Hotel Delta a Broxbourne

I stayed in one of the updated rooms and was upgraded to a courtyard view, not much of an upgrade but better than facing the car park perhaps. This room (12) was on the ground floor and gave you access via sliding doors to a small table and chairs within the courtyard. As a lone female traveller I do not like ground floor rooms facing on to courtyards like this but the hotel was hardly occupied and I felt reasonably safe after checking the sliding doors to the courtyard were secure. As a regular of this hotel pre-pandemic and pre closure and subsequent change of ownership (franchisee), I was keen to see what had changed. Not much it turns out. Reception service was not a good as before and the young man on reception wasn’t exactly welcoming. You now have to pay for parking, which is utterly ridiculous. Who abusing the parking such that a separate charge is needed? Just make it part of the room rate. The updated room was ok. A cosmetic makeover at best and sloppily done in places, edges of paintwork, grouting, dented towel rail, no hairdryer. But if you know what the old rooms are like the update is welcome and long, long overdue. The bed was as comfortable as before. The aircon unit, although welcome during the mini heat wave, is the same old unit and it rattles and rumbles throughout the night. The rooms themselves are exactly the same layout as before except the horrible old bath tubs have been replaced with decent showers. The low profile shower tray meant the bathroom floor got quite wet but I liked the large, refillable, ItWorks toiletries in the bathroom I just wish that housekeeping would not replace the little wrapped hand soap everyday, that felt wasteful. Housekeeping generally was poor. I had the previous guests wet bath towel hanging behind the door day one, a bottle of glass cleaner left on my room on day two and no bath mat on day three. I also strongly dislike the pungent air freshener that is pumped throughout the hotel. It’s always been like this, it’s just this time I found it really overpowering. I did not eat here on this trip but the restaurant and bar appeared to be offering the same fare as before.