The Diplomat Radisson Blu Residence

Location and cleanliness

Breakfast time little bit crowded

Room layout and space availability

Hall with smoking smell

For a property marketed as a 5★ hotel in the Middle East, we would expect core amenities to be readily available rather than provided only upon request. Basic kitchen essentials such as utensils, crockery, cutlery, and a small selection of pots and pans should be standard. While a coffee machine was provided, there were no pods supplied, and the Nescafé sachets offered felt below the expected quality for this level of hotel. In Bahrain, offering Arabic coffee would have been far more appropriate and aligned with regional hospitality standards. Additionally, the concierge team were unable to assist with arranging third-party excursions — something typically expected at 5★ level — and instead directed us to the VisitBahrain website to organise activities ourselves. I would like to emphasise that many other staff were excellent — particularly housekeeping and the breakfast team, who were attentive and remembered personal details about us throughout our stay. Mary at reception was also exceptional and demonstrated the level of professionalism and service we had hoped to experience consistently.

Service inconsistencies were also disappointing. On our first day, we requested a wash bowl from a member of the reception team, however no action was taken. It was also my birthday during our stay; my wife discreetly asked the same receptionist to arrange a cake, but no arrangements were made or noted. When my wife followed up on the day itself, other team members were unaware of the request but kindly organised a tiramisu from one of the restaurants at short notice. Given the circumstances and clear service lapse, we would have expected a small gesture of goodwill — however the dessert was fully charged, and there appeared to be little acknowledgement or apology from management. While we were happy to pay, the response did not reflect the service recovery standards expected at this level. On one of our final evenings, we returned to our room to find it smelled strongly of smoke. After contacting concierge, maintenance and housekeeping attended only to spray air freshener rather than addressing the root cause, which appeared to be smoke entering through interconnected ventilation from a neighbouring room. A more proactive resolution would have been expected. Finally, on the day of checkout, we requested luggage collection from our room via concierge. This request was not actioned, and we had to call again to arrange it. Unfortunately, many of these service failures involved the same receptionist, Ali M (man bun), who consistently appeared disengaged and inattentive compared to other team members.

The location and the pool.

I’m staying in a one-bedroom apartment. When I first got there, the room wasn’t very clean—it smelled like sewer! Also, the water boiler had rust. The main bathroom faucet was dirty and had food stuck to it. On the second day, the reception manager was a bit rude when she asked for my wife’s ID. It seemed like the other receptionist had already confirmed to me that the ID was scanned during check-in.