Pickering Hotel

The village is lovely but the company I work for ( which I booked) paid for this. STRONG ADVICE - if you arrive and although there are empty tables ( I sat in the bar for over an hour but was told that the tables were all booked even though I was staying on my own) over an hour I sat there and there was still empty tables everywhere, but I still couldn’t order a meal. I was told by a staff member that the chefs only cook for a certain amount of tables- ( hence everywhere booked up, but actually close to empty tables). So the restaurant will be fully booked and you can’t get delivery of takeaway anywhere, Just Eats and Uber don’t deliver here. You get advised there are restaurants close by, but who wants to drive when you’ve been driving all day. I’m sure they could have easily fitted in just one person (I was on my own) but it was a NO NO. The rooms are nice, but the premier in Ultimate WiFi is crap. My phone on its own network is quicker, so if you want to work from here then I’d say you’d have to be very patient coz the WiFi is typical Premier Inn “slow”. The rooms were nice. I’ve not yet attempted breakfast ( I’m hoping I’ll get a table but I’m not building my hopes up). So basically I wouldn’t even entertain this place. If I was forewarned I’d need to book a table within my confirmation email then I’d have booked as late as possible. But no warning at all. So if you want to stop here, I’d recommend booking a table ( if you know your arrival time) or stop off and eat on the way ( although the food didn’t look that appetising in this so called restaurant ). There is always a queue at the bar too. It’s as though they are really understaffed and although the staff are apologetic and very polite, they must get complaints all the time. They are litterally run off their feet. I get the feeling, Premier Inn are struggling to get staff. Such a shame as the room was nice but really expensive at £160.25 per night ( York Horse racing was on). I would actually recommend to people to look at an Air B&B ( lovely cottage’s in the area with similar prices, some are cheaper, but this particular Premier Inn, hits below the belt and it’s a staffing problem. They obviously need more chefs and more service staff. Me personally, I’d give this place a wide swerve.

Visited for less than an hour for breakfast and recieved a £95 fine through the post. Despite there being a sign on the pay and display meter saying no need to pay for parking. No instructions to do anything else and nothing was said by the staff at the desk/bar. Tried contacting the parking company and they don’t want to know, can’t seem to get in touch with premier inn they won’t answer the phone or respond to emails. £95 for 50mins of parking!

Very comfortable as all premier inns the are air conditioning was great as the weather was warm when we were there staff very helpful getting my wife a large print menu on the nights we ate at the hotel and nightshift staff were very helpful when my wife had a diabetic hypo. The only downside was that due to a staff shortage in the kitchen we were unable to eat there every night but the staff did supply a list of local restaurants and take aways.

I booked a Premier Plus room for four nights for my partner’s birthday, a couple of weeks before our visit, I rang the hotel direct to check that the room had a walk in shower as we are both in our seventies with some mobility problems and find climbing into a bath challenging, I was told by the person on reception that it didn’t but he could move us to an accessible room, room 1, next to reception which also a Premier Plus room. On arrival, we had been changed to a standard room, not the room we had been promised, I had paid for a Premier Plus room and I demanded it, I was told there were none available, the person on reception just shrugged and said there was nothing he could do, he gave me a telephone number of customer relations in Dunstable who were as good as useless, eventually the hotel manager appeared and found us a standard accessible room, but still lacking the Plus extras we had paid for, he offered to refund our breakfasts which we had already paid for, this never happened, so he lied to us. On our return I tried Dunstable again and after much haggling I did get the breakfasts refunded and the extra cost of the Plus room also. This experience has severely soured our relationship with Premier Inn, we have been staying at their hotels for many years all over the country and have never had a bad experience, what really made me angry was their indifference and the manager lying to us.

Wonderfully clean and lovely staff but not for me. Modern and feels like a cafe in the restaurant, no atmosphere at all and hardly any seating at the bar. Three pub tables outside are not enough and although they have a view of the car park it would have been nice to sit outside. I wouldn’t come back because of the lack of atmosphere and seating inside and out. Nowhere to relax .