I wasn’t eager to share a negative review, but I wanted to provide my experience after our recent stay at Raffles. When we arrived in our room, there was a persistent fried food odor. We initially assumed it was lingering room service from a neighboring room, but when we returned after dinner, the smell had become even stronger. We mentioned this to the front desk and were told they had never received this comment before, but I later saw another recent review referencing a similar “cheap food smell” here on Tripadvisor, so I felt it was worth noting in case others encounter it as well.
We had to call twice about the issue and ended up waiting over an hour before being moved to a different room on another floor. It’s also worth mentioning that it took multiple attempts each time to reach someone at the front desk, as the line just kept ringing with no answer. Additionally, we didn’t receive any butler service—no texts, messages, or check-ins—which was disappointing given that this has been a nice touch during previous stays and is an amenity strongly highlighted on their website.
We’ve enjoyed Raffles before and haven’t run into issues like this, but this visit made us realize that other hotels are offering stronger service and amenities at a similar price point. Hoping this was just an off stay, but overall it left us underwhelmed.