The Devil's Punchbowl Hotel — Restaurant in Waverley

My new wife and I stayed here on our wedding night having booked the "bridal" suite. To summarise this review, this hotel is more of a £20 a night hotel rather than £68!

It all started when we tried to check in, there was a sign on the reception that said if no-one is available on reception please check in at the bar... Fair enough so we moved over to the bar.

We got walked past and ignored 4 times! We then got her attention and asked if we could check in. We got a VERY rude and short answer saying "in a moment, you can see I am busy". To make it even worse we were still in our wedding outfits, so pretty obvious we were in a rush to get onto our reception.

Not once did we get a congratulations or any sort of nicety you would expect from anyone in the service industry, let alone a so called top class hotel.

So finally we are checked in and have our room key, so the room... Considering that when booking we had made sure that they were aware that it would be our wedding day, so not too much to expect maybe 1 or 2 nice touches in the room. We walked in to find a 4 poster bed where some of the beams were actually broken and hanging loose, paint peeling off the walls, a "jacuzzi bath" that did not work.

So not a great start really, but it only gets worse from here.

After our reception we came back to the hotel with some of our guests that were also staying at the hotel. This was at 22:50. We then asked to have a drink at bar and were promptly told that the bar was closed! What sort of hotel closes their bar before 11pm and further still does not stay open for residents! We were pretty shocked and did try to ask them why they had closed so early.

This prompted the answer that they always close at 11pm (It wasnt even 11 yet! they also made sure we knew that they had cashed up too). So this ended up in an argument about how UN-accommodating they are. They eventually relented saying that we could each get 1 drink but we have to take it to our rooms as we were not allowed to stay in the bar area. We were also told that we must have the exact amounts otherwise they would not give us change! The cheek!

We did take them up on this offer as we did want to have a post reception drink together with family and went to our room. About 15 minutes later I went back down as we thought one of our family members had left their phone in the bar area. They allowed me in to have a look and to my utter amazement there were other guests sitting in the bar DRINKING FULL DRINKS. So not sure why on site we seemed like people that are not allowed the privilege of drinking in the hotel bar!

I then went back to my room, fuming, finished my drink and we settled down for the night. The next morning we went down for breakfast.

We had to wait for 10 mins for one of the staff to finally acknowledge us and let us in for our breakfast. Now one of the small expectations I have for any hotel offering breakfast is a buffet for the hot breakfast. We know we all like to take this opportunity to have more than 1 or 2 sausages/eggs/bacon/etc. Not here no way! I got asked if I would like a hot breakfast which I did, When it arrived all you get is 1 sausage, 1 egg, 1 rasher of bacon, 1 hashbrown and some beans. Pretty stingy really! No offer or chance of a 2nd round either.

Maybe it is just because I have already been let down so much by this establishment but I really do expect better, especially when paying more than your average hotel price.

I would also like to add that at 8am they started up heavy machinery outside to aid the decorating of the exterior of the hotel. Now most people that stay in a hotel expect some peace and quiet, not a hydraulic cherry picker making a racket right outside room windows.

I have searched for a contact for the owner Sonia Rehman but it appears she doesn't want people to contact her, who can blame her when her hotel is so disappointing!

Needless to say I will not be staying here again and am extremely unlikely to recommend this...

DO NOT STAY HERE AT ALL BELIEVE ALL THE NEGATIVE REVIEWS The photos of the rooms on Booking.com bare no resemblance to the rooms our party stayed in. Not worth the money we paid. Please do not spend your hard earnt money in this place.|The 1 star is for the Croatian member of staff who seemed to be Jack of All Trades. |On arrival we had to wait 20 minutes in a tired DIRTY looking reception area where you could see the disabled toilet facility looking dirty and giving of a bad smell (not fit for purpose) |we were then given our keys and we made our way up to our rooms on route noticing that hand rail was thick with ground in dirt to the point you did not want to use it, carpet was tried but the landing window was thick with cobwebs and a build up of dirt evident not been cleaned for years.|As we got to the bedroom door we noticed that the fire extinguisher was missing.|When we opened the door if it was not late I would have walked out. The room was so DIRTY it was unbelievable. Skirting boards had not been touched, windows in the room and ensuite (if you can call it that) were the same as the landing. Lampshades and headboard were broken with layers of dust on them. |The bed was not very comfortable, the pillows were very thin that looked like they had clean pillowcases on, looked for extras which we found in the wardrobe/cupboard in the room my goodness these were disgustingly unclean and not fit for purpose. We asked for extra pillows got them eventually but were not any better than the ones on the bed.|I stayed fully clothed for the night as I really did not fancy sleeping between the sheets.|Bathroom was DIRTY with mould etc around the bath area.|The wall behind the bathroom door when closed and you were sat on the toilet you could write a book in the dust/dirt. |The toilet did not flush until you removed the system box lid to knock the boy down for toilet to refill before flushing. |Bathroom bin was broken. |Everything you touched was dirty and had a greasy feel to it. |The other members of the party described their room very similar to ours but thy had wallpaper pealing of and very unfortunately they dropped something behind the bed and they said it was disgusting the bed had not been moved for years.|Breakfast was a set menu and you were able to pick 1 listed item if you wanted more you were expected to pay for it. Cereal and orange juice was not even an option.|On leaving the establishment there was no one in sight to make a complaint and request a refund. |The restaurant looked the cleanest part of the whole establishment bar area was dirty but not to the extent of the bedrooms.|There are pictures already on Trip advisor showing the disgrace of this establishment so there is no need...

On arrival the building is tired but we expected that as reviews had said that it needed updating but was clean. That is not true! ||We entered the reception area but the desk unmanned. This wasn’t such an issue as we had arrived later in the evening so my husband followed the instructions and went to the bar to get someone. There was only one person behind the bar and so we had to wait approximately 15 minutes before we were checked in. This gave me time to look around the reception area which was shabby and in need of a good clean. This did not fill me with any confidence about what we would find upstairs. ||The stairs to the bedrooms is a charming, little old spiral staircase - or at least it would be if you ignore the flaking paint, sticky, dirty carpet and the disabled toilet (also filthy) which is situated at the bottom of the stairs with the door wide open so that whether you are going up or down, your greeted by the sight and smell of the toilet. ||We proceeded along a corridor which once again was not only outdated but grubby - the paintwork would not look out of place in a crack den.||And then we entered our double bedroom. Again, I was expecting dated decor and furniture but this was the thing of nightmares - in fact it would be a great filming location for a horror film. ||The double bed appeared to have crisp white linen but only one paper thin pillow each. The bottom sheet was also thin and revealed a stained mattress with not mattress protector. My husband located tow more pillows in a cupboard, along with a screwed up bedcover. These pillows didn’t have pillowcases on, and just as well because on sight of them, there was no way I was putting them anywhere near my head. The ones on the bed were not as bad, just thin.||It didn’t stop there… the tea/coffee station hadn’t been wiped over for a long time, the carpet was filthy (I kept my shoes on) the walls and ceiling stained and the skirting boards thick with grime and dust.||As we had arrived late, we were out of options in terms of finding elsewhere to stay, which what I wanted to do. In the end, I laid the bath towels on top of the bed and slept fully clothed all night. ||Needless to say, the desk was unmanned when we left in...