was needing to do her course work. After speaking with the member of staff she basically just said that she would not be offering us a room change because of this reason but they could however send the IT guys up to come and take a look at the wifi issue. Again explained that it wasn’t just a wifi issue but that we could not connect to 3 different networks and that it was as though the room was a total dead spot for receiving signal. Still had no help whatsoever so just told her that it was fine and we would make do with what we had. A gentle reminder that guests are paying for their stays here, the hotel itself and the car park was empty so there would have clearly been no issue with having space to move us. Like I said above we have stayed in this hotel many many times and had no issues regarding this or any other matter. Its just very disappointing that dealing with one staff member can make the decision for you that you will not stay at the premises again. Obviously after that I was never going to mention the problem with the flush in the bathroom as it just didn’t feel worth dealing with such member of staff again. Overall I wouldn’t say to avoid this hotel as we have had many good stays here, but I do hope you don’t have any issues on your stay and have to deal with this staff member as I fear you will be met with the same ignorance and...

Amazing staff but Hotel could do with extra investment to utilise full potential. Common areas are a little worn and dated. Breakfast is very variable. One day bacon and sausages swimming in fat next much better. Rooms could do with led lighting. After initial investment it would dace money and provide better lighting than the energy bulbs currently in use. Rooms could do with more window space. Our room had to large blackout curtains but only one window. On a cloudy day light is very limited. Bar area runs in a corridor style from reception to the restaurant. Restaurant is well laid out but gets very busy. Walk in rate displayed at reception is invariably much higher than on comparison web sites, so best to book online, rather than just turn up. Rooms which are odd numbered are quietest. Even numbers face a busy road and, even with double glazing, can be disturbing to noise sensitive guests. Plenty of disabled bays and all close to reception. One placard invites disabled guests to call reception for help from hotel staff bur doesn't show phone number. If you have a reservation email the number is also on there.

Public toilets on ground floor were clean and we'll maintained.

Room sizes for accessible rooms are some of the largest I have come across.

Our rate was very competitive and I believe this hotel is one of the best in the area. Various web sites rate this hotel very highly.

You can definitely see signs of recent improvements in hotel. The refurbishments seem to be ongoing but are not obtrusive at all.

For the area and footfall this hotel has I believe that this hotel is well worth a visit. We stayed over 4 nights in August so had view of both weekday and weekend service.

Week days also include a laundry service and also a wider menu for the bar dinner service.

There is a conference room on ground floor (Possibly more elsewhere which we didn't see) and two very fast and independent lifts. The hotel is based on 4 levels, with each level laid out in a corridor style with rooms on either side of the corridor.

This hotel is very close to Barnsley. Doncaster and the Yorkshire Dales and Moors are only a short distance away, as is the M1 Motorway.

I don't normally post such long reviews but I believe this hotel deserves one. From the outside it certainly doesn't have the same level of appeal as it does...