HOSHINOYA Tokyo

The hotel was definitely clean and the room was big for Tokyo standards. Staff are attentive to when you are leaving the room as you are required to remove the shoes when you enter the property ( which was quite inconvenient with all the winter coats). It was not clear when booking that the gym and swimming pool was outside the building which we can access for additional fees. However the most disappointing was the attitude and service for the front desk! We had arrived at the hotel at 1.30pm and requested for an earlier check in. We were told they would check however we were left sitting for 45 minutes before we approached the counter to be told that we could not check in early. We left the hotel and came back to Check in at 10pm as we didn’t want to waste the day sitting around waiting for an update whether we could check in or not. The most disappointing though was when we requested for a check out for 1 hour later (1pm) instead of 12pm. When we asked for a complimentary 1 hour extension if they aren’t fully booked, the lady asked bluntly if we couldn’t afford to pay 8,000 Yen for an extension? She said if we pay she would be happy to extend for us. We have stayed in many hotels before, even in Tokyo, where they had extended by an hour without such snark remarks. If they had put it across in a polite manner, it would have been more acceptable. This was a lousy way to end our trip and we probably would not be heading back to hoshinoya/ recommending it to our friends.

The staff was very helpful and kind, the facility is beautiful and everything was very well thought out.