Vibe Carlton

Check in was of poor quality. 4 people on desk attending to one person & ingnore me for 10 minutes before i state is anyone able to check me in. Our room smelt like poo. Yes it smelt like a poo. Couldn’t see one but I had to keep door open. My family pulled off the doonas as both doonas were dirty with brown stains on something liquid or extra ment. Not a welcoming environment. Cheap & needs a freshen up. It’s been a week and I still no received bond back yet.

The word "Quality" has been dropped from the hotel name, and that's certainly appropriate. The most disappointing aspect of our stay was not the generally grimy appearance, the cracked or broken room features, that half of the lift buttons don't work, that the surcharge to park "inside the gate" means leaving one's car behind a never-locked-never-closed gate (is the thought that a thief would not walk the extra 10 metres?), that though booking for two we were provided with one teacup, or even that due to a malfunctioning door lock we had to ask six times for new keycards (then were told that the problem was a flat battery in the doorlock mechanism - which even then wasn't fixed!) The real kicker was that housekeeping didn't bother to make up our room one of the days, and when querying this the reception's response was limited to "I will report this to the manager". We didn' hear from him/her, of course, but we can picture a Mr Burns like figure giggling maniacally at the thought that people actually pay to stay at hotels like this.

The star rating (and therefore room rates) for this hotel should be downgraded unless or until the renovations are completed. As other reviews state, there’s good and bad. The “good” is that my room was newly painted, new soft furnishings, clean bed linen and comfy new bed. The “bad” is in mid-winter In cold Melbourne, you can’t get away with having no hot water, or at best luke warm, despite running the tap for 10 minutes each morning of my 3 night stay. Further, there is no breakfast room (supposedly under renovation too). Also, attention to details such as removing rubbish, used bed linen etc from the passages and bins should be done promptly. The bathroom was probably “renovated” but tile grout and corners we’re still grubby, the towels were plentiful but old, yellowed and threadbare (chuck them and buy some fluffy new white or black ones). The coffee mugs still had the evaporated dregs of the previous user’s drink in them! Yuk. But boiling water in the kettle fixed that: but should I have been the one to do that? Overall it’s a disgrace to what it was 5 years ago when I stayed there. Not ever returning which is unfortunate because it is in a great location for university and city access, cafes, and recreational parks, and transport.