TripAdvisor Traveler Rating

I cannot wait to return! This hotel, its wonderful staff and facilities are just first class, I had reservations at first following some poor reviews, but I was blown away with this hotel. We were greeted at the airport, helped through passport control and luggage reclaim, then into our Rolls Rolls Royce to the hotel. We were greeted with a drink, and then taken by our butler to our room, The room was an MB1 suite and was perfect. We were looked after during our stay by three wonderful butlers, Melisa, Rachel & Aquila, and this team looked after all of our extra needs, reservations etc. We ate at various restaurants, including The Green House, La Parisienne, Schooners, Portofino's, Chi and Butch's Chop House, and could not find fault in any, but we did enjoy the Sunday roast in the British style pub, The Merry Monkey - definitely worth a visit. During the day we ate donuts or pastries and excellent coffee around the site. We used a cabana most days, which again was reserved by a butler, plus they came to us with a cooler box full of cold drinks and ice. There were plenty of sun beds and plentiful supply of fresh towels at each of the pools and some by the beach. I love the fact you can use all of the facilities of the two Sandals hotels next to each other. Please do try the excursions, The Rum tour were so interesting. We also had a fantastic massage at The Red Lane Spa, Thank you Mr Kahlon, Charles and all of the team at Sandals Royal Barbados, we cannot wait to return as you and the team made this one of the holidays of a life time.

My husband and I stayed at the Sandals Grande St Lucian for our honeymoon 8 years ago. We were so excited to stay at the Sandals Royal Barbados to celebrate our anniversary.  While the resort is beautiful, at this time, we won’t be planning a return trip. The issues that we experienced during our stay were really not up to the standard of “luxury-included” Sandals.  First, was our experience with our transfer from the airport and checking in. We stood in line standing outside for quite some time at the airport before being able to board our transfer. There wasn’t much communication about our luggage, but it was taken on a different vehicle to the resort. Once we got to the resort, we were taken to a nice area with lots of other people to be checked in. We waited and waited. Someone came around and took our name, but they didn’t seem very organized. We watched as they took lots of other couples to their rooms - even taking one couple to the wrong room and having to bring them back. After waiting about an hour, we checked with someone and they said they were still working on getting everyone’s rooms. Then, a while later, they started taking couples to their rooms that had gotten there much later than us (on the next bus). I had to talk to the leader 2 more times before someone finally, begrudgingly, took us to our room.  We asked where to eat. She told us a restaurant, but not where it was. We were really hungry from traveling and waiting. We walked all across the resort and finally found the restaurant.  It was closed for another hour. It was frustrating that she had told us somewhere that was closed. We finally found some food ourselves at the jerk chicken place.  Then, we went to find our luggage because it hadn’t been brought to our room. We were surprised, because at this point it had been a LONG time waiting to be checked in, etc. So we went up to the lobby and found our luggage sitting up there. We just took it to the room ourselves. I don’t know if it ever would’ve made it to us.  The whole check in process just started our stay on the wrong foot. So much different than the way we were treated at the Grande St. Lucian.  More restaurants than not did not have functional air conditioning. The hibachi restaurant was almost intolerable it was so hot and we ate at 8pm after dark. Another issue we had was concerning a taxi. We had booked a taxi to and from the fish fry in town through the excursions desk, as advised by the Sandals staff. The taxi was reserved for the wrong time and we had to call ourselves. Several other guests had this same issue and were very frustrated.  But as much as check in was an issue, check out was the straw that broke the camel’s back. We went to the lobby to check out and take our transfer back to the airport. She informed us of our charges to the room and the amount was incorrect. As she was listing out the room charges, there was a charge for over $400 from the spa. We never went to the spa, booked anything at the spa or contacted the spa in any way during our time at the resort or before our trip. I informed her of this and she called the spa. The spa insisted that we had booked an appt and no-showed. They repeated said we’d been “made aware of the policy.” The whole thing was just entirely untrue - we’d never booked anything. She had the manager come over and she called the spa. They just kept insisting that we were charged for a no show that was our fault. At this point, I was very frustrated and upset about these accusations. Finally, the manager took the charge off our account which was appreciated, but the whole ordeal was stressful. So we started our trip with stress and ended it that way too. It certainly didn’t feel like other 5 star resorts we’ve been to and at this time we would not recommend traveling there as for the price, there are other places with better service.

Great place to stay. Room was exceptional. Lots of great choices for dining. Staff was very responsive and friendly. One of our best Sandals vacations. Beach was great as were the pools. Airport was easy to navigate and resort to hotel drive (and unfortunately back) was great.

Not as advertised or expected, restaurants opening times were not as advertised leading to long waits at breakfast and evenings due to some not opening at all and a distinct staff shortage leading to below par service and somewhat disgruntled staff members. Similar issues at bars, particularly the Merry Monkey and Lovers lane where staff were in short supply and had an annoying habit of disappearing for lengthy periods leaving customers without drinks and causing queues to build up. Tonic water was in short supply at several bars including the Piano/Oyster bar spoiling the evening for several UK customers including myself as well as running out of ‘top shelf’ spirits later in the evening. Staff seemed to think soda water is a suitable substitute for tonic on several occasions, I can assure them it is NOT. WiFi in the room did not work for 4/5 days and the lack of response from the concierge lounge was abysmal, no returned calls and no action taken for four days. Air con had failed in the room on returning one afternoon and floors were soaked with condensation and slippy, bedding and clothing was also damp, several calls later and after finally requesting the attendance of the Health & Safety manager due to the lack of attention someone finally attended and sorted the problem delaying our evening entertainment and wearing damp clothing. The general response from the concierge lounge was totally unacceptable and not anywhere near the level of service experienced on previous visits to Sandals. As usual the butlers had taken all the best sunbeds by the pools and beach before 7:00 a.m. even though they go to great length to inform customers that beds reserved prior to this without attending visitors will have towels/ possessions removed. I realise this happens at all resorts but if butlers do not abide by the rules do not expect customers too resulting in several confrontations at the pool pre 7:00. My final observation was that one of the lists to our building (Wahoo) was out of action for the duration of our stay and this serviced the Sky bar and French restaurant causing long delays for customers and staff alike and one day the other list went out of service meaning visitors had to climb/descend up to five stories, totally unacceptable. Our previous experience of Sandals Barbados was far superior to this visit in all respects, the resort has got too large, too few staff and has become very impersonal, unrecognisable from our previous visit. Personally, we have stayed at better 3 star hotels and certainly received far superior/friendlier service. This review will be replicated on Tripadvisor

This is our second time travelling to Barbados and staying on the Royal Side. A huge reason we returned aside from the beauty of the island was that we loved all the staff on property and they had made us feel so welcomed the first time through. When we returned this year, we were welcomed back with open arms and we knew we made the right choice. Everyone was so friendly, helpful, and truly made our time on property unforgettable. We'd like to give a HUGE shout out to the following individuals who definitely went above and beyond to make sure we enjoyed our vacation to the absolute fullest. A big shout out to the following playmakers: Terisha, Azizi, Tandiqua, Treshaun, Andrea, Shane Paul, Ruchelle, Tabitha, Charles, and Skai. Also we loved DJ King Scoobz and bartenders Rena, Cayenne (at the Oyster Bar), and Kyle (at the Bowling Alley Bar). Had a blast doing aquasize as well! Also a huge shout out to our old butler from our first trip Jeremy. While we were not in a butler suite this time, he still stopped by to say hi and check in on us while we were on property. Dale at the piano bar was always a wonderful time and Mario took some great photos of us during our trip! There are so many more wonderful staff and memories we've had of this trip but truly can't thank all the staff for welcoming us back and being such an important part of our trip. We can't wait to come back in the future and miss this island so very much. I highly recommend visiting and hope you have the same experience as we did.