Premier Inn Cardiff Bay

good and no issue

Close to the Cardiff Bay area and a very short bus to the main city and Cardiff Castle. Breakfast was excellent (but no muesli). Rooms spacious but no fridge (I think that the UK don't do fridges) we did enjoy our stay and would fully recommend staying here. Car park is next door at a multi carpark which is subsidised by the hotel @ 25 - 30%.

Not the best experience on this occasion. Stayed a few times always been good. All self check ins out of order. Rang bell for reception and waited 15 mins before having to find a member of staff so I could get checked in. Then they decided to test fire alarm 1815-1845 on a Sunday when a poster displayed clearly states it’s checked 12noon on a Monday. No notice was given about the test. Tried to call reception to see if it was a test and no answer so had to email and the reply was very dismissive.

I’ve stayed many, many times at this hotel and it’s usually always busy but well staffed. My most recent stay though started really badly. Like three others (in the queue at reception behind me), the key charging system wouldn’t work so I needed receptionist help. None of the other check in machines worked either. After ringing the ‘help’ buzzer 9 times and waiting 15 minutes, I headed down to the restaurant where I could see some staff and asked one girl for help, to be told she was in the middle of doing an order. No problem, I thought. I went back to reception and waited a further ten minutes brilliantly someone came and sorted out mine and other peoples keys. Then I went to dinner and was kept waiting ages for my food. When I asked and checked it had been ordered, the female chef barked that “not all food is made in the microwave” meaning it was being cooked. Just very slowly. It’s not even a busy night in the restaurant . Less than half full. I’m not sure what’s happened to this branch of PI but it’s honestly downhill very much since my last stay only a few months ago. The is building work going on as well and my bedroom window is covered with netting, so I wont see any light. I really think they need to put some love back in this branch. The staff seem really stressed, the food portions were quite small and it’s freezing here too! Oh dear.

Check-in was chaotic, with long queues and only one of the three digital check-in machines working. There were no signs indicating that the other two were out of order, so guests kept trying to use them, adding to the frustration. My room was clean and comfortable, but the pillows were quite firm. Although a kettle and two glass mugs were provided, there were no drink-making supplies at all—something I mentioned to staff upon checkout. Additionally, bottled water wasn’t provided. It’s worth noting that parking and breakfast were not included in the stay.

I highly recommend Cardiff Bay, where I stayed a couple of weeks ago. So I tried to give Premier Inn a detailed and excellent review about many aspects of my stay. BUT now I am very fed up with Premier Inn asking me for reviews. I've tried to give a positive one twice and it's taken me ages. It asks for loads of details. If you go back it loses everything you've already put in. I gave up after a long time the first time I tried and I can't remember the details of why any more. Today I had another email asking for feedback and decided I would do a short positive one, because it was really good. This time it wouldn't allow a short review. So I decided to tell them about the rotten review process, as I'm doing on Trip Advisor now. It was difficult to find a way to do that. When I thought I'd found a way, it asked for dates, which I had to look them up. Then it lost everything I'd written. That's when I gave up and went to Trip Advisor. I hope Trip Advisor will publish this message and Premier Inn will pass it to someone who has the ability to improve it. It's sad that I'm so fed up after such a good stay.