Pine Cliffs Village

Conveniently located in the resort, offering easy access to amenities. Exceptional service by friendly staff. Spacious rooms with well-equipped kitchen. Delicious breakfast surpasses expectations. Suitable for self-catering.

We were excited to stay at Pine Cliffs with family friends, but unfortunately, the experience fell well short of expectations for a so-called 5-star resort. • Lack of basic amenities: No bathroom toiletries were provided in the room, and even after requesting them multiple times, they never arrived. • Everything is an upsell: Kids club, shuttle service (even within the resort), and other standard conveniences all come at an extra cost — no real sense of hospitality here, just charges added to the final bill. • Mandatory 10% tip added to every bill: it’s automatically added — and worse, multiple staff told us they don’t even receive the tips we leave. • The resort advertises free daily water in the room, but we had to repeatedly request it. • Half-board is a scam: You can only dine at one designated restaurant for dinner (not made clear at booking), which is a 15-minute walk away — or you take a shuttle which they charge you for at end of stay as “resort fee”. Then, you have to wait for this shuttle. One time we waited 20min and ended up walking back to our room. Total waste of money. • Understaffed & slow service: Expect to wait 20–30 minutes for a poolside drink. Service across the board was slow and uncoordinated. Clearly not enough staff for the number of guests. The resort looks great on the surface, but the service and nickel-and-diming drag down the experience. At best, this is a 3 to 4-star stay — not a luxury resort by any true standard.

We don't usually write hotel reviews, and we are currently part way through a stay at Pine Cliffs.  Firstly as others remark, the natural environment that the hotel is located is very beautiful and the hotel relies on this.  The beach is beautiful and the grounds are vast and generally well kept.  In terms of the hotel, the hard product is good. There are a variety of different property types available which vary in age and type. We have two rooms in the main hotel and both are good. They are perhaps aging a little as other reviews remark, but perfectly adequate.  The soft product and the service is where things start to go wrong.  I am a Marriott Lifetime Platinum member and whilst this particular stay at Pine Cliffs was booked through an airline package I can draw on many other recent hotels stays to compare the service too.  Firstly, some positives.. There a bottle of wine upon arrival in one of the rooms which was appreciated, and also one of our guests has had a birthday during the stay and a bottle of sparkling wine was left in the room unprompted which was much appreciated.  There are some good staff at the hotel. A lot of staff though seem very inexperienced.  Some particular problems we have encountered: 1) we have to mostly request for clean glasses in the room every day. They just seem to neglect to do this by routine.  2) trying to call guest services usually goes unanswered and has only been answered about one in twenty attempts and the request was never fulfilled.  3) reception staff also can't seem to get any better service and appear to behave as if they are doing you a favour when you go and ask for something that should have been done as part of an everyday routine.  The biggest issue though and why I have taken the time to write this review is around the 'policy' of 'recommended tip'.  When ordering anything the bill has a recommended tip of 10pc listed. This is automatically added to the amount to sign for though. Therefore it is not 'recomended' it is 'automatically added'! This is the first major complaint.  On its own this is not a huge issue, but we have a half board package, and it being used as a way to inflate prices. We have noted on a few bills at the included 'O Grill' buffet something like the following..  200euros cost for buffet, included in stay 50euros drinks cost, not included.  Recomended tip of 10pc is therefore 25euro. Included half board then has -200euros deduction on the bill.  Total Charge is therefore drinks of 50euro plus a tip of 25euro and total 75euro So the hotel is charging 25euro 'tip' on 50euro of drinks as an example.. The order in which the charges are applied appears to be done to inflate the price create a larger mark up.  Be aware of this practice if you are planning a visit.  The hotel could be amazing but this issue with the' Recomended tip' and the general level of service is the problem. The service level is lower than an Autograph Collection and more akin to a Marriot