Grand Palladium Colonial Resort - Spa

Let me start with a quick summary of the good, the average, the terrible. Then if you need to know more you can read more about our experience. Most of our issues were being experienced by many guests who were also sharing their frustration The Good - The Spa, probably one of the best I have been to for an all Inclusive hotel - The pool area, good size pools, but can be a fight for sun-beds at peak season. Slides for small kids, swim up bar - The overall outside areas, beach is nice but only a small bit you can swim in given rocks and seaweed - The wildlife - Sports facilities, football, basketball, tennis, pickleball, volleyball, badminton, - Japanese restaurant. Nice experience but short. - The on site doctor was very nice and helped my son with his bad ear. The Average - The buffet, good selection, but go early to avoid long ques and food not being replenished The Terrible - Room quality. Very outdated, dirty, appliances don’t work such as fridges and hair dryers. Air con is hard to use and very nosiey - The booking of restaurants. You have to get up at 6.30am and book them on the app or que at concierge. As we’re are a family of 6 we had to go to concierge at 6.30am where we were greeted with a long queue of people already, we got to the front and no options available. Other hotels on the complex get to book there’s first leaving none for Colonial guest. Impossible to get in the restaurants - Restaurant quality, food is average, service is slow due to lack of staff and not very authentic - Room service.. don’t even bother, if anyone picks up the phone your lucky, and then if you get what you asked for it will be a miracle - Customer service.. no one until day 6 was prepared to help us. Even when we spoke to a supervisor they just said sorry. They really don’t care about your experience - Check in process.. non existent, give your room, no offer of a drink or towel like in most hotels, no information about the hotel just told to come down in the morning. - Be prepared to que a long time to get into the buffet restaurant and it be very busy and noisy - Drinks especially the cocktails are poor. We only had one well made cocktail the entire time. House wine is low quality. So let me tell you more about our experience We arrived at the hotel at around 8pm after 15 hours of travelling , the check in experience by Eduardo had no personal touch. No offer of a drink, or towel. The noise from the entertainment was so loud we couldn’t hear anything. We requested our two room to be located near each other months before our arrival. We knew this could not be guaranteed, however they did not even have notes on the system of our request. After 20 minutes of searching, he found two rooms close to each but we needed to move the next day to two other rooms. We were tired so we agreed. Thankfully we did as the rooms we were put into on the first night were not acceptable 1. sand in the beds 2. Damp and smelt stale 3. Not enough towels 4. Hairdryer not working 5. Condensation dripping from the roof 6. Fridge broken and warm water in there 7. Rooms very outdated 8. Air conditioning is very loud and always super cold 9. Key phobes not working in one room We asked about booking restaurants, and Eduardo told us we just come down in the morning and book at concierge. He then just said everything is on the app. Having slept fully clothed, in a dirty bed and freezing room we headed down for our second day. We went to book our restaurants to be told e everything is fully booked, and to keep checking the app. However we could not use the app as we were in two separate rooms as a family. When booking restaurants it’s good to know 1. you can only book two days in advance if you are at the Colonial 2. TRS and family collection can book up to 7 days in advance and before they arrive 3. Restaurant bookings open up at 7am and you need to either join the queue at concierge at 6.30am or be ready on the app So having been annoyed that the first 3 nights we could not book a restaurant, we set our alarm for 6.30am (yes this is meant to be a holiday) and headed down to reception to book our restaurants. However at 6.45am we were met with a long que for the concierge. Full of frustrated and tired guests. After an hour we arrived at the conceige to be told there is now limited availability. Either they had really early or really late. We were frustrated once again. After sharing our frustrations that it was looking like we could not get in any restaurants they asked us to come back at 12.30. We did and they managed to book us into a few restaurants as a gesture of good will.. we will come back to our experience of the restaurants shortly.. Next challenge was to move rooms. Back to reception we went. We moved rooms in block 5. Only to be greeted with more rooms with appliances either leaking or not working. Also one room only had one double bed when we had requested two double beds in each room. Back to reception we went. They finally found some more rooms. They said they would send conceige to help move the bags. This took a long while so I moved most of them selves. When I entered the next room, we were greeted with another leaking fridge and a broken shower. After more time at reception we requested the shower and fridge to be fixed. They arrived at 10.30pm at night to fix the shower, and then finally they replaced the fridge the next day. Day 3, we head out of the hotel on an excursion to the Cenotes and turtle swimming. Nice experience but very over crowded, especially the turtle swimming, hundreds of people in the sea kicking you in the face. Day 5 wehad a good experience at the tapanyaki restaurant, albeit very short, it was good food and and nice experience Day 6. Room not cleaned today, and fridge now broken and very warm. More time at reception. We were booked into the Thai restaurant. We arrived at our time of 7.30pm . To find the restaurant closed due to lack of staff. No one had informed us until we had arrived. They moved us to The Nest restaurant in the family selection hotel. They positioned this as a a la carte and buffet restaurant, this is where our faulty towers experience begins 1. one hour for starters to come out 2. When they arrived the chicken Cesare salad had one tiny bit of chicken on it, we asked more but they said they had run out. The salmon and avocado was missing the avocado, once again they said they had run out 3. The mains arrived, my son’s prawn pasta dish had one prawn in it, and they had put 10 just prawn heads in the dish to make it look more! See picture of all the prawn heads from on dish. My chicken dish was uneditable, so was the rest of the children’s dishes 4. The deserts arrived and one was still frozen. The poor waiter was trying his best, but they had so little staff and food it was impossible for him. We left and I went back to reception to tell them about our experience. A supervisor finally came to see me but could only apologise and said she was looking into all our concerns. At least after 5 days a supervisor bothered to contact me. We went back to the room, dirty room that had still not been cleaned. We settled down for the night. At 11.50pm I get a knock on the door and it’s our towels. Yes 11.50pm.. kids now awake. Day 6, breakfast, managed to beat the large que, but once again no staff on, no cutlery, impossible to get water or a hot drink. Food choices limited as was not being replaced quick enough. On a positive we had a monkey entertain us on the trees. We are still chasing our collection time to the airport. No ones seems to help. Might be here for a little longer at this rate. I am more frustrated by the situation as the hotel facilities and grounds itself are good but the food, service and rooms are something you would expect from a 2 star resort. I did feel for the staff as so many people were complaining and no manager was there helping them. The staff work really hard and are genuinely really friendly. On our final night at 9.30pm we were approached by a member of staff saying that they would be giving us VIP wrist bands so we had access to all areas of the hotel. Given we have have 16 hours of our stay left and we would be sleeping for about 8 of those and packing for another couple this offer was completely unsatisfactory. When we told the member of staff we were leaving the next day they looked surprised. This just sums up the hotel. It could have been so much better but just fell well short. Much better options available and by the number of complaints we heard at concierge this is just not a one of case! Oh and now the hotel isn’t responding to British airways or myself. Showing they truly don’t care about their customers! Read less