It’s rare I post a negative review and perhaps you’ll find my comments nitpicky, but I was left disappointed by my stay at the Hilton Stockholm Slussen.
I realize that prices are high in Scandinavia, but perhaps not as high as you think. I had stayed the night before at the Radisson Stockholm Arlanda with great breakfast and paid $125. The Hilton Stockholm Slussen was double in price, and lacked both the quality and key amenities I look for in a hotel.
Location, location, location may be your response. Of course there is a premium for a centrally located property, but I believe I just chose the wrong hotel.
I chose the hotel because Hilton Gold members receive complimentary breakfast, which is an important way for me to start my day. Many hotels in Stockholm, though, include breakfast for all guests.
Hilton Stockholm Slussen Executive Club Accesss for Hilton Golds
Hilton Gold members receive an upgrade to the Executive Level on a space-available basis. The hotel was running quite full so I was not offered a room upgrade of any sorts. That meant no Executive Club access.
Hilton Executive Club rules—
- If you are an Hilton Honors guest with Gold status, you and up to one additional registered guest in the same room will be granted complimentary access to the Executive Floor Lounge only if you receive a room upgrade to the Executive Floor or an upgrade to a room type that confers Executive Floor Lounge access benefits.
That’s a shame, but I was not entitled to an upgrade so no strike against the hotel for running full. I still visited the lounge, just to take a look and document it for this report–
Hilton recognized my gold status by sending a package of cashews and two drink coupons to the room.
Rather than a single central building, the Hilton Slussen is a series of smaller, unconnected buildings. Our room, 3014, was both not in the remodeled wing and not easy to get to.
Accessing our room required going down two sets of stairs, walking across a ballroom, down another hall, and finally to a set of elevators (only one of two functioned) to take us up to our room. The hallway felt like a cruise ship or British hospital.
Hilton Stockholm Slussen Guest Room
The room was tiny — again, to be expected — but was clean.
The bathroom also felt a bit cruise-ship like and the toilet made loud and seemingly random draining sounds. I mean really loud — very audible even when the bathroom door was closed. This became particularly annoying during the night.
Another issue: the wireless internet worked terribly. We were at the far end of the hall and I assumed we were just far from a router. I asked to be moved to another room and although it was only 3pm, I was told there were no other rooms to move us to.
Hilton Stockholm Slussen Fitness
Instead of a dedicated hotel fitness center, the hotel uses a public fitness center connected to one of the hotel buildings. This can be advantageous or disadvantageous, depending on the club. I’d call this one a wash. There was good equipment and a sauna available, but the gym was packed. The nice thing about working out in a hotel is typically that you don’t have to wait for equipment. This was not the case here. Avoid working out around 5pm if you visit this property. There was no swimming pool.
Hilton Stockholm Slussen Dining
After a long day of walking around Stockholm, we did not feel like going back into town to seek out a restaurant for dinner. Instead, we dined at one of the hotel’s restaurants, Eken Matsal, which turned out to be a great choice.
I had lamb cutlets while my brother had a filet. The sides were also tremendous.
Later on I had the drink with my brother in the hotel bar (“Eken bar”) to use those vouchers. The bartender was from Oregon and lampooning American guests in front of a Swedish trio. He meant no harm, but I’d watch my words more carefully if I were him.
The hotel has a nice outdoor bar and dining area as as well, though it was far too nippy of an August evening to eat outside–
The breakfast buffet in Panorama Restaurant was good–just not as good as the Radisson the day before.
CONCLUSION
I explained the plumbing and internet issues at checkout and received no compensation. Fine, the stay was okay overall, but it will be my last at this property.
Read more of my Scandinavia Trip Report:
Review: SAS A330 Business Class Los Angeles to Stockholm
Lounge Review: SAS Gold Lounge Stockholm
Review: SAS Business Class Stockholm to Oslo (Scenic Flight)
Lounge Review: SAS Gold Lounge Oslo
Review: SAS Business Class Oslo to Longyearbyen
The Advantage of AirBnB in Longyearbyen
A Boat Trip to an Abandoned Russian Mining Island
Review: Hotel Tulpan in Pyramiden
Why Pyramiden is a Must-See (Photo Tour)
Exploring Pyramiden at Midnight with Two Armed Female Bodyguards
Where to Eat in Longyearbyen
Longyearbyen to Stockholm via Tromsø on SAS
Lounge Review: SAS Café Tromso
Review: Radisson Stockholm Airport (vs. 747-200 hostel)
Review: Hilton Stockholm Slussen
We just stayed there last month in June. We stayed in the same building as the checkin desk and the executive lounge. In fact, our room was directly above the busy road, but did offer a very nice view of Gamla Stan. As diamond, we went to the executive lounge, but you didn’t miss much. It was terribly crowded, so much so that it was standing room only. And the food was severely lacking- only fried cauliflower and some other thing that was gobbled up in minutes by the crowd. But the lounge is always good for drinks. What was interesting is that there is no bottled water. Swedes pride themselves in saying how drinkable their water is so they only have carafes of sink-filled water instead. As far as the room, it was spacious but the bathroom was a terrible setup. I was surprised that the curtains are not blackout which is needed when it doesn’t get dark at night. Overall, I liked staying here because it was so convenient to just walk to Gamla Stan which is so much fun.
Not too bad if I read your review correctly. Maybe I’m wrong? Or maybe you need to emphasize the downside a bit more to warrant that this hotel is absolutely no good?
Stayed there in May. Location was excellent in our opinion (except the construction going on outside…), but agree that there were some things not efficient about the hotel, and rooms were not that good. Breakfast was quite good. Definitely enjoyed it as gold. I think we actually paid cash for the room at a decent rate instead of using points. The rest of our trip to Norway/Sweden we did AirBnB’s, which worked out very well. Hotels in many of the smaller cities out in the mountains are not cheap at all, but at least there are options in the big cities. I think we’d stay again.
Nice review, good info on the ups and downs of this property. The Hilton close to the central station is equally subpar, just for those wondering.
I hope you took time to go to Copenhagen. It is – by far – the better of the three Scandinavian capitals.
Stayed there in October, we had a ton of problems, no housekeeping one day, lounge appears to still suck, breakfasts was also pretty crappy. There were enough things wrong where they comped a taco to the airport, but would never stay there again.
They’re lying about not having rooms. See my review below:
1. I came back at 9+pm to find my room uncleaned. Cleaning dept clearly didn’t do their job.
2. Complained to the reception. Reception casually said there was no cleaning staff (kind of understandable at 9pm+) so they’ll just bring towels… Of course I complained a lot. And then miraculously, a so called night housekeeping staff appeared. So they lied about housekeeping thinking some excuse would make me go away.
3. I told them it was late and to get a fresh and clean room for me now. They can clean the room in the mean time while waiting for other guests to arrive. They said there *may* be other guests and they didn’t want them to wait. So it was okay for me to wait??? But not others?
These guests may not even be coming for the next 4-5 hours. I was really disgusted by their attitude already.
4. They claimed they would be able to clean properly with the night housekeeping random person who showed up. I didn’t believe them because they said they’d be changing towels etc only. I just threw it back to them and told them to offer that room to their next guests if they are that confident it will be cleaned up to normal standards. Then they said it wouldn’t be clean enough… So I can be given a dirty room but not another guest??? What rubbish. Seriously, are they bullying me or do they just want to avoid work??? Because that does not cut it for luxury hotel service, or in fact any type of service.
5. I brought everything down and demanded a new room or a refund. Night front desk said they didn’t have rooms and there weren’t cancellations and guests would be arriving “anytime” (… till day break). Lady said before over the phone no one had cancelled. Guy at front desk then said there were no rooms -> after arguing changed his excuse to that there were rooms but of a different category. So either the lady or the guy lied again. In fact, probably both because eventually I was given a new room of the same category.
6. Guy’s tone was really obvious he didn’t care about the situation and wasn’t going to do anything about it. I haven’t been so blatantly lied to so many times in a day. I decided that was it and I wanted to refund and I’ll leave to another hotel that’s more decent. Guy receptionist said I could leave but they can’t do a refund because he doesn’t know how to…… Seriously??? He said there was no duty manager or night manager (again, the lady receptionist said she would check with her manager so there was one and either of them was lying) so he cannot do a refund. And then he blamed the third party reservations saying it’s a different system and when I told him they will need to do some approval etc (i.e. more work), he just said he doesn’t handle it but a reservations department does. It’s so obvious he was trying to avoid all the extra work by pushing it around internal departments. I told him I’m not paid to do his work and he can contact the relevant internal Hilton departments. And then he said no. Guests are really treated as avoided overtime here. Do you actually believe a front desk in charge of payments and check ins don’t handle refunds, has no night manager, no supervisor or general manager to call in case of problems as such???? You might as well fire them and buy a statue to decorate your front desk.
7. When I was talking to him, he kept saying there were no rooms and then there were rooms but of a different category, and that there were no cancellations. When I insisted on the refund strongly, he then said there was a room (and of a similar category) that came up 10 min prior. 10 min prior up till a second before, he was still denying the existence of rooms, cancellations etc???? How shameless can he get blatantly lying in someone’s face. It would have been more believable if he had lied it came up right then. I told him I didn’t believe him because it doesn’t add up and to show me the time stamp to prove. And obviously he didn’t – because he knew too it was a lie. There just couldn’t have been no cancellations AND a cancellation at the same time.
8. The final room was also a double in the same category. In fact it was one floor up in the same exact position as the previous room. But it was better furnished and newer. So that means they gave me a lousy room right from the start???
Writing this entire experience so no one else gets lied to multiple times and their welfare bulldozed. BE WARY. Just count the number of lies I’ve been told in the same day. I’ve never seem a night front desk as lazy and deceitful as this two. I think all potential guests ought to know about this before booking. Definitely NOT 5 star luxury experience.