Hotel Cardiff

I’ve stayed in a lot of hotels in Oostende for work, and this is the best so far. It’s a family-run place where the hosts are happy to help with anything. My colleague has dietary requirements, and they sorted out his packed work lunch every day. The rooms were cleaned to a very high standard each day, and the location couldn’t be better. Highly recommended.

The location is the only thing I found positive. The room was old and felt poorly maintained, even if some people might call it cosy. The elderly couple managing the hotel came across as arrogant and didn’t seem to value guests as customers. We couldn’t put up with that attitude, and I wouldn’t recommend staying here. I honestly don’t understand the rating or how the hotel is still in business.

The cleaning ladies were lovely and helpful, and the room had enough space for two, with basic bathroom facilities. Still, it was only just clean, the bed was too soft for me, the towels were too small, and some things felt too basic for the price. The room’s free Wi-Fi kept resetting, so I had to enter the password again and again. I didn’t try breakfast, which runs from 8 to 10am. There’s no do-not-disturb sign, so each day we had to tell the cleaners not to come in, even while we were sleeping. Getting in and out was awkward. Reception is usually closed off, and although they say they can remotely open the outer door until 8pm, I waited five minutes after 6pm. When sharing a room, this makes it hard to go out without locking the other person inside. I couldn’t reach anyone to deal with flickering lights, and the elevator only worked about half the time, sometimes making me go up and down three times just to open the ground-floor door. After 8pm there’s no staff, and I got no response through the emergency system. On our last day, after we’d declined room service, a manager came at 11:40am to say checkout was at 11 and staying longer would cost 15 euros per hour. I know that sort of fee is standard, but nobody had warned us, it wasn’t written in the room, and staff had already been hard to reach. Being pushed out that way felt very unpleasant and unprofessional. If you just need a room, it may be fine, but it’s too pricey for the service, which felt like what you’d get at a cheap hotel in a big city.

We paid 241,90€ for two people for one night, which should have been the price of a suite. Breakfast and Wi-Fi were the only things included. The “suite” had no coffee machine or way to heat water for tea, no phone to call reception, no bath, no radio and no alarm. The lift was too small even for two people, and the minibar cost extra. Inside the fridge were two colas, two beers and two small waters, with a can of cola costing 2,5€. This was the worst hotel we’ve ever stayed in, and we won’t return. We hadn’t booked at the last minute, we made the reservation online four days ahead. The room still had no coffee maker, and because the lounge was closing, they gave us a key to use a small side door to come and go. The TV didn’t have Belgian channels.