Greatly helpful staff. Hospitality at its best!!

I am writing this review to warn other travelers about a serious security incident at Mercure Cardiff on 28/8/26. Late at night, while my elderly mother and young daughter were inside their room, an unauthorized individual unlocked and entered the room using a keycard. Although the person left immediately upon realizing the room was occupied, this represents an appalling breach of basic security and guest safety. What makes this situation even worse is the hotel’s complete disregard for guest safety following the incident: - Zero Accountability: The front desk and security team dismissed the incident by simply claiming 'nothing was seen on the CCTV footage,' completely ignoring the possibility of blind spots, staff misuse, or duplicate keycards. - Ignored Escalation: Despite my repeated requests for an official investigation and a full Door Lock Audit Log (to verify electronically which keycard opened the door), management has provided NO formal response, NO explanation, and NO update. Leaving a senior citizen and a young child vulnerable in a hotel room with compromised keycard access is completely unacceptable. To date, the hotel has shown zero urgency or remorse. I strongly advise families, solo travelers, and especially anyone traveling with elderly family members or children to AVOID staying here until management takes guest safety seriously and addresses keycard security vulnerabilities.

I have done my review, the air con, hotel food and staff need improved. Not a 4 star hotel.

Whilst the price was good, the rooms were clean and the beds were comfortable, I was very disappointed by my overall experience. There was only 3 disabled bays, and while I understand that these cannot be reserved and are first come, first served, the normal bays were incredibly narrow, and this makes it very difficult for me to get in and out of my car when I am the only driver. It's not like I could get my 16yr old son to park it for me. Having booked through booking.com, I sent a message in advance to say that I am disabled, and while I did not require an accessible room, I would need to be on either the ground or first floor at most if a lift was not available. Luckily there was a lift as we were on the 3rd floor, but I never received any response or acknowledgement from the hotel to my message. I was sent an email 2 days prior to my stay, inviting me to select add-ons in advance. I followed the link and selected to pay for the parking and breakfast, which was listed at £10 for each. I received an automated acknowledgement email, but had not been given the option of adding more than one breakfast. I was able to reply to the email, so I did that and asked about adding another breakfast. Again, I received no response, but also, no money was taken. Upon arrival at the hotel, they claimed to have no record of my add on request, and told me that if I wanted to pay for breakfast at that point, it was £15.95, or I could wait until the morning and pay £17.95! I showed them the email I had received and was told the prices had gone up recently. I asked when, and they said 2 months ago, so not within the last 48h when I had requested it. They said there was nothing they could do about the price, although they did agree to waive the parking charge. I reluctantly paid the higher price and went on to my room. Extra pillows were requested and bought up very promptly. My son and I decided to have a game of pool when we returned from dinner later in the evening. The entire reception / lounge area was filthy, covered in used cups, glasses and plates that were not cleared away the whole time we were down there. The following morning, we arrived at the restaurant for breakfast, only to be told they had no record of us having paid for it! It wasn't on the restaurant check in sheet, and when he called across to the receptionist to ask if she had a record of it, she took claimed there was nothing on the system. As you can imagine, I was incredibly fed up by this point. I said I still had the receipt for it in my room and started to walk away to go back and retrieve it, but he did call me back, asked how much we paid and then "generously" let us through. I actually wish he hadn't. I'd have been disappointed if if paid £10 for what was on offer, the food was disgusting. The fried eggs were rubbery and tasted very strongly of oil and nothing else, the bacon was fatty and the scrambled eggs were watery and completely unseasoned. Most of the cooked breakfast items were completely inedible. We would have been better off driving 2 minutes down the road to the Harvester for their £4.99 breakfast. I also had a croissant, which at those prices should have been decent, but was disappointingly not even a proper croissant, more like a soft bread roll. It was almost certainly not freshly made. For the mass catering rubbish that was being served, the prices you are charging are ridiculous. The hotel claims to be 4*. I have received better service at 2* hotels.

Spacious queen bed, good size TV and tea-making facilities. Was at the end of hotel closest to main road so some road noise but fortunately I had brought ear plugs so no problem. Breakfast had a good choice and well-cooked - good value I thought. Biggest issue was poor light quality in the room - just lamps by bed, nothing overhead and nothing by desk. After a couple of hours sitting at the tiny desk working between paper notes and laptop, I really felt the strain on my eyes and a bedtime read was out of the question. So if you are staying for leisure or are a youngster who doesn't need reading glasses, you will probably love this hotel but for me as a "mature" business user wanting a bright environment with desk space for a laptop and second mobile screen, sadly didn't suit.

The hotel was ok! In need of an update especially the rooms and the furniture in reception which was really grubby. No food available after 9 ish on a Saturday evening and nothing around to get anything. Somewhere to stay but that’s about it.

The positives Close to the venue of a party we were going to and although parking was listed as chargeable, hotel guests get free parking with vehicle registration validation Big towels in the bathroom was good The negatives The room - The chairs were dirty. No iron / ironing board. We did ask for one from reception - the plate on the iron was dirty and it didn't work. Had to go down to reception around 1am to ask for batteries for the TV remote and again to ask for assistance as still didnt work and couldn't turn TV off. No wardrobe and hanging space was no good for long dress Air con didn't work. We had already asked about moving room if TV couldn't be sorted and was advised the hotel was full. Breakfast- Very salty and scrambled eggs were slimy. Wall in the restaurant where we sat - to the right when you enter next to the wall, was dirty with food stains. Overall state of hotel was very run down in corridors leading to rooms. Was disappointed to see empty bottles and glasses outside our room door when we checked in and outside of other rooms too. We have stayed in many Mercure hotels and this is not their normal standard. Staff - My husband was met with a naked man in reception area when he went to seek assistance for the TV issue, this man was not being dealt with by any staff and could have led to distress to other guests. At Check in we were given our room key, but upon checking out realised the card had someone else's name on.

Very friendly staff

The AC won't work. we were switched to a new room. The rooms are soo dark and dimly light you can barely see things. There is no intercom. The toilets are old. There is no closed wardrobe, the coffee station is poor placed within the wardrobe. This is no way a 4 star hotel.

Booked Mercure because website said AC in rooms. Once booked in and went to room found AC not working. The receptionist then told us that room AC is broken and should be a fan instead. If Mercure knew that room doesn’t have working AC and looking at reviews afterwards it wasn’t working for awhile then why didn’t the receptionist tell us when booking in. On a positive note the meal we had in the restaurant was great.

All in all, a very pleasant stay.

We enjoyed our overnight stay at this hotel. Comfortable beds, nice rooms and good shower. We did not eat - but the restaurant and bar area looked nice

Although the room generally was comfortable- I turned on the airconditioning unit and it worked for about 10 minutes before dripping quite considerably. I had to put a towel down because I was worried it would go through the floor. I waiting another 10 minutes but it was still dripping and had to turn the unit off even though the room was too hot to sleep in. My young daughter was asleep in bed so I couldn't leave the room to ask someone to come and look at it. The unit, then kept turning itself back on so the dripping started again. In the end I had to take out the key card for the electrics so stop it. The noise of the dripping and worry it was going to drip through the floor kept me awake. Also I was too hot.

Parking a scam £10/ night charged even though no other local parking available. Unclean and stained towels left by housekeeping on second day. No amenities was told delivery of amenities such as dental kit is not until next week. Did not have correct bedding for cot bed for my 5 month old baby and used adult sheets which were too big and a health and safety issue for my baby. As risk of infant cot death when incorrect sheets used they were for a double bed sheet not cot bed! I had to remove these and have my baby sleep on bare mattress in the cotbed. Lack of care or interest and lack of general customer service from staff

We’ve stayed here before but it’s not as good as was. Light bulbs in the room didn’t work, there were no hangers, no hairdryer, hairs in the bath and the carpet wasn’t cleaned. The bar prices and breakfast were very expensive. Several clients had too much alcohol and using bad language but the reception staff ignored it. The fire alarm sounded at about 22.30 and people opened their room doors but no one from the staff came to say it was not a fire. All in all very disappointing.

Not refurbished as advertised, rooms generally dirty hairs on toilet and shower tray, dust (lots of) in the recess behind the headboard pointless led backlighting harbouring dust. Overpriced food of which the standard was poor, Would not return to a mercure hotel again.

Highly recommend, activate friendly staff and management, top quality life

Staff who are understanding and do their utmost to be helpful.

Stayed one night for a football match. This is not a 4 star hotel. When we checked in there was a dirty tissue in the middle of the floor. The A/C didn't work. We had to leave the window open all night and have a desk fan on, which made no difference. We sweated all night and slept about 2 hours. Until the traffic woke us. We should have believed the negative reviews. Never again.