Whately Hall Hotel

Refurbished bedroom excellent - breakfast excellent value. Staff friendly and helpful.

My daughters and I had a wonderful 2 night stay here. We were upgraded to junior suites which were beautiful.

Nice old stone built hotel,in the centre of town,tons of old world charm,staff very good polite and efficient,it's breakfast buffet when busy,and al a carte when quiet,both good but a la carte very good Plenty of on site free parking Would and will stay again

I wanted to like this hotel; I have stayed here before, but it is under new management and there are improvements like newly decorated suites. The location, an historic building very close to Banbury Cross, could not be better. Now for the downside; the parking lot is accessed through a tunnel through the wall of the building, and if your car is not small it is quite scary to drive through it, and if you don't you are stuck with the paid spaces outside. It is probable that alterations to the building are not permitted because of its historic nature, so the windows in the rooms are small and the rooms tend to be stuffy even when they are fully open-there is no airconditioning. Public areas are pleasant, bar service is good, we tried the restaurant only for breakfast (which doesn't start until 8 on weekends, a bit late I think). The food was fine. A weird thing happened to the water in the room, the cold somehow became disconnected so the sink and the shower were hot only, though this was fixed when we complained. The management change is fairly recent so things may improve but we honestly weren't that comfortable.

Hotel has a lot of history and the information provided was very interesting. Room was very nice and well decorated. Reception and restaurant staff go above and beyond to be friendly and efficient. Food on the menu was well presented and the service was great.

stayed here for two nights,paid for three nights but left early as the hotel is a disgrace.The whole place is dirty and dusty and needs a full refurbishment and clean.Food was uneatable.Staff are all very nice and helpful when i complained about all the things i have mentioned the member of staff agreed with all i said

This hotel was offered as a Travelzoo deal and after a nice day sightseeing we arrived at the hotel at around 5pm. The foyer was pleasant enough and check in was efficient. However as we made our way to our room it became clear the hotel is very run down and in need of major refurbishment. There was a strong smell of cigarette smoke and the room doors all had big red ‘no smoking’ stickers - clearly indicating this was quite a problem. The room was the worst hotel room I have ever seen. Absolutely filthy - black mould on the windows, dust everywhere, cobwebs, old run down furniture that was only good for the skip, a broken bedside light. A particular highlight was the hair all over the shower curtain. Broken tiles, mouldy grout etc etc. I felt I was in some sort of documentary about the state of British housing rather than a night away in a nice hotel. We trundled downstairs to complain. We sensed this was not an unusual occurrence and were told the hotel was full, there was no option to change rooms. We thought a bottle of over priced pinot Grigio might help - it didn’t. We eeked it was out for another hour and decided to cut our losses and head home. Our fellow ‘guests’ effing and blinding down the hallway and the fresh aromas of fag smoke helped to confirm this decision. We explained to the receptionist and although she was sympathetic she did not seem surprised or offer to refund. She suggested we write to complain. Mercure need to sort this hotel out urgently. The room we had was not fit for purpose.

We arrived and were greeted by a lovely girl whose name we later found out was Daisy. On arrival the lady Infront of us was complaining that although cleaned her room was very dusty and could this be rectified. Daisy was very apologetic and arranged for this to be rectified as they were fully booked and had no other rooms to offer. We joked that ours should be clean and continued to check in. We went up to our room to find that it had not been at all cleaned from the previous guests, the bed was unmade, towels on the floor and glasses outside. I went to reception to complain and was angered to which Daisy calmed me down and Took control of the situation. She cleaned the room herself and refunded us and also gave us a complimentary drink, had it not been for her we would have left, it was our engagement weekend and we wanted it to be special. The front of house staff in the bar and reception were amazing and are a credit to the team and like I say made the situation a whole lot better. I suggest that more cleaning staff are recruited 3pm is a reasonable enough check in time for rooms to be turned around,

Lovely historical building but other than that not much going for it