We stayed at the Royalton CHIC Punta Cana from 13Feb to 19Feb2022. We selected this resort based on the info/pics on their website, YouTube reviews and the advice of our Travel Agent. While we ended up having a great time, as we do wherever we go, we were extremely disappointed in the resort.
This feeling was shared by virtually everyone we met that week. On Wednesday they conducted a customer-satisfaction survey and the next morning there were “management type” people all over the place as I’m sure they got blasted in the survey. Here is my view of the pros and cons…...
The Positives:
The beach was very nice.
The nightly entertainment was good.
The made to order breakfast omelets were good.
The Indian restaurant (Taj) was very good, including the food, service and atmosphere.
The Cappuccino was great at Insomnia (the coffee shop).
The weather was amazing!
The Negatives/Disappointments:
The Diamond club is very misleading. The website describes all of the amazing benefits including nice rooms. We arrived to find out we got “Diamond Junior” which means no room upgrade and very few of the advertised services.
They were constantly running out of common things including bottled water, tonic, Tito’s, chicken, etc.
The food (except for Taj) ranged from good to unacceptable, we were expecting great food. The steaks were thin and gristly, the mashed potatoes were cold, the French toast at the sit-down restaurant was ice cold, etc.
The meal portions are child-sized; you literally have to order multiple entrees and several appetizers to get a decent meal.
The restaurant service was slow; we spent two hours at the sushi restaurant after being seated to get our meal.
The staff that we tipped well daily were great. The rest of the staff was uninformed (they could not answer basic questions), rude (you’d walk up to the bar and they’d ignore you), and many didn’t speak English. It literally felt like it was everyone’s first day on the job and there was no adult supervision.
They have very few waitstaff in the restaurants; simply getting a coffee at breakfast was virtually impossible. After the third day I started going to the coffee shop on the way to breakfast and brought my own coffee.
The alcohol tasted like it was watered down (unless you ordered shots as that would be too obvious) and the included wine selection was poor (the only white wine was Chardonnay and the few reds were not very good).
All of the food venues close by 10 pm and the room service was horrible. They should keep one food venue open late every night.
A friend that we met got what he believed to be food poisoning partway through the week, and Pam got the same symptoms on the last day of the week.
They have vendors all over the property selling jewelry and trinkets that are very aggressive to the point of making the guests uncomfortable. Michael decided to give in and buy a bracelet and is quite certain that he was “pick pocketed” by one of the vendors while talking to another.
This is not “all inclusive” it’s more like “somethings inclusive”. It seemed like everything was an up-charge. Again, not as advertised and it left a bad taste in our mouths as we were constantly asked for money.
Summary:
I’ve traveled all over the world and based on my experience I do not recommend this resort! My assumption is that they struggled during the Pandemic and lost a lot of money. They are now trying to survive by cutting back staff, training, food portions and quality, alcohol portions and quality, and “all inclusive” elements. I believe this is the wrong strategy as they’re destroying their reputation and that will be difficult and expensive to rebuild.
Royalton CHIC Punta Cana Reviews
We stayed at the Royalton CHIC Punta Cana from 13Feb to 19Feb2022. We selected this resort based on the info/pics on their website, YouTube reviews and the advice of our Travel Agent. While we ended up having a great time, as we do wherever we go, we were extremely disappointed in the resort.
This feeling was shared by virtually everyone we met that week. On Wednesday they conducted a customer-satisfaction survey and the next morning there were “management type” people all over the place as I’m sure they got blasted in the survey. Here is my view of the pros and cons…...
The Positives:
The beach was very nice.
The nightly entertainment was good.
The made to order breakfast omelets were good.
The Indian restaurant (Taj) was very good, including the food, service and atmosphere.
The Cappuccino was great at Insomnia (the coffee shop).
The weather was amazing!
The Negatives/Disappointments:
The Diamond club is very misleading. The website describes all of the amazing benefits including nice rooms. We arrived to find out we got “Diamond Junior” which means no room upgrade and very few of the advertised services.
They were constantly running out of common things including bottled water, tonic, Tito’s, chicken, etc.
The food (except for Taj) ranged from good to unacceptable, we were expecting great food. The steaks were thin and gristly, the mashed potatoes were cold, the French toast at the sit-down restaurant was ice cold, etc.
The meal portions are child-sized; you literally have to order multiple entrees and several appetizers to get a decent meal.
The restaurant service was slow; we spent two hours at the sushi restaurant after being seated to get our meal.
The staff that we tipped well daily were great. The rest of the staff was uninformed (they could not answer basic questions), rude (you’d walk up to the bar and they’d ignore you), and many didn’t speak English. It literally felt like it was everyone’s first day on the job and there was no adult supervision.
They have very few waitstaff in the restaurants; simply getting a coffee at breakfast was virtually impossible. After the third day I started going to the coffee shop on the way to breakfast and brought my own coffee.
The alcohol tasted like it was watered down (unless you ordered shots as that would be too obvious) and the included wine selection was poor (the only white wine was Chardonnay and the few reds were not very good).
All of the food venues close by 10 pm and the room service was horrible. They should keep one food venue open late every night.
A friend that we met got what he believed to be food poisoning partway through the week, and Pam got the same symptoms on the last day of the week.
They have vendors all over the property selling jewelry and trinkets that are very aggressive to the point of making the guests uncomfortable. Michael decided to give in and buy a bracelet and is quite certain that he was “pick pocketed” by one of the vendors while talking to another.
This is not “all inclusive” it’s more like “somethings inclusive”. It seemed like everything was an up-charge. Again, not as advertised and it left a bad taste in our mouths as we were constantly asked for money.
Summary:
I’ve traveled all over the world and based on my experience I do not recommend this resort! My assumption is that they struggled during the Pandemic and lost a lot of money. They are now trying to survive by cutting back staff, training, food portions and quality, alcohol portions and quality, and “all inclusive” elements. I believe this is the wrong strategy as they’re destroying their reputation and that will be difficult and expensive to rebuild.