The Savoy Sharm El Sheikh

I have just returned from a 2 week stay at the Savoy Sharm El Sheikh and it was wonderful! I travelled with my partner, 10 month old son & our mothers (glutten for punishment eh!) Having read some very mixed reports on Trip Advisor before I went I was a little dubious about the service (or lack of it and the cleanliness etc).but, our fears were completely unfounded because the hotel was stuuningly beautiful and possibly the cleanest hotel I've stayed in! Upon arrival the staff were welcoming and very accomodating moving our rooms as we were travelling as a group and wanted rooms near each other. Our room overlooked the huge pool and sea and was a really generous size even with a baby cot. The restaurants were good, we opted for All Inclusive for the first week and bed and breakfast the second week..we only ate in the buffet restaurant one evening because the variety of food was quite poor but there are 3 other estaurants where you can eat, Seafood, Asian and Italian, where the food was absolutey marvelous! The staff could not do enough for us..when a waiter spilt wine on my mothers clothes, her clothes were dry cleaned and returned to her the next day! The swimming pools are huge and two are really heated so its not too much effort to go for a dip! We did venture out one evening to Naama bay which was good though booking the hotel car service is a better option that taking a local taxi (£10 return) If you're child free you can stay at the Royal Savoy which has a seperate restaurant, all day canopes, wine & beer private pool etc But book it on arrival because its far cheaper than via the travel agent etc. Its clear at the Savoy that the staff are very proud of their hotel and work so hard to keep it in the most immaculate condition. I will definately be returning next year - it really stands out as a wonderful place!

Just back from a week at the 'ultra all inclusive' Savoy. Beautiful hotel, a little shabby in places but generally well looked after and very attractive and comfortable.First thing we were offered was an upgrade at £40 per night - we declined. Our room was on level 5, quite a hike from the pool etc.. but it could have been worse. The all inlcusive simply isn't - it's a starting point. You can have 2 or 3 things from each menu but if you want steak/prawns/lobster you must pay extra. Drinks are ok, although you can have gin/vodka/rum but not brandy! Not all inclusive like the caribbean at all - but we didn't let that spoil it. The pools are lovely and the food is plentiful and available almost 24/7. Service is good although a lot of time is wasted signing for drinks etc.. The beach is the main disappointment - it is only suitable for sitting on, you cannot access the sea apart from along the pontoon. Having said that, the pools were so lovely it didn't matter too much. The other irritation was ice cream, it is only all inclusive between 4-6pm and then only some of it - they need to sort this out as it really is frustrating. Overall, an interesting experience but not one we would repeat!

Not useally one to write reviews or anything such like on the net but I am compelled to do so in this case. My wife and I have just returned from staying at the Savoy - Sharm and had a very bad experience!! From day one, you could see that this is a 3 star hotel dressed up in 5 star clothing!! On arrival at 00.30 in the morning we were informed that the suite that we had booked 2 months earlier was not available and would we like to take a room in their sister hotel, the sierra sharm. After flatly refusing this offer, they then miraculously found us a suite after 1 hour. However, when we arrived at the room it was clear that it had not been cleaned for a couple of days or so and the bedding was still dirty! The Hotels only response to this being that they will send Housekeeping to clean it (at 03.00 in the morning!!) After this terrible start to our Holiday, things only got worse. I will list the one's that i remember:- -The TV Broke - The toilet flooded - The patio door came off its runners - No water for 8 hours(then when it came back on it was black!) - The air conditioning caught fire - The minibar did not work - The safe did not work For all these problems the hotel offered us.........................a free bowl of fruit!!! Thanks! I suggest to anyone wanting to go to sharm, research the hotel you will stay at, or you will be sorely dissapointed! I for one, will never return to this hotel. From what i saw there are many mkuch better hotels in Sharm that truly are 5 star. DON'T BE SEDUCED BY THE NAME OR THE STAR RATING - IN THIS CASE IT MEANT NOTHING!

I will try to keep this as short as possible. The hotel was excellent although the range of foods on offer was pretty limited. My main complaint was the constant bang bang bang of the JCB's fitted with rock breaking tools which were on the go from 8 in the morning until 8 at night next to the hotel. The noise was incessant and completely ruined our holiday yet the hotel manager seemed to think that it was all very amusing !! Apart from the rock breaking, we had to put up with workmen using angle grinders on the marble topped pool bar from early evening until way past midnight - yes, midnight - I kid you not, for 3 consecutive nights. After numerous letters of complaint, we managed to get a £500 refund on the holiday from Libra Holidays but had to threaten them with ABTA before they finally paid up. Be very careful when booking a holiday in this area of Egypt as there is so much building work going on.

After a short and timely airport transfer (TIP: book before hand), we arrived to a pleasant welcome. Be fussy about your room, there are lots of options - overlooking pool, etc. We went for a big upgrade to the Royal Savoy wing, and whilst not cheap, as it was a rare chance for me to get away with the two children, it made for a great holiday. Lovely breakfasts in the private lounge, pool side assistance at private pool, etc. Staff are excellent. Other features include lovely rooms, very comfortable beds, internet access, free dvd hire and complimentary drinks in the lounge. Resort is beautifully done and spotless. Smashing pools spoiled only by not being heated :-(. Whilst you could be anywhere in the world, a really relaxing holiday was had by all. Tried all the restaurants while we were there. Italian was very nice, but all good. Prices on par with hotel restaurants in the UK. Not bargains, but food and service excellent. Wine expensive, stick to local beer. Overall 5*, thanks to all staff.

We are a retired couple in our early 60s. Experienced travellers and holidaymakers. In recent years we have stayed at a range of 5*, 4* hotels on BB, HB, FB and AI. The hotels range across Renaissance Harbour View Hong Kong; Royal Meridian Dubai; The Pellangi Beach Llankawi; Iberostar Costa Dorada and Riu Bachatta Dominican Republic and similar hotels in Singapore, China etc. This was our first visit to the Red Sea. The hotel We booked the Savoy expecting it to be 4/5 * and fall overall somewhere in the middle of the above list of hotels for quality. In many respects it did but in some other areas it fell well short. The public reception areas are to a good 4* standard as are the pools (one heated) and the hotel grounds. The staff are plentiful and we found them attentive and polite although obviously a few tips helps with this (we took our usual US dollars for this purpose). There is a small beach but no immediate access to the sea for swimming this being by way of pontoon over the reef giving access directly to the deep water. We booked a sea view room and ultra all-inclusive. We stayed in room 2217 which was reasonably spacious with a nice terrace room and balcony. We got the morning sun at about 07.15 and a sea view over other buildings which was fine. Clean with no insects other than flies from time to time with effective and quiet AC. The shortcomings related to the ultra AI package. It is inadequate failing miserably to meet the standards elsewhere. Far too many petty restrictions (caused we were told by the Management by the fear of exploitation by Russian guests – more of this later). Forget the al-la-carte dining options most of the items on the menu are excluded from the package, even lasagne in the Italian restaurant! Only two of the main courses being available! Likewise the Steak and Pizza restaurant which is anyway only open Saturday, Tuesday and Friday for limited hours. The ESS restaurant is not available in the package. Thus the Tiranna buffet restaurant is the main option. Here the soup is hot and the desserts are adequate but the salad had bad gastronomic consequences and the main courses were never hot and frequently cold. The management at middle levels know the hotel has not got it right in the restaurant or with the AI package. Emergency measures were introduced in our second week to try to keep the food warm, not completely successful, a new Chef was brought in from Thailand, and a team was sent to Turkey to learn how to do it. Thus the management promise they will have it right by February. Frankly this is doubtful. There is also a problem with overbooking so be sure if you go and there is a room for you before you arrive. We were ok but others were not. Many of the petty restrictions were said by management to be a response to the large number of Russian guests but they applied to all. Likewise the incredibly time consuming paper work for drinks, etc. However the systems whilst inconvenient do not stop the abuse they are aimed at. The Russian guests, mostly a charmless lot in large groups being on BB or RO kept the remainder in ‘rations’ by a few in the group on HB or AI. Food being taken out of the restaurant and people being smuggled into the restaurant etc. It was difficult for staff to control any of them despite the system as the Russians would become rude and aggressive to the staff. Likewise large quantities of vodka, etc were being brought into the hotel by Russians from duty free shops and being consumed by groups of 6 plus at tables in the public areas, sometimes until they were unconscious. We concluded that the top management at the hotel are not up to the task and at present are letting down the owners, staff and most importantly the UK customers. The tour company travel reps know well of all these issues but are not helpful. If you have already booked enjoy the good elements and adopt strategies (usually involving a few dollars and being polite) to mitigate the others. The staff will go out of their way to make you enjoy the stay, their efforts being only limited by the petty rules e.g. one min bar per stay! (Restock from the bar!). If you have not yet booked do some more research. Others do it better for less. At present the ultra AI 14 nights package is probably worth circa £500. P.S. The airport is not a nice place particularly on Thursdays when the Thomson Cruise customers overwhelm the facilities.

Me and my wife have just returned from a week at the Savoy Hotel. We were on an all inclusive basis ("S class") and therefore did not have to pocket any money out while staying whitin the hotel. I would recommend to go on an all includive basis as extras can quickly rocket through the roof. The hotel is probably less than 10 years old and generally still in good condition. It has this whoua factor, marble stone is present everywhere; you can feel that this is a luxury hotel. The decor is just superb (especially the external areas) or at least at the level of our expexctations. The hotel has three swimming pools and a private beach. We never had any problem to find a deck chair and you will even get the member of staff to lay the beach towel for you. Talking about the staff, they are generally friendly and never too far to please your wishes. However they find it difficult to work under pressure and you may sometimes have to wait (15mns) before getting your drinks or being served. Also they can be too friendly and tend to forget that you are the customer and that they are working for the savoy, but I believe this is the arabic friendliness taking over. The choice of restaurant may appear good but you will quickly find out that it is not as impressive as it sounds. Unfortunately after two days you will find the choice of food boring and repetitive or served differently. It is disappointing for a 5star. Also you would need to be there first otherwise you will eat cold food and the left over as they do not refill the dishes very often. The room was of correct size. We had a sea view and would recommend it. Rooms are clean every day and your towels get also changed every day. Do not have to complain on this point. The other guests are mainly Russians (85% of the customers) and the rest are europeens. Be prepared Russians have different ccustoms. Queing, wait for your turn, speak (as opposed to shout), smile, apologise or thank are not really in their habits, but you will quickly get over it and ignore them... We would recommend to take few trips out of the hotel. We experienced the camel ride in the desert followed by a dinner in the desert with bedhouins. Also we went on one day boat trip in Ras Mohammed and snorkel in the national park. Very nice to out. These only costed us £25.00 each and have been booked with the travel agent before the trip. I would recommend (if your pocket money allows it) the boat trip to tiran island as well as the star gazing night and the diving experience. Otherwise you can also enjoy the gym or the spa (massages and beauty treatment) at the hotel. We also went to naama bay. The little town is only 15mns drive away from the hotel an will cost you LE45.00 (£4.50) by taxi (white and blue Peugeot car). Did not really like the town. Be preapred to spend minimum 1hr in each shop as Egyptians will first invite/offer you a tea and then try to sell you their goods. you can feel that people are only after your money. We even have been asked for money when asking directions to the toilets and as well to use the toilets. I believe this the downside of being a tourist. Overall we would recommend the hotel (All inclusive basis only) We had a pleasant stay. We definitly enjoyed the room and facilities proposed at the hotel. The food is not at the level you would expect it to be. We would recommend to take few trips out of the hotel. We would probably go back to sharm but will try the Hilton or the Marriott.

My boyfriend and I recently returned from a 4 day stay at the Savoy. The hotel is so well run and so beautiful that it was hard to drag oursleves away to explore Naama Bay and surrounding areas. I cannot give the staff a high enough recommendation. They were all extremely friendly and attentive. We had a sea view room which also had a view of the pools which we were more than happy with. The inclusive breakfast was more than enough and as well as the buffet we had the choice of made-to-order omelettes and pancakes. The on-site dive centre were extremely helpful and friendly and took us on two amazing dives off the hotel's pontoon out the front. Because of the hotel's location there is brilliant scuba diving and snorkelling right off the beach. You literally dive into 30 m deep crystal clear water and schools of tropical fish. The hotel was quite busy around the pools and beach even for the off-season with mainly Russian and German tourists. We were the only Australians there and I spotted only a few English. There were also a lot of kids and mostly families staying at the hotel, but that didn't affect our romantic holiday. The beach belly dance lesson went down very well too! The on-site restaurants are good value and serve delicious food. You don't even need to leave the hotel grounds your entire holiday if you don't want to. We did use the hotel's 'limousine' taxi service which charges £9 return trip to Naama Bay with the same driver in a nice car (as opposed to the horrible local taxis). The only gripe I have is that we booked a massage each for the llast day at the same time. We were 5 minutes late for our appointment and found they had given one of our masseurs away to someone else so only one of us were able to have a massage. Neither of us did and it left a bit of a sour taste in our mouth. Depite this, I would highly recommend the Savoy. Very clean, spacious, well organised, perfet location, a great variety of restaurants, bars and even a nightclub!

This hotel absolutely does not cater for anything other than All Inclusive. They have a card which they use like a magic wand to get the best service going. When you add up the cost of the holiday and add that to the amount of money that my fiance and I spent on food and drinks within the hotel, it far outweighs the cost of an all inclusve trip, yet we felt that we were treated as second class compared to the AI guests. Although there are six restaurants on site, very few of them are open during the day so you either have to queue for about 30 minutes in the Rocky pool bar (waiting whilst they serve the AI guets first, even the ones who turn up 20 minutes after you've already been waiting), or go upstairs to the AI buffet lunch, which is dire. Twice the visited the Italian restaurant on site and spent over £100 on our meal both times (including £42 - yes, English pounds, not Euros or Egyptian pounds - for a bottle of Italian wine because the Egyptian wine is diabolical) yet we were treated as though we were putting the staff out by asking for a table in the first place. There is a horrid little man in the on site bank who not only accused my fiance of having forged money, but also accused him of cutting of the serial numbers on our travellers cheques. He makes changing money the most difficult thing in the world to achieve, yet the Russian AI guests just walked in, threw their travellers cheques at him and had no problem. On the subject of money, for the love of God don't take USD travellers cheques - there are only two places in Naama Bay which exchange them. Save yourself the pain in the neck and just take currency instead. Our hotel bill had to settled in USD so I would reccommend taking 10% Egyptian currencly and the rest USD. Most places will also accpet Euros. This hotel could be fantastic but the staff are obviously told to serve the AI guests first and treat them better than the other guests and they do this to the letter. All of the British couples we met who weren't on an AI basis said exactly the same thing. If you want AI, then this hotel is probably fine, but as it's 8K away from Namma Bay if you find that it's not what you were expecting, the problems are amplified by the location.

On arrival we were pressurised to move to the sister hotel Sierra on all-inclusive basis, we refused and 1hour 30 mins later we eventually got our booked room. After speaking to other guests it appears all the British guests are given the same option. The Savoy hotel is 3*+ at best, sockets hanging off the wall and toilet basin cracked. Most other nationalities especially the Russians are on All Inclusive and flash their white card to get service; I stood at the beach bar for 15 mins and could not get served. The restaurant staff are friendly, but the choice of food is limited and repetitive the themed nights only change the way the meat is cooked, creamed sauce it is French, spices it is Mexican etc. The lack of snacks meant quite a few guests mainly Brits either had to order room service at lunchtime or get a cab at £10 return into Naama Bay. The other restaurants at the hotel are very expensive for what they offer. At one of the beach restaurants food is left out in the sun on a boat sometimes covered in cling film sometimes covered in birds feasting? Get used to being asked what class you are, i.e. All Inclusive you are First Class anything else you are Second Class, this comment comes from staff members. This is definitely not a hotel I would recommend, but I would recommend the area and the diving is excellent.