Exploding Toilet and morePosted: Sun, Mar 09 2008Location:
5Rooms:
2.3Service:
0.9Value:
1I stayed at this establishment last summer with my wife for about 5 days. First off, when we arrived at the entrance, no one offered to help with our bags, even though there were several bell boys standing around chatting - a first sign of doubt for a supposedly 5 star hotel. We went to check in, the staff at the reception were trying to avoid contact with the guests - forget smiles and hospitality, we waited for 10 minutes just for them to "get around" to us, even though there was no line. The girl that checked us in clearly had her mind somewhere else, as I told her at least twice I wanted a smoking room, and she had to ask me again as if she had not heard what I said.
So we got to the room, to be fair, housekeeping was not bad, the room was clean. However, just when we were putting down our bags, we heard a strange sound coming from the bathroom. I went in to check, and I was rewarded in awe with a view of black liquid was spewing out of the toilet, flooding the bathroom, with the authentic stench of the Victoria Harbor's shelter area. Needless to say, we had to change the room. I went down to the reception and explained the situation, but rather than apologizing, the reception guy sounded accusingly as if WE broke the toilet - I don't think even the top terrorists in the world can make a toilet spew sewage upon 2 minutes of entering a room. Anyway, I threatened to call the manager and the very rude and unhelpful reception guy reluctantly gave us a different, but smaller room.
The toilet in the new room worked, at least that night. The next morning, the flush was having problems again, the water was black and it stank. And then, at around 11am, the water just stopped. That's right, a 5 star hotel with no water. We had to leave the hotel to go to the nearby Sogo department store to use the toilet. My wife was so scared that the toilet would explode on her that she did not use the room toilet once during our 5-day stay. The hotel obviously has serious problems with its plumbing.
Next, we move on to the noise. They were apparently working on the rooftop pool or something during our stay, and every morning we would hear drilling and hammering from 9am, and that would last for the whole day, everyday, during our entire stay, except for one day when a typhoon shut down the city. Most respectable hotels would close down at least sections of the building when they renovate so the noise would not bother the guests, but the Regal is too "cost efficient" for that.
And to top it off, the WiFi was down, and there was no ethernet cable in the room. I tried to shop for one around Causeway Bay, but it was getting late in the evening and we had a dinner appointment. So we had to BUY one from the hotel through room service, at an appalling premium.
I've stayed at youth hostels during my college days that were better than this filth of a hotel.