KarenWe were invited to spend the night at Novotel in Liverpool city centre last week, so we planned a couple of activities around it and enjoyed a quick family city break.
We checked the Novotel website and found that we could check in from 2pm. We arrived at around 2.15pm but unfortunately the room wasn’t quite ready. The hotel have a play area in the lobby though, which was perfect for keeping the boys entertained while we waited 30 minutes for the room to be finished.
Once we were given our room key we headed up to the 11th floor to settle in. The room, at first glance, was clean and tidy with a double bed and a double pull-out sofa bed suitable for the children to share. My children are 8 and 5 years old but if they were much older the pull-out bed just wouldn’t be big enough. There is no additional space for a travel cot for any younger children if the sofa bed is in use.
As we pulled out the sofa bed I noticed a shard of glass on the mattress, which obviously prompted me to take a closer look. Sadly we discovered that the frame above the children’s bed had previously been smashed and the remnants hadn’t been properly cleaned. There were pieces of glass on and around the sofa bed, inside the remaining frame and on the floor. I tried to call down to reception but the telephone didn’t work, so I went down to the desk in person. Housekeeping were asked to return to the room to address the glass situation and also to make the boys’ bed as there was no bedding for it.
Once this was all done the room was as satisfactory as I would’ve expected it to be on arrival. I imagine that the frame had been smashed by a previous guest and housekeeping hadn’t been made aware, otherwise I’m sure the broken frame would’ve been removed before our arrival.
The shower room and toilet were separate from one another and both clean, with basic complimentary toiletries provided.
Towels were also provided for each of us, and a mini bar with one bottle of sparkling and one bottle of still water which we didn’t use.
The room was kept at a comfortable temperature and given the recent heatwave I noticed that there were instructions for guests on how best to manage the thermostats in the rooms.
After our evening out, we came back to a comfortable bed and a good night’s sleep. One of my worries about hotels is whether there will be noise from other guests but we weren’t disturbed at all.
By morning, refreshed and ready for a day in Liverpool, we enjoyed a delicious breakfast in the hotel restaurant. Both continental and cooked breakfasts were available, as was breakfast via room service for a small surcharge. The boys had cereal and blueberry muffins – cake for breakfast went down a treat! There was also a pancake machine but I really wasn’t sure how to get it to work so I opted for croissants instead – much easier!
After breakfast we took the boys.down to the hotel swimming pool where they thoroughly enjoyed a quick dip before we checked out. The pool is small but warm and clean, and wasn’t busy at all. Gym facilities are also available but at 8 months pregnant I figured I could get away with not using those!
Overall we had a pleasant stay at Novotel Liverpool. The staff were friendly and helpful, and when we did encounter a problem it was adressed thoroughly and fairly quickly. Room rates seem very reasonable considering the ideal location of the hotel and start at just £59 per night. Both the main shopping area and Albert Docks are within ten minutes walk from the hotel’s front door. There are lots of restaurants in the immediate vicinity too – we ate at Turtle Bay in the evening which is just a couple of minutes walk from the hotel.
*We were offered a complimentary stay at Novotel Liverpool in order to carry out this review*
A good honest review. It’s nice to see that nothing was covered up just because your stay there was free.
Everyone makes mistakes in every industry and its hard to keep on top of all guests / rooms I would think but when you can’t check in till 2 and even then the rooms not ready that’s not acceptable. If you check out late I think just saying sorry won’t stop an excess charge!
Good to see the staff were friendly tho. That makes the difference in whether to return or not. Sounds like it’s in a good location for a city break so id probably consider it because of the reasonable cost.
Wow this has really surprised me, we love Novotel, in fact if we visit Barcelona with the boys we always stay in the Novotel and have stayed in quite a few others too, I think you were just unlucky with the bed but thank goodness you noticed it x