Novotel Madrid Puente de La Paz - Madrid, Spain 

Friendly staff, superb breakfast, well communicated
Posted: Fri, Sep 07 2007
We booked this hotel as it is was a cheap option, near to family in Madrid, so were unsure what to expect. We were very impressed from moment we drove up to front door. The staff are so friendly, and went out of their way to help us. Extra towels, phoning taxis, extra water/coffee/helpings of apple tart at breakfast, etc. For such a reasonable price, we were so well looked after. The breakfast was excellent (try their apple tart if they still have it, it is worth staying there for that alone!). The rooms were clean and large enough for a base to rest. Although remember that in a double room, with an extra 2 single beds we did not have room to spare, but sufficient for our needs. We are a family of 4, and it was superb value. My parents in law spent more for a simple double room, with no breakfast included at another hotel down the road from us. There is a bus stop outside hotel door, or the reception staff will call for a taxi if you prefer. Will most definately stay here again when next in Madrid.

Just ok for the price we paid
Posted: Mon, Aug 27 2007
We booked our stay in this hotel through the novotel website and got a city break rate which was really cheap. It was the standard novotel but without the bath tub. We have used 6 other novotel hotels in different countries (italy, belgium, amsterdam, dubai) and this one was the first that didn't have a bath tub. I was also woken up during the middle of the night because of something that smelled like cigarettes, it turned out that the pillows smelled of cigarettes. I specified in our reservation that we wanted a non-smoking room. On the positive side, the people at the reception were all very nice and helpful. The hotel may be outside the city but there's a bus stop a few meters away. Bus 53 takes you direct to puerta del sol (and has a stop at las ventas). The breakfast was good except that there wasn't anyone who readily served us with brewed coffee and hot chocolate (unlike the other novotels). My husband had to find a pot of coffee himself and the hot chocolate was instant that you had to prepare yourself.

Very Let Down
Posted: Wed, Jun 06 2007
Being Novotel, we expected the kind of room we got. The bathroom was nice too. What we didn't expect was the lack of pillows, only 3 for 4 people, the curtain off its track and hanging down, lack of blankets, my daughter used her bedcover only, the fire alarms very bright flashing light going off every few mins, lights not working, putting one of the chair beds up ourselves without instructions after a late arrival - it turned out we were supposed to pull the legs out to make it bed height, my daughter slept on it on the floor - it would have been nicer if the hotel had put the extra beds up for us as we booked 2 adults and 2 children and told them we'd be arriving late. I know maybe's I'm being harsh, but it really annoyed me. The next day, we ate a huge breakfast, the choice was superb and fresh, then headed into the City. When we returned, the bed was raised correctly, the room spotless and the curtain was refixed to the track. We decided as there were no tea making facilities, we'd be decadent and order room service! It was only 8 pm but no one answered, so we waited 10 mins and rang again, hooray it was answered, we asked for 2 hotchocs, but the staff on room service spoke no English and our Spanish wasn't good enough. Not to be put off, we rang the front desk to explain our plight and they put us back to room service, who spoke no English! If they really didn't, shame on the Novotel, a chain of their reputation has no excuse for not making sure at least 1 person on RS spoke it. And if the staff just couldn't be bothered, shame on Novotel. I'm trained in hospitality, I know how hard most work in the industry and how annoying customers can be, but a Hotel of Novotel's reputation, needs to sort out these kind of things. We were going to use the Hotel's restaurant, but the lack of choice was terrible. If we had been there at the 'low' season, I could've understood, but this was Easter weekend and the hotel was really busy with families, Spanish, English and coach tours American and English. The underground parking was an issue too, 18E a day, surely it should've been free or even just a lot cheaper. For what we paid and Novotels reputation, I expected better all round.

Very poor, considering the price, non-existant customer service
Posted: Fri, Apr 06 2007
I stayed at the Novotel Madrid Puente de la Paz at the end of March 2007 on business; it had been recommended to me by my company. The hotel cost 116 Euros a night, EXCLUDING breakfast. The actual hotel is not well situated - at least 20 mins taxi from Madrid Airport (tax ride cost 28 Euros), and approx 15 mins taxi ride into Madrid city centre. It is in a typical city suburb, consisting mostly of concrete high rise flats. The hotel itself is fairly innocuous, and the reception is well furnished and clean. Checkin was fast and efficient - the staff speak fluent English - and the lifts to the room were spacious and fast. The room was a disappointment - clean enough, but very small, and with a number of annoyances: - extremely hard bed: I simply could not get comfortable on it, and eventually has to sleep on top of the quilt, which I had to fold in half - the smoke detector had an extremely bright blue light to indicate it was working; this flashed every 5 minutes, and when it did, it was bright enough to illuminate the entire room! This is not an exaggeration - in the end I had to cover it with a sock to get some sleep - TV had Spanish channels and some satellite, but reception was so poor it was unwatchable - bathroom suffered from the usual continental problem of the plug-sink mechanism not working at all - room only had a shower, no bath In its favour, the room did offer Internet access, costing 12 Euros for 24 hours access, which was a bit of a bargain. In additonal, there was a kettle and cups in the room - but nothing to make a drink with, e.g. no coffee, tea, milk, or sugar! This appeared to be an oversight on room service, so I rang reception to see if anything could be supplied, only to be told that I had to come down to the restaurant and order tea there! I stayed for 3 nights, and in that time no tea or coffee was supplied to the room. Breakfast was extra (16 euros!), and for that you got a pretty good selection of fruits, cereals and cooked food. Again, service was haphazard - the table was set with a knife and spoon, but no fork, when the tea was brought there was no milk, and when the milk eventually did arrive I found they'd brought coffee instead of tea! In summary: not a good experience. I think you can do a lot better, and I for one will not be staying here again.