Taplow House Hotel & Spa

The spa is on the small side, but if you time it right you can have the place to yourselves, which is perfect. My partner and I had a lovely New Years stay, a great little escape from London, and the service was amazing. They really went above and beyond. We’ll definitely consider coming again. Thanks to Peter and his team for looking after us so well.

The staff were amazing, and I couldn’t fault the service or treatments. Our rooms were comfortable, with good pillows and complimentary tea, water and biscuits. Breakfast was good as well. The sauna was nice and the massages excellent. The outside pool was a few degrees too cold for the hot spa pool experience we’d hoped for in the chilly weather. We asked if they could turn up the temperature and the staff were happy to try, but even several hours later it was still too cold. That was a real shame and changed our plans quite a bit. I understand it must be hard to get right in cold weather, but it was very disappointing since the pool was why we chose the venue. Dinner was mixed. The smoked salmon and tempura prawn starters were lovely, and the lamb main was very good. But three of our four guests ordered sirloin, and the steaks came unseared, overcooked, thin and not great quality. Two of the three left more than a third because it was fatty and inedible; the third steak was less bad. The chips were undercooked and possibly processed, though I may be wrong about that. Either way, they weren’t what I’d expect at this kind of hotel. We had cheese for dessert, with a £3.25 supplement. It wasn’t great either: the Brie was hard and cold, the blue was okay, and the other one, which we think might have been Gouda, lacked flavour, perhaps because it was cold too. We could have raised it with the kitchen, but we were having fun catching up with friends, the wine was flowing and the staff were lovely. We didn’t want to make a fuss, spoil the mood, then wait for the food to be cooked again. The steak and chips left on the plates said enough. For the money, the trip felt overpriced and disappointing, though it would have taken very little to make it excellent.

The room was decent, and we genuinely liked the ambiance and décor of the executive room. The area around the hotel was pleasant too, with greenery and even two roe deer. The spa was just average, small and crowded, so it didn’t feel tranquil. Service was the weakest part of our stay, and below what we expected from a 4-star hotel. At check-in, we were told the TV had no signal and a solution was being arranged. That evening, we learned no technician could come. The receptionist was dismissive, kept saying there was nothing she could do, and offered neither an apology nor compensation. The next day, a front desk representative mistook my partner for another guest of Asian heritage. Again, nobody acknowledged the mistake or apologized. These two incidents felt well below a 4-star standard. The service throughout seemed closer to what we’d expect at a 2-3 star place.

Awful service and lies to customers. I booked a 90min £120 massage for my wife’s birthday. The week before, Taplow house called to ask if they could move it 15 minutes earlier to fit in another booking. That wasn’t possible, and I told Taplow house so. The appointment stayed as confirmed in our original email. When my wife arrived, she was rudely told she was 15 minutes late, even though she wasn’t. Taplow had moved it anyway, despite being told that couldn’t work. After they said the massage was over, she got dressed and checked her phone. It had only lasted 45 minutes, although we’d paid for 90. At first they said there was nothing they could do because they had another booking. They then offered the remaining time, but she was already dressed and upset, and the relaxing experience was ruined. After five phone calls with different people, we were promised a full refund within 14 working days. It’s now been over a month and nothing has arrived. Every follow-up call gets the same lie that it’ll be sorted, and they’ve ignored every request for a call back or an email confirming the refund. Avoid Taplow House!