Metropol Palace Belgrade

One of the main reasons for this low rating is the service and the terrible restaurant upstairs. Travelling with a 5-year-old child obviously makes you eat in the hotel restaurant more often then you would wish, and this is where things became very disappointing. It is honestly strange, because almost every other restaurant in Belgrade is incredibly delicious, with top service, food arriving within minutes, hot, perfect and exactly as ordered. Unfortunately, this is absolutely not the case with the 10th floor restaurant. You wait for one hour for food to arrive in a constantly empty restaurant, only to be served freezing cold dishes or badly cooked food. For example, overcooked chicken next to seabass, both completely wrong in temperature and execution. They seriously need to look into hiring chefs from neighbouring restaurants, because the quality here is unacceptable. Room service is the same disaster. What is promised as 20 minutes easily turns into 1.5 hours, and when the food finally arrives it is ice cold. I do not mind prices in restaurants at all, but food and service must be on top. This restaurant is definitely in the highest price league in Belgrade, yet delivers one of the worst dining experiences. Tbh I’m not sure how anything here was associated with Michelin guide it’s definitely nothing to do with it at current moment. Room guest service is almost impossible to reach by phone. Reception staff are mostly nice and polite, and I do not think this is their fault. It feels like the hotel itself is running with many internal problems. Check in was a bit of a waiting line but it’s was day prior NYE so very understandable not big deal. Everything here needs to be asked 4 to 5 times before it actually happens. There is a lot of hit and miss. Almost daily you think, ok, now everything is fine, and then again something annoying happens that you would never expect in a 5-star hotel. The spa is a bit outdated and overcrowded at times, but it does have very good sauna and steam facilities, which are genuinely amazing. Gym was good. There are no facilities for children at all. Even during New Year’s Eve, every second family had kids, yet the hotel did not arrange any kids playroom or kids club, which is very surprising for a hotel of this level. The hotel has potential, but at the moment it feels like it is run more on a 3-star level rather than a true 5-star hotel. The rooms are fine. I was happy we managed to sort out a bed for my child, but be advised the hotel does not provide rail guards to prevent a child from rolling out of bed, which many other 5-star hotels do. I think housekeeping have lots of area to improvement including cups never washed cutlery never replaced etc again very strange for 5*. The concierge was knowledgeable and helpful. The downstairs bar was very nice, and the staff there were helpful even after hours by assisting us with room service in the lobby. Bell desk always helpful staff as well assisted us with advise how to get somewhere always got us taxi etc. We chose this hotel mainly for the location, as it is close to our family friends’ house. On our next visit, I would probably look for another option instead.

"Disaster" This hotel may once have been good and deserved 5 stars, but today there's no trace of that left. Only the prices are appropriate for those stars. First, we were given a room that smelled of sewage, the second of old, musty wood. Only the fourth room had a somewhat tolerable smell. The staff were understanding and friendly. They did their best to accommodate us and offered us an upgrade to the junior suite, where we spent three nights. We also received a good bottle of wine in the room as an apology for the inconvenience. The room was okay, but by no means 5-star standard. The floor was dirty. Our room wasn't cleaned once during those three nights! We hoped that at least the spa area would improve our opinion and mood, but it was simply a disaster. The water in the whirlpool was dirty, the tiles were falling off, and the hydromassage button didn't work. And in the shower next to the sauna, water dripped everywhere except where it was supposed to. The steam room was completely covered in limescale, and the shower hose leaked. It was awful to sit on! The Asian cleaning staff in the spa speak neither Serbian nor English. They couldn't answer our questions. They cleaned the floors with the same towels we were allowed to use in the spa. It's a disgusting sight for guests. In short: a disaster. The management urgently needs to be replaced because they clearly have no idea how to run a 5-star hotel. If they continue like this, they'll ruin what little can be saved. I would recommend they use the spa area regularly to learn what guests actually want. I personally would never return to this hotel and wouldn't recommend it to anyone. The only positive thing is the very friendly staff.

Excellent hotel, excellent service, large rooms, good breakfast, very good experience