Huge, clean

high humidity - mould smell in rooms

The beach is incredible; lovely blue seas, the sand so white and soft, really the best thing about the stay at the resort. The food was very good too, breakfast, lunch and dinners all high quality, as were the drinks. I liked that the mini bar was free and replenished every night but for the price you pay I expect that.

The room location looked nothing like the brochure, instead of a lovely 2 story "village" setting we were placed on the 5th floor of a block of flats, interior of the room the same but not the same feel. About 90% of the staff were rude, unhelpful and untrained, the remaining 10% were very nice but they were few and far between. On the first day of arriving we were told that we were only able to book 2 restaurants for dinner over 9 nights (!) but when we looked at the places they all seemed empty - the real reason we were unable to book anything for dinner was because of lack of staff, we heard people saying they had far too many guests and far too few staff to run everything. Of course there were walk in restaurants but even with those sometimes we had to wait 30 minutes to get a table, once at breakfast there were only 2 tables full and we still had to wait 25 minutes. All the restaurants were artic cold too, we actually took hoodies on some nights out which was ridiculous, if you are able to get a booking at one of the "bookable" places they require a dress code, trousers and shoes for men which I find ludicrous as there's literally nothing fancy about the experience. Literally no atmosphere in the restaurants either, it felt like it was 11:30pm and the kitchen was closing but in reality it was only 8:30pm. There were a lack of towels by the pools on some days too which wasn't ideal too.

The resorts aesthetics and swimming pools were decent.

The staff are extremely rude take no accountability for anything. Rooms aren’t cleaned and bedding wasn’t changed in my room for 8 days even tho I complained several times for it to be changed. Food is of a 3* hotel standard so is customer service. Had tours booked that were over booked by the staff so on the day of the tours I was told I couldn’t attend. Imagine waking up getting ready and sitting at reception for your tour at 8:45am to be told you can’t go cos the tours been over booked And nobody taking any accountability. staff at sandals Barbados are the worst I have ever encountered not only in the Caribbean but in the world and I’ve traveled to 15+ country’s. I don’t no how Royal Sandals Barbados is a 5* resort when they give a 3 star customer service and food and drinks are that of a 3 star restaurant and bar at best. They don’t even have a drinks menu and the staff can’t mix and make cocktails some are just having fun attempting to make drinks they clearly can’t.

The resort is amazing. The staff can't do enough and the beach is gorgeous. Cannot wait to go back!

The sun loungers is a real issue, if you're not up at 7am with your things at the pool you've very little chance of getting a good spot for the day. People tend to double book themselves reserving beds they don't even go to. The food on the resort could be better for the price you're paying.

beautiful location, staff walking around property very friendly. I had my wedding out there and the photographer/ videographer were amazing, really went above and beyond.

Service is very slow, staff working don’t seem very happy. As it’s all inclusive you can’t tip the staff so it feels like the have no incentive to work faster/harder. The vibe I got was they get paid if the serve 100 guests or 10 so speed and efficiency doesn’t matter.

A review of our 7 nights stay in November (party of 3, couple + mother, 2 rooms booked). I don’t usually post neutral/negative reviews as on reflection I’m usually able to empathise with the reasons for bad service but on this occasion I cannot. I hope it will allow you to make an informed decision on where you want to stay in Barbados as our experience did not chime with the reviews we read before. This is not the first time I’ve been to Barbados and I have also stayed on 4 other Caribbean islands in the past. This is the first experience of a Sandals resort. I’ll start with the positives of our stay 1. The resort itself is very clean and well maintained 2. Overall the quality and range of food (when able to access it) was very good for an all inclusive resort 3. Staff were very friendly but not necessarily helpful nor quick 4. Rooms are cleaned to a high standard (when they are cleaned)

Unfortunately overall the negatives outweighed the positives: 1. Lengthy checkin process, having to provide basic personal details that were all provided when I booked. I have never been asked to do this before. Furthermore they check-in in “batches” meaning it can take up to 45 mins for you to finally get served and taken to your room. I recommend you take your bags with you once you are shown to a room - leaving this to the porters will mean 1-2 hour wait for your bags according to other people that opted for that option. 2. Queues - this became a real chore by the end of our holiday. Queues to get into any restaurant, for breakfast, lunch & dinner. Some of the 20 eateries involved over an hour and a half wait for dinner. I specifically use the word “eateries” as some of the advertised “restaurants” are in fact fast food shacks or doughnut places or cafe shops etc. One UK couple we met mentioned they were glad to be going home after a week of queuing! 3. Inconsistent housekeeping service - one day one of our rooms was missed and other days they claimed to have run out of towels or bath mats etc. I rang housekeeping late afternoon on the day we didn’t get a clean and they assured me someone would come to give us toilet roll & towels. That never happened so I had to ring again 10pm just asking for basic provisions, we wanted to get to bed and were too tired to let cleaner in to change sheets etc 4. Room mini bar not restocked daily as promised. I rang them to notify and again promised someone would come, they never did 5. Unless you pay more for a butler (or get up at 6am), don’t expect to get a prime spot for your sun lounger or a brolly. The butlers reserve them all with little wooden plaques.

The catamaran with the crew of Cool Runnings 4 was fantastic. Dinner at Sandy lane was exceptional. Lunch at the Lonestar hotel was very good. Best lobster I’ve ever had at a restaurant called “Lobster Alive”.

Check in(s): Our first check in process was with the Royal resort on the 24th of October 2021. After arriving at the hotel in the shuttle from the airport (which we waited 30/40 minutes for) we were ushered into the ‘Club Sandals’ room where a single staff member addressed all 6 couples that were wanting to check in and gave us a group introduction to how the check in process would work and what details they needed from us. Having already done a pre-check in before arrival we were forced to sit around and wait for the other couples to complete iPad check ins and give their card details one at a time (similar vibe splitting a check with friends except you haven’t had the meal yet and don’t know anyone). After the hour long introduction and card solicitation we were told rooms were not ready yet (3pm is check in and we arrived at around 1pm so this was expected). To make the time go faster the staff member checking us in took us to the Neptune restaurant for lunch. At this point we had a long (40 minute?) wait to be seated after being asked our room number several times (no one let them know 12 new guests were dropped off together and they didn’t seem to connect the dots that all of us had no room number yet and were in winter clothes having arrived from the UK) When we finished our food it was well past 5pm and we were tired having had a 9 hour flight and still being in our flight gear, understandably at this point very keen to get to our room. The issue was it was raining, and, we had no way of getting to the reception without getting ourselves and our travel documents (passports, COVID test certificates, laptops, etc.) wet. To get around this we noticed several staff members delivering food with umbrellas and asked the host at the restaurant if it was possible for us to use an umbrella, to which we said none were available. We asked to call reception to get one and were told no phone was available.

Great place to relax and enjoy, great facilities, good choice of restaurants.

There were a couple of issues we had during the stay. The concierge could be a be blunt and seemed very short when being asked questions (not all staff but some of them) they could do with some staff training, also you are better ringing them if you have a problem, the prioritise phone calls over personal visits, the phone was forever ringing and the always told you to wait whilst the prioritised the calls very annoying when you are stood there waiting. Also went for a pizza one lunch time ordered a burger and a pizza the burger came after several minutes, the pizza after a further 20 minutes had not shown up, a complaint was made they said it will be done in 2 minutes 5 minutes later still no pizza, the manager Guisseppe told me that pizzas take a lot longer to cook than a burger, he must think people are stupid, i made a complaint re this and nobody got back tome which was disappointing. Also, Guissepe was on the front desk at the Italian restaurant the next night and decided he would challenge me re the pizzagate scandal, I ended up arguing with him re this before my wife stepped in and tiold me we dont want our night ruining and we should walk away. I would give the resort 5 stars but for this character who was totally inept and talked to me like I was stupid i should know a pizza need 40 minutes to cook!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Fab facilities, always clean and loads to do! Best hotel I’ve been to in terms of catering for my food allergies (gluten free).

Beautiful rooms, landscaping, property, pools and beach. Great bar service and friendly staff. Bakery cafes open fron 7 am to 10 pm real plus....crepes, ice cream, fancy coffees and other desserts.

Food varied from excellent to acceptable. Limited places for breakfast and lunch. Without butler level service harder to get dinner reservations in reservation only restaurants for first 3 days of one week stay. However, several good options for non reservation restaurants filled the gap.

Great staff, great facilities, definitely book room with a butler. Clean and dreamy beach

Room service food was not great