Sofitel Sydney Wentworth 5 gwiazdki

I booked 4 rooms to stay with family for 2 nights to see the fireworks at the Opera House in Sydney. This is my second time staying with the hotel. The location has a very convenient access to the harbour and is only a 10 minutes leisure walk to the Opera House and Circular Quay. Although the hotel is a bit tired, it is elegant. The bed is comfortable, the Club Lounge is of general Sofitel 5 stars services. Check in experience was great despite of the hotel was fully booked. We had the New Year Eve dinner at The Garden Court Restaurant, the restaurant is spacious, the services and food were excellent. The reason I only gives the overall rating of 4/5 is: I was only given award points for two rooms instead of 4 rooms which I booked. After calling the hotel booking at Sofitel I was told they will check with the manager and get back to me. It is now 3 weeks since my call, neither the reward points have been corrected nor got a call from the hotel. As an Accor Gold member I am a bit disappointed on this.

Very good, Rooms clean and comfortable, great location within walking distance to most locations shopping, the opera house and ferries. great friendly helpful staff. breakfast, afternoon tea and pre dinner drinks was excellent.

I find myself deeply conflicted in giving this review. I have stayed at this Sofitel a few times previously and, it seems that each time I return, I continue to be wowed by the beauty and comfort of the rooms and the hotel itself but become progressively dismayed by the declining quality of service. First of all, I'll start with the positive aspects of my stay. Firstly, it cannot be disputed on my part that the interior of the hotel and its rooms is spectacular and breathtakingly beautiful. The hotel lobby is warm, modern, very well-lit and inviting and there are lots of comfortable seats around (meaning that even when check-in was crowded, as it was when I checked in on NYE 2022, you could still sit around and relax and wait for the crowds to clear. It was a pleasure spending time in the lobby. The rooms are still as magical, beautiful, spacious and comfortable as I remember them and in fact they caused me to add an extra star onto this review. The lighting is warm and welcoming, the light switches easy to use (not always a given in these types of hotels) and the temperature comfortable. The work desk and the chair were adequate, functional and up to standard. The bed was divinely comfortable and the abundant supply of pillows and cushions appreciated. The armchair and foot rest were very comfortable and relaxing and allowed me to spend hours of end demolishing much of a very long novel which I had with me -this aspect in particular was greatly appreciated. The oval shaped bathrooms are a particular treat at this hotel, beautiful design with a beautiful interior. As someone with minor disability and mobility issues, I found the toilet here to be one of the most user-friendly I've encountered in a hotel and the combined shower and bath, while a little low, was also easy to navigate. The TV controls were also easy to navigate, which is not always a given at some hotels. (although I couldn't find the in-house movie service, only cable TV, is this just an oversight on my part or does the Sofitel not have this?). It is always a massive pleasure and privilege to stay in a Sofitel hotel room and this time was no exception And there were aspects to the service I'd like to commend. I did think there could be more people on the desks for check-in on a busy day like NYE and it did seem a little slow at times but, that having been said, it was still much faster than it could have been and has been at some of the hotels I've stayed at during less busy times of the year so that is to be commended. The actual check-in itself was amazing -fast, efficient and the very friendly receptionist even allowed me to keep the pen that I used to sign in. Actually, I must single-out the receptionists at this hotel, they were always very patient and helpful. When I was having problems with swiping my key on the lift's interface, for instance, one of them came into the lift and helped me -which was also greatly appreciated. The complimentary box of chocolates and bottle of wine which I found in my room, presumably as a NYE gift, were of great value and quality and were greatly appreciated on my part, helping to make NYE celebrations that extra special (one of my great disappointments on this trip was finding that the chocolatier in the lobby from where it came and which I've enjoyed on previous visits, was closed for the first week of January, but I'm not holding this against the business or the hotel, perfectly understandable staff need time off). The abundance of complimentary watter bottles delivered to my room on a daily basis was also greatly appreciated. The cleaning staff were friendly and did a great job, of particular mention was the Fijian cleaner with whom I had a very warm and friendly conversation on one of my days here). Room service, if a little overpriced, was of good quality (apart from some issues I'll raise later on). The staff at the Soiree were very friendly and helpful. The complimentary Internet access was an added bonus of staying at this hotel, too many Sydney hotels seem to charge like a wounded bull for this and it's wonderful to see a hotel which doesn't Now, unfortunately, we have to move on to the bad points. It firstly started with the fact that my baggage took an eternity to be delivered to my room, one of the longest waits I've had for luggage in my travels around the globe. I'm led to believe that there may have been some misunderstanding about my identity and the room it was supposed to be delivered to, and I'm also willing to allow some leeway for the fact that it was NYE and it must have been busy, but it was still frustrating. The telephone service in this hotel has also gone greatly downhill. It was almost impossible to get hold of room service, they almost always never answered, and my call would often get redirected somewhere else, which also sometimes either never got answered or only answered after a long time. Quite a few times, I had to hang up and try again. A few times, I got disconnected (I hope I got disconnected, it did feel like once or twice I got hung up on, but I'm willing to give the benefit of the doubt here). A few times, I got put through to the receptionist, whom in some cases seemingly (according to them) had to physically trundle all the way up to wherever the room service people were to relay my order and then the kitchen would have to ring me up to confirm my order once again. It was terribly inconvenient and frustrating and I've rarely come across such consistently disorganized and unresponsive service in any other hotel. Additionally, the concierge never seemed to answer his/her phone on the days I called whoever it was for help, which was also incredibly frustrating. It meant I had to keep calling the poor front desk receptionist to sort out my issues and I'm sure they have better things to do. I recognize that COVID has now ensured that hotels no longer keep room service menus or a min-bar in the hotel room and, while I find this immeasurably frustrating, I perfectly understand and respect the health advice/logic behind that. That having been said, I think that only giving hotel patrons the option of scanning a QVR code they must scan to give access to the room service menu is problematic because there are many people who are not proficient or tech-savvy enough to be able to use this technology or at the very least will need assistance with it. I do thank the very kind member of staff whom, when I complained about this, sent me up a printed up menu so that it wouldn't be an issue for me. However, why does this hotel not do what some other hotels do and put the room service menu up on the TV's hotel network? After all, the rest of the hotel directory guide seems to be there. Also, I'm disappointed that room service no longer is available after 23:00PM. I realize staff logistical issues associated with keeping an all-night kitchen but most hotels of this star quality have one and I'm pretty sure Sofitel used to at one stage. For business travelers working late, for people who have missed dinner at the normal times or just for people who make up in the middle of the night feeling peckish, an all-night room service (even with cut back items) is a valued part of the experience staying at a hotel Additionally, while I found the choice of main dishes on the room servie menu to be commendably diverse and wide-ranging, I do think it could do with a greater selection of dessert and entree items My final issue had to do with the cleaning which, while exceptional in both personnel and service (my heart always goes out to cleaning staff at hotels, I imagine it is one of the least pleasant occupations there is), did let me down slightly on one day. On one of the days of my stay, I needed to use the room in the afternoon and the evening and therefore wanted my room cleaned while I was out for a few hours in the morning. I phoned up housekeeping and specifically asked for my room to be cleaned as soon as possible. I don't expect housekeeping to drop everything and attend to my room but, in most hotels of this type I have stayed in, the room has been cleaned up within the space of a few hours. I was greatly disappointed to find that, upon my return to my room in a few hours, my room was still not cleaned. In fact, it was another two or so hous after I'd returned that they finally got around to doing it, making it approximately four hours since I'd first asked for it to be done In summary, I still find it a great pleasure and privilege to stay in this hotel because of its beautiful and comfortable rooms and interior and the professionalism and courtesy of the majority of its staff. I would stay here again and hope to do so in the future and would recommend it to others. That said, it dismays me to see the quality of its service decline each time I visit and I am worried that it will keep on this downhill slide. I urge the powers that be in this hotel to look at how things were done about ten years ago, when I first stayed here, and seek to recreate those high standards of excellence to compliment the amazing rooms and the great staff.

The hotel is fulfilling all Sofitel standards, in terms of service, comfort and cleanliness. So is the room. The breakfast buffet is quite pricey ( $47 ) but the quality of the offerings is also of high standards. The club sandwich baguette in the Soiree restaurant is delicious ! ;))

We stayed three nights at the Sofitel just before Christmas. Our overall impression was that the staff were disinterested and it didn’t compare with the usual Sofitel standard and our usual experience having stayed at many. Unfortunately to top it all off we had Christmas gifts including a smart watch STOLEN from our room by a staff member. When we brought this to the attention of management they kept insisting we had misplaced our items. They eventually agreed to investigate but clearly this did not happen as we received an email regarding our lost property. We replied with a stern email insisting on further investigation but alas we have had no further correspondence from management. I don’t understand why the Sofitel isn’t more concerned about a dishonest staff member? We will never stay there again!