To think my request at hotel wasn’t unreasonable?

[Chocowoka]

In a nutshell a friend and I wanted to have a spa day. We found what looked like a beautiful hotel with great facilities and decided we’d like to try there.

The offer included and cost £95 each

Spa treatment 25 mins (either a foot scrub, facial or body scrub)
Full use of spa facilities for 4 hours
2 course lunch or afternoon tea

I asked if I could just have a massage as I have bad flare ups with my skin with many products so a scrub wouldn’t be ideal. I was told no... ok fair enough so I chose the foot scrub.

My friend wanted the lunch and I wanted the afternoon tea. When I told the girl what we wanted she said oh I’m afraid we can’t do that as they’re served in different restaurants so you’d have to eat in separate restaurants (in the same hotel) 🙄 I said, “Well I’m not expecting silver service. I’ll happily go the restaurant that mine would be served in and take the plate with my food on, to the restaurant that my friends in, so we can eat together?” 🙄

She went to ask someone and came back and said “We can’t do that I’m sorry”

I said, “Ok, we’ll just leave it then” and we going somewhere else and booked it.

Now I could have had the lunch and my friend could have had the afternoon tea. I felt on principle however that we were spending a lot of money there for a treat so why should we not get what we really want!?

The hotel offers room service and is a 5* hotel so I’m quite sure they could carry some from one restaurant to the next or allowed me to, because if day a hotel guest fancied afternoon tea does that mean they can’t have it in their room?

If a group of 6 friends went chances are they aren’t all going to want the same. So the hotel would still say no and lose custom potentially.

I just think for such an expensive few hours they could have been more accommodating.

YABU

A scrub is a lot different to a massage.

It states there are two dining options in two different locations.

I bet they didn’t bat an eye kid at you cancelling plenty other will take up the offer on the T&C

What are you on about. I have not experienced bigger pandering to customer and their bullshit anywhere else, but in Britain. And that is why customers are generally taking a piss, don't read t&cs, and treat stuff like a dirt. Referring to being flexible with a paying customer as "pandering to customer" says it all.

They can't start chopping and changing bits of a special offer otherwise it negates the point of the offer

Offers are space fillers and easy to manage. Everyone in restaurant A is having lunch, everyone in restaurant B is having afternoon tea

It's simple and easy to staff. If you add in more complications then you need more organising and more staff, which takes away your profits from the deal - which are probably already small

Same with the treatments. You offer a few selected ones to tempt people in. If they enjoy their scrub they might come back for a massage. Or pay for a massage on the day. If you start allowing people to change their elements the upselling/future selling is gone.

Agreed. And a true 5 hotel wouldn’t treat people with a voucher/special offer as “lesser” than full paying guests.*

A true 5* hotel wouldn't offer such a cheap package in the first place. £95 for afternoon tea, a treatment and four hours unlimited use of the spa is pretty cheap. You get what you pay for.

The hotel probably doesn’t want guests randomly running around with plates of food. Apart from anything else it could be a liability concern for them, e.g. if said guest trips over while ferrying their food from one place to another, and injures themselves it pours scalding hot soup on a small child or something.

I can clearly identify the type of customers who come in with voucher for a cookie, demand sausage and then write bad reviews, on this thread😁

Referring to being flexible with a paying customer as "pandering to customer" says it all.

If you want flexibility, don't book a set-price package! The reason packages are cheap is because the choices are limited and you can't just go in and have whatever you want.

Actually the point of these packages isn’t always to lure people in to get repeat custom.

The point is often to provide a short term boost to turnover when a business is struggling. Or, to fill a period when they already know they are quiet.

The customer type can be one who is offer-driven and won’t in a million years say “that was fab - I’ll come back next month and pay 2x the price for something better, but pretty similar”. No, that customer type will be on Groupon looking for another £95 deal elsewhere.

YABU - You book an offer, you take what is included in the offer. if they amend the offer for you, great. If they don't, YABU to complain.

But you weren't paying the 5* premium service, you had a package deal, which at a guess would be a hell of a lot cheaper then buying the experience/items individually?

So YABU.

@Chocowoka Surely if you and your friend wanted to eat together, one of you should have compromised? The issue is you and your friend not the hotel.

You are being a bit mad to expect the hotel to allow you to wander round with a plate of food and go into a different room to eat it .

Regarding the massage instead of the scrub- it may not be possible simply as the person doing it may not be qualified to do massages, or it may take more time, or any number of reasons. Also, I think £95 for the day when it includes a treatment and lunch and the spa is quite reasonable.

It’s a cheap package designed to generate future revenue. It’s only worth the effort if it’s straightforward for them.

Incidentally the last massage I had at a 5* hotel cost double your £95

Believe me, a scrub is different to a massage! The therapists doing these offers may not be trained in massage. They may have done an inventory and realised their pedi stock wasn’t shifting as much, hence the foot exfoliation on the offer etc etc

Carrying food from one area to another-they may not want you doing that for insurance purposes. Also when other diners start wanting what you have they have the issue of explaining ‘that’s in the other dining room’ and again it can cause a headache for them.

These offers are to get bums on seats to fill empty slots, use up stock and spread word of mouth.

If you choose a special offer you’re agreeing to pick within the limits of what’s being offered. If you want something different, you pay the full price and get things more readily on your terms.
Spa offers are great as long as you then don’t want to change them-if they were happy to offer a massage they’d have added it into your pick and mix options 🙂

I dont think its unreasonable to ask. I'm a bit surprised a 5 star place wouldnt accommodate your request.

Agreed. And a true 5 hotel wouldn’t treat people with a voucher/special offer as “lesser” than full paying guests.

It’s not about treating them “lesser” it’s simply that they are sticking to the special offers terms. They may be trying to get people through the door but that doesn’t mean they are going to break their backs offering things that don’t exist.

They were being very weird about the massage. A 25min massage is no different to a scrub in terms or time or cost!

But the person who does the massages might be fully booked, or might command a higher rate per half an hour, or might have sold their services as part of a different package.

The offer was for a choice of three treatments. If you don't like (or can't have) any of those treatments then don't book the package!

Princessing eh?

YABU. You bought a special package deal. You knew the details and restrictions when you booked it then you expect them to change it for you because you're special and the rules clearly don't apply to you...

They had a lucky escape! Glad they have the backbone not to pander to nightmares like this who are not customers but complete pains in the backside not worth the paltry custom they claim they are deigning the business with. It's a package, not a pick n mix.

Some people are utterly entitled CFers whose custom is not at all worth it, quite the opposite.

Also...when the offer was for 4 hours, that is either a morning or an afternoon session ( and the lunch is for clients who arrive in the morning and the tea is for clients who arrive after lunch - such as 1pm to 5pm.)

They would cater for those times and those numbers.

If you arrived for a morning session the expectation is you would eat lunch.
Afternoon session- afternoon tea.

Sorry but you sound a bit naive about how these places work.
And a bit cheeky.

Another one who thinks YABU and hard work, you don't buy a package then try to change it

It's not a case simply of carrying food from one dining room to another.
It's more likely that the kitchen staff work on preparing lunches in one kitchen and then do the afternoon tea later on in another kitchen (or dining area.)

So if there were 50 guests for lunch the staff would be busy doing lunches.
They might then swap kitchens or whatever to make the afternoon teas for another 50 guests later in the day.

I just can’t imagine being that bothered about whether I had lunch or afternoon tea that I couldn’t just settle for the one my friend wanted!

They can't start chopping and changing bits of a special offer otherwise it negates the point of the offer But the offer was lunch or afternoon tea, from what OP has said it didn't specify that they'd be served in separate rooms so I can't see what is unreasonable about expecting to be able to choose. Nothing wrong with them normally being served in separate rooms but someone taking the afternoon tea to another room is hardly a big deal.

The massage is changing the offer but it might have been possible so again nothing wrong with asking, nothing wrong with it not being available.

Now I could have had the lunch and my friend could have had the afternoon tea. Are you sure @Chocowoka ???

I thought the whole idea of using spa facilities for 4 hours, was that you either arrive for a morning session ( 9-1pm) or later for the afternoon.

I think you misunderstood the bookings.

Maybe link to the spa and we can see for ourselves?

I've been to Champneys and they work on a half-day facility and the meals you get depend on when you arrive and leave.