Hoshino Resorts KAI Beppu

A Deeply Disappointing Stay (July 6–7, 2025) (All communication with KAI Beppu was documented) We traveled with over 20 family members and stayed at KAI Beppu. Given the reputation and premium pricing of Hoshino Resorts, we had high expectations — but the experience was deeply disappointing and completely unacceptable. With service like this, we’ll never return. 🔹 Check-In Chaos: Wrong Guest List, No Prior Confirmation When we arrived, a staff member boarded our bus and handed out a completely incorrect rooming list — five rooms were listed under the same name. One week before our stay, I had submitted the full list of guest names through the official booking system and by email. I even received written confirmation that everything was in order. And yet, this very basic error happened, forcing our entire group to wait on the bus for nearly 45 minutes while staff tried to fix it. According to the hotel staff, the booking system and front desk weren’t properly connected — and even worse, they casually told us, “This has happened before.” Seriously? That’s your excuse? If this is a known issue, why hasn’t it been fixed? Why should guests continue to suffer because of your internal communication problems? 🔹 No Cultural or Health Consideration for Meals Before our stay, we submitted a full list of allergies and dietary restrictions. The hotel replied, saying: "We can accommodate allergies, but not personal preferences." We respected that, and we didn’t expect them to customize every dish. But when it comes to health and cultural needs, the handling was unacceptable. For example: some of our elderly family were advised by doctors to avoid raw food, but the hotel offered no alternatives. Several people of my family do not eat beef due to Taiwanese cultural beliefs. We’ve stayed at many other hotels and restaurants in Japan that were happy to make substitutions — why was that impossible here? Even worse: One of our family members has a severe milk allergy. He sat in his assigned seat, and everything seemed fine — until one dish was served with dairy. Only after he ate it did staff come over to say they had made a mistake. That is completely unacceptable. Thankfully, he had medication on hand — if he hadn’t, this could have ended very badly. What’s most frustrating is that all of this was clearly communicated before our arrival and confirmed by the hotel. These weren’t last-minute requests. This shows a serious lack of sensitivity to guest health and cultural needs — and poor risk management for a hotel that welcomes international travelers. 🔹 No Manager Ever Apologized Despite everything that happened, no manager ever came to speak with us, explain, or apologize. There was a clear lack of responsibility or sincerity — and none of the “OMOTENASHI” (Japanese hospitality) that Hoshino Resorts constantly advertises. Honestly, it was ridiculous. 🔹 Huge Gap Between Brand and Reality I’ve stayed at many hotels all over Japan — even small local inns — and they’ve consistently provided better service than what we experienced here. For a brand as well-known and expensive as Hoshino Resorts, this was shockingly poor service. ⚠️ I would not recommend KAI Beppu or Hoshino Resorts to anyone. I sincerely hope this feedback is taken seriously and leads to real changes — because no other guest should have to go through what we did.

The facility itself is quite nice but the service is terrible. When we arrived, there was no one at the front desk and there was no bell to call for services. Staff members walked around without checking on us. When someone finally showed up, she kept asking about our names and confirmation and claimed that she could not find our reservation. We were puzzled because the rooms were all paid for when we made the reservation. After much waiting and back and forth, they finally admitted to us that they gave our rooms to another party. When we waited there for them to sort out their mistakes, our kids went playing in their daily game area. A guy impatiently told us that we can only play the games after we check in. Hey, whose fault was that? After our newly made rooms were finally ready, they kept asking us whether we wanted to check in. While they apologized, they showed no intent to compensate for the inconvenience. We were a party of 10 and really had no better options. We finally checked in. After they had multiple meetings, they decided to offer us free beverages. I will never come back here.

A wonderful and peaceful stay perfected by hospitable service staff from arrival to check-out, especially warmed by the attentiveness and helpful Yoshiki-san who served us dinner for the evening. He offered great introduction of the meal and tips on enjoying the sunrise, beppu and fukuoka [sakura]. Room is nice with great sea view. The night activities in the hotel added lively vibes. For friends who love some shopping, there is a YouMe mall within 5 min walk. Will definitely recommend a stay here.

Food and facilities were great, location was beautiful but a little away from everything like main station and north beppu which had more (not like beppu has much anyway). I had stayed at other OMO places and the people there are more hospitable, here it felt robotic but tranquil. Almost like Siri playing zen music while yapping. Onsen facilities GREAT, food GREAT, rooms GREAT especially with an ocean view. One other gripe would be, the rooms only had showers, I wanted a bath bomb and not onsen but had to use onsen. No biggie but eh. Massage was nice, a little softer than I usually get so I fell asleep both times but really enjoyable when awake.

I cannot recommend staying at this resort. While my friends and I were using the public onsen facilities, we had noticed another patron using his smartphone in the public bathing area. We had reported this to the resort staff, but when we had returned the next morning to use the public onsen facilities, the same patron was still using his smartphone in the public bathing area. This was very disturbing. Separately, one of my friends and I had suffered severe food poisoning from the dinner provided by the resort. We were very unwell that night and for several days following our stay and eventually had to visit the hospital for our symptoms. This is far below the standard of service of what we would expect from a resort at this price range. I would recommend staying elsewhere.

We have great experience in this hotel. We stayed for 2 days and we were so relaxed that we forgot about the wallet we put in the safe! The staff immediately called us when they found the wallet! We will recommend this hotel to anyone who wants to visit Beppu!

We had a wonderful stay at Kai Beppu. This Kai appears to be more geared for family stays but the rooms are still wonderfully decorated and with magnificent views of the sea. We booked a room with a private onsen. The private onsen is excellent for foreigners like my wife and I not comfortable with public onsen. The food provided is excellent which is typical Hoshino Kai flare if you are aware of the brand. We were lucky and caught both days of the Christmas fireworks by Beppu City. We drove and found that from the hotel, the access to the jigokus and even Yufuin is fairly accessible with reasonable drive time. The hotel provides fun activities if you have children with you on your stay.

During our Kyushu trip, we stayed for two nights at the Kai Beppu, having booked directly via their website. We arrived by train from Fukuoka and, as it was raining hard, we took a short taxi ride from the train station (under normal conditions, walking would have been perfectly possible).||Check-in was swift and we were on the way to our spacious corner room on the 9th floor with a private onsen balcony. This balcony however is tiny and makes bathing there a bit of an enclosed experience. Still, the water was very nice.||Dinner and breakfast were excellent as were the English speaking staff allocated to us. As the hotel is in Beppu itself, exploring the neighbourhood on foot is easy and interesting. The next day, we picked up our rental car and drove up to Myoban Unosato Onsen. Back at the hotel, parking was easily available and free. On the day of departure, we visited Takasakiyama Natural Zoological Garden (monkey park) before driving to Aso.||How do we rate Kai Beppu? As an onsen ryokan, compared to Kai Aso for example, it lacks the charm of nature and smaller size. As a city hotel, it has excellent rooms with great food and activities at evening, but comes at a certain price. Given that Kai Beppu combines both, you might go away somewhat disappointed depending on what you expected. We enjoyed our stay, but might prefer a more traditional city hotel when visiting Beppu the next time.