London Docklands (Excel) hotel

What a find! 5 mins from London City Airport, good price, quiet room with all you need for overnight stay. Bed comfy, room spotless and extra pillows. Friendly welcome, great meal, for quality service and price. Done it again Premier Inn, we will revisit this one!

This was by far the worst hotel experience I’ve ever had. The breakfast was revolting – stone cold, tasteless, and looked like it had been reheated for the third time. The eggs were like rubber, the sausages were dry and cold, and the whole setup was just depressing. When I asked who cooked it, a staff member told me it was the manager – some guy named Terry. If that’s true, it’s honestly laughable. He should never be allowed near a kitchen. Stick to checking people in – even that might be too much for him. The room was filthy – hair in the sink, stains on the sheets, dust everywhere. I’ve stayed in hostels cleaner than this. The reception staff were clueless and moved at a snail’s pace. No one knew what was going on, everyone looked lost, and I genuinely started to wonder if anyone was actually trained to work in hospitality. This place is a complete joke. I wouldn’t stay here again if it was free. I wouldn’t recommend it to my worst enemy. If you’re reading this – go somewhere else. Literally any other hotel in the area would be a massive improvement over this disaster. Avoid. Avoid. Avoid.

I usually choose Premier Inn because I know what to expect—clean rooms, reliable service, and good value. Unfortunately, the Docklands Excel location didn’t quite live up to the usual standard. The positives first: my room was clean, spacious, and impressively quiet considering how close the hotel is to both the DLR and City Airport. The bed was also very comfortable. The check-in process was slow. I waited around 10 minutes, and my colleague mentioned that reception and the bar were being run by just one member of staff. If that’s true, it certainly explains the delay but also points to an understaffed operation overall. That said, the hotel clearly needs attention. Several low-level lights along the corridor between reception and the bar/restaurant area were out, with only two of about seven working. It gave the impression that regular maintenance is being neglected. The bar and restaurant areas are in visible decline. Fixed seating was patched and worn, and the tables were heavily scuffed and in need of replacement or refurbishment. Breakfast itself was disappointing: the coffee machines were out of order, the hot buffet was inadequately stocked, and the usual range of items you’d expect from a Premier Inn breakfast simply wasn’t there. When I returned to the buffet to get juice and toast, I found that my unfinished meal had been cleared. This was likely due to staff not being able to keep track of guests during the under-resourced service. Given its location right next to the Excel and the high volume of paying guests that must pass through, this hotel would really benefit from more staff and a bit of investment.

Excellent service, and amazing host from Rasel! Would 100% recommend, very accommodating! Rasel is super helpful on check in, helping me with local area information also.

Let me start with highlighting I did run hotels as a manager for 10 years including both Premier inn and Travelodge. So I'm fully aware how the service should look like. I've checked in at around 6.30pm. Jurate- was checking me in. She started with question: Do you drive here? No hi. Welcome to premier inn. How are you. Basics... When she asked for my surname I started to spell it as it is a long one. She abruptly stopped me saying tell me your surname. Then I was told I got meal deal and I need to go to the bar to book a table. And that's that. No have a nice stay or we are here 24hrs if you need anything. When I went to book my table I've meet assistant manager Rasel. Great guy. Premier inn can be proud of him. I asked him if I can print off few pages and he said yes. He gave me card with email address. I went to unpack. Came back down for dinner. I saw empty reception so I thought great opportunity to ask for print outs. Jurate was at reception. Gave me attitude again saying that Rasel shouldn't promise me print outs and send me to find him as she rudely said he promised so he needs to do it! So I went to look for him. Ridiculous right? I found him in the bar. He went to reception with me to print off my pages. As I've made mistake when typing email I had to resend and because reception got busy he served customers in between. Which I didn't have any problem with. So because of this delay with print outs I was late with getting to bar cafe. Which got busy. I waited 30 minutes to be served. I even went to the bar trying to order. But I was sent away. And Jurate decided to ignore me the whole time. She took orders from everyone around me. I got so upset I went back to reception shaking and crying. You can check out my story on your CCTV. Rasel tried to comfort me and offered to place my order himself. I was so upset that I refused to go back to the bar cafe and I was forced to eat in the room. My food supposed to be ready at 8.40 pm. I waited in the bar cafe another 20 minutes and upset even more went back to my room. I went back down 20 minutes later to get a refund and get Uber eats as this was 1 hour 40 minutes after I first tried to place the order. Rasel apologised. Brought me my food. And promised to refund me. By this time I cancelled all my meals too. When my food finally arrived. Squid was burned. Lasagne was overcooked too. If Jurate would treat me with care and have the basic customer service my experience will be totally different. Why management decided to put her on reception is blowing my mind. Even pub service next door are much more qualified then she is to deal with customers. If that would be my only experience I would never stay in Premier inn again. And to top it off she didn't even check me in on the system. So my Room was charge as no show. So if reception would have to swap rooms possibility could be that some stranger could walk into my room! Room was like always comfortable and clean.