Value Hotel Thomson

Cheap but bad service

Most europeans will probably understand what I mean when I say that Value Hotel Thomson is the hotels' answer to the flights' Ryanair. It's cheap, really cheap. It's quite good and convenient - but the service is crap.

No problem with checking in, the room was big and plenty of space. Only problem was that, as often in Southeast Asia, the bathroom is a mixed toilet and shower. Not that you shower in the toilet (or other way around...), but the bathroom is so small that everything gets wet whenever you shower.

The hotel is more or less brand new, and apparently they haven't got everything in order yet, as in WiFi internet all over the building (maybe shouldn't say so on their home page then...). Of course our room was on one of the floors where it wasn't working, and despite the staff's reasurance that it soon would work again it still wasn't after three days. So then I asked to switch room.

That suggestion wasn't met with much happiness, but after a bit of discussing I was allowed to move mine and my girlfriend's luggage. No help from the staff, but instead got a irritated phone call from the reception after 20 minutes asking if I wasn't done moving soon, as they needed the room for other guests.

The whole ten days were like that, never any smiles, never any excuses for problem caused by the hotel and never any tries from the staff to make the stay better. Not even when we asked if it was possible to borrow a dvd-player (as our first had had one, but not the second) we got any help, just a "it's not included a dvd-player on that level"-comment.

To add to that the expensive breakfast was crap too.

So nothing good at all with this hotel? Sure not, the hotel pool was really nice and calm. And the room itself was very nice, both of them. The elevators were quick and you rarely had to stay waiting for one more than a few seconds. Best of all though was the price. I paid 77 SGD/night for a double room (excluding breakfast, 69 SGD for a single) which is about 40 euro. There are cheaper hotels in Singapore, but then the rooms are much smaller and the area is less nice. If just the hotel staff could be a bit more service minded this would be a really good hotel!

It's located a bit away from the most central parts of the city, but a 10 minute walk brings you to the closes MRT-train station, and then you're just two stations away from Orchard Road.

The hotel has a parking space inside a garage, but it's quite expensive and not included in the room rate.

Unique Quality: Great pool, big room.