Patrick R
Google
Quite mixed feelings about our weekend stay at JA Hotel.||The visit was booked weeks in advance. To confirm the booking, my partner had to give credit card details and cvc number. We then increased the number of nights from two to three. The rate quoted was about 1300Kr/night B&B.||We arrived Friday, late afternoon. At check-in - which is at the side of the foyer bar - my partner was invited to pay the bill in full. She queried this but was told “This is how we do it”, so resistance was futile and she paid up. We noted the rough and ready appearance of the foyer cement floor, which simply looked dirty (I sense someone had lifted carpet or tiles and these might be replaced at some future date). She asked how, if we decided we didn’t like the room/hotel etc and were to decide to cancel the remainder of the stay on the Saturday, that would be dealt with. This produced one of those Homer Simpson “D’oh!” moments and we were given a “better room overlooking the inner garden area” (Photograph shows the view out the sole bedroom window (which could not be opened to enjoy the “view”). She was told she could not have a receipt until Monday morning’s check-out, which seemed to be an even stranger turn of events. And then, we received notification there were rooms available in the hotel for the weekend at less than 1100kr/night B&B, but as she had paid the bill, it all seemed too difficult to change things.||Friday evening has a musician/singer in the dining/vestibule area, so it was both crowded and noisy. We went by lift to our floor and then to the room along a corridor which had obviously been decorated in the last 6 months or so. The room too was recently painted/refreshed or newly renovated. Someone might buy a spirit level for the person who fitted the door-lock/handle to the inside of the room, because it was not straight.|A quick check of bedding revealed no small creatures and the towels and shower/toilet area were clean. Also, despite there being six clothes hangers, none of them had an arrangement so that trousers, male or female, could be suspended from the arms or folded over a horizontal bar. A wash-hand basin with a crack really needs replacing before the crack becomes blackened (Photo). Also to remark, our room had a sloping ceiling so, at about 1.35m from the bed head, my head and the sloping ceiling collided (I’m only 1.80m tall). I hadn’t been the only one either judging by the marks on the ceiling. (Photo)|Overnight there was no noise or disturbance of any kind, indeed everything was peaceful. I noted some fluff had gathered in the vent in the bathroom (but I have to ask why the fan at some part of that venting system ran constantly throughout our stay). The bed was moderately comfortable (I prefer a very hard mattress). Breakfast Saturday morning at 0900 was less serene. The dining area was crowded and for an event scheduled to run 0700 until 1100, it was disappointing that they had run out of bacon (“there’s no more”, we were told) and there seemed to be no plan or prospect of any more being provided (there’s an ICA supermarket down the hallway of the shopping centre which abuts the entrance to the hotel and when we visited it the next afternoon there was plenty of bacon for sale!). Anyway we survived breakfast and spent the day around the town area. (I will write up the evening dinner experiences in their respective pages later). The shower gel had clearly been watered down and its containing bottle nearly empty, plus neither TV nor phone were working on Saturday morning, so we left a note at reception as we went off on our walking tour. The room had been tidied during our absence and the TV fixed; we discovered later that the phone was still not working properly. |Sunday breakfast showed no shortage of bacon or other items and the attendance seemed less than the previous day. We went to the Navy Museum at 1000 and returned by 1530 to find the “please tidy the room” notice on the door was still outside and the fresh towels etc which we had left out for replacement hadn’t been! Luckily, the room maid arrived by 1600 and gave the room a cursory tidy. Again, a reasonable night’s sleep on Sunday night.||Monday breakfast produced no surprises (and plenty of bacon) again. We departed around 0900.|As she was getting the receipt at reception, my partner was told again that paying on arrival is the way the hotel does things. I’ve stayed in some interesting hotels worldwide, but in only two places have I been asked to pay upfront - a villa-type accommodation in Rwanda and a curiously small hotel room in Samara, Western Sahara. |||Overall: If this is the “Best Western” then maybe look to one of the other cardinal points, North, South or East; it’s not one of the great hotel experiences of the Nordic countries: it’s the small things that make or break any hotel visit and while the staff were individually pleasant, Ja Hotel is unlikely to improve its rating without some professional management input and attention to detail. ||Would we return? Frankly, it’s unlikely!
