Rixos The Palm Hotel & Suites

Just plain awful! Any suggestion that this place is a 5 star luxury all-inclusive resort is delusional. Whilst you cannot fault the friendliness of the staff, the quality of the accommodation, standard of catering, and overall experience is just dire. We had to check-out after a day, so bad was the experience. Start with the rooms. We had booked a 2 bed family suite and a senior suite and asked for the rooms to be close together. We ended up with the senior suite overlooking the noisy front entrance and the family suite in a completely different building. In both cases, the rooms were unattractive boxes with little furniture and ill thought through design. No dressing table for my wife to do her hair and make up, no plugs anywhere near any of the mirrors, no towel in the restroom for the living area, one TV that didn’t work and one that did (a theme in the family suite), and no drawers for your clothes so you end up living from a suitcase. The family suite was in a separate building called the Residence and was clearly some kind of time-share or other arrangement. It was like walking into a block of flats or apartment block and a completely different feel to the hotel. Whilst big, you could only give it a 2 star rating at best and certainly nowhere near the 5 star rating the hotel marketing department would have you believe. The all inclusive element was a total deception. Yes, they have a la carte options but good luck booking one. My guess is that because the menu is a la carte that they’d rather not have people eat there. On our first night we were told we would have to eat from the all you can eat buffet. We walked up to the a la carte steak house at 7 pm and asked for a table. It was close to empty and we were told they had no table available. We ate out and returned at 9. It was still empty. We went for a drink and looked again at 10; empty again! And as for the buffet, it really was dire. Yes there are lots of items on display but they are very low quality, poorly cooked, unappetizing, largely cold (the hot dishes that is) and really poor value for the expensive cost of the stay. We complained to our travel agent who were very sympathetic and said they’d speak to the hotel to see if we could check out early. I am an All Accor platinum member and stop in group properties on business some 30 or 50 nights a year. This is by far the most disappointing I have seen. As a platinum member, they just did not care. No recognition on check in and certainly none when I complained. I met the hotel manager who had been notified by the agent of our complaint. He was, or at least appeared to be, sympathetic, having gone through the motions but really could not solve some of the challenges. One of those was that I had had major surgery to remove my stomach 9 months earlier and so needed to order simple food like you might be able to order in a restaurant or room service. The hotel didn’t have a room service option and booking a restaurant appeared deliberately impossible. He said the chef at the buffet could cook something specially for me if I gave them advance notice but who wants to do that on holiday knowing the rest of your family is eating sub-standard catering. He passed my details on to his reservation team to see about us transferring. To be honest, had he said we could move to the Accor owned Sofitel just a few minutes away then that would have been fine. Instead, one of his colleagues called and said the reservation was non-refundable and that was that. Really appalling customer engagement, really disrespectful approach to legitimate concerns, and something that will determine my future stay at any All Accor property. I asked the manager about how my wife was meant to dry her hair when there was no plug within 20 feet of a mirror. He seemed surprised about the point we had made and asked if there wasn’t a plug in the bathroom. Clearly, there wasn’t! So what about the rest of the hotel? Sitting writing this at 6am having been woken by the blaring music coming somewhere from the reception/car park below where the room is located. That noise is only broken by the shouting from the cleaners, taxi drivers and valet staff below. I would open the window in the senior suite and shout but there are no opening windows and nor, for reasons we should probably be grateful for, is there a balcony. Apparently, some rooms do have balconies, but neither of the two we booked. So what about value for money? When we asked the agent to breakdown the package price splitting out the air fare, it turns out that the senior suite was almost £900 per night and the family suite was £1,200 per night. Honestly, there are so many decent, better appointed and more customer-friendly hotels in Dubai that deserve your custom than this place. Yes, the climate is good, and yes there is a beach and swimming pool, but when it comes to the things that matter, this place is so below a reasonable standard that the rack rates are daylight robbery. Another robbery was the fact that we booked a room for the night before our stay because we were arriving on a morning flight. We were travelling with a young baby and a 3 year old and, after an overnight flight, getting to the room on our arrival was worth the expense. However, that was another let down. We got to the hotel and as we approached the busy reception, somebody showed us to a seated area by the coffee bar, because he said reception was busy, he took our passports and said he’d scan them and start the booking process and come and get us when our key was ready. In fact, they left us for a long time and then did come and get us but nothing had been processed and we had to go through the booking process having wasted so much time just waiting. By the time that was all done, and they had to scan the passports, we were shown to the rooms at just before 1pm having wasted the cost of booking the rooms for the extra night before we arrived so that we could check in on arrival. Injury to insult, we had to chase for our luggage which, half an hour after being shown to the room, was nowhere to be seen. All in all, it seems hard to imagine how much was wrong with this hotel. I am sure the paid instagram influencers will say it was 5 star paradise but it’s so far below that standard that it’s hard to know how to rate it. One review we read said that the impression when you drive up to the hotel is uninspiring and reminiscent of an office building or block of residential flats. Truthfully, you don’t get a second chance to make a first impression and it did not get any better when you got past the lobby. Rixos, the standard of your service was only beaten by your lack of customer care and your apparent commercial and financial greed. Accor, from a platinum card holder, this whole experience was just awful and you do not deserve my repeat business. This disaster could have been solved really easily by management just suggesting a transfer to the nearby Sofitel. Instead, you have lost a customer, won a critic and we will be pursuing a claim for compensation. Pretty hopeless approach to brand management and customer relations!

Cristy in the bar was warm, friendly and very attentive and nothing was too much hassle. We had 2 great evenings in the bar. Music was great and kids loved the pool table. Pool table was payable so be advised bring cash. Bar was family suitable.

Attention to detail,amazing experience. I would highly recommend this resort for a seamless experience in Dubai. From the check in to them accommodating all our needs,this is a one stop shop. They also offer free Atlantis tickets plus a free shuttle daily. This helps when travelling with four kids. I can not fault anything .