HÉLIOS HÔTEL & SPA

Disappointingly underwhelming||For a Five Star hotel, or is it Four Star – it seems they can’t decide, there was a lot lacking, considering the prices. The main thing lacking during our stay – the swimming pool / jacuzzi, which was the main reason we had booked the hotel – just what one feels like after a hard day’s skiing. It was closed until the last day of our 3-night stay – degradation issues from previous guests were blamed, but it also took almost two days to heat up the water once the problem fixed. And no compensation offered on check-out for lack of such facilities, as management said we hadn’t spent enough money in the hotel during our stay. To be frank, even when working the space isn’t really up to scratch for a “Hotel & Spa”. Small, dull lighting and somewhat tired…||Other issues – the hotel entrance…seriously underwhelming, you need to get the lift to the reception to check-in, when you can work out where it is (the lift and reception)…and the lighting is almost non-existent (for energy savings they will argue!) Certainly not the happening place we had imagined / hoped for.|No bottled water or minibar in our room (a no-plastic regime, and energy savings – minibars are apparently a “real sinkhole of unused energy”). No liquid bath foam, shower gel etc (no plastics again – they have solid products [shampoo, conditioner], which sound novel but didn’t work well. No coffee/tea facilities (why bother). No English-language films in the “cinema” (that we found out of 2,000 titles), though the Bourne Ultimatum with sub-titles was still watchable – albeit in a somewhat drab narrow space, where no food or drink is allowed. |No-one serving in the bar on two occasions when I popped down to get a beer/cocktail…after a hard day’s ski, and for that matter, no other guests in the bar…but hey…it was towards the end of the ski season! I also got trapped in the hotel’s service lift, from which there was no obvious way out – but I won’t blame the hotel entirely for that!|That said, it wasn’t all bad. Free chocolates in reception…my daughters loved that, the concierge tried his very best to please…though was perhaps a bit overworked (staff are somewhat thin on the ground, or were when I was there), and breakfast was OK…perhaps being a bit harsh here, but we’d just come from staying at Le Coucou, which is in a different league…|I’ve tried to be fair – when I asked for some sort of compensation for lack of facilities, the manager mentioned article 222-33-2-2 of the French Penal Code relating to defamation via bad reviews! I should also add, he did offer a free treatment or massage if I return.

We stayed at this hotel, and were met with a terrible owner. We arrived to find the pool was not working but were told by the staff that the pool would get fixed and operate the following day. We waited like this every day for 5 days. When we complained to the owner who happens to be at the hotel, he dismissed taking any accountability and blamed his prior guests. We then asked him for some compensation since the family holiday of using the pool post skiing for the kids was the reason we chose this hotel. He said he would do so during checkout. However from the time of the conversation to the checkout the owner disappeared from our view and never was present at checkout despite us asking the receptionist to reach out to him to see what compensation he could provide. He completely ignored his responsibility and decided to ignore his guests.

The same happened over breakfast where we had paid for breakfast and had informed the hotel of our dietary restriction of being vegetarian but instead there was very very limited vegetarian food available, so we asked for pancakes and or avocadoes but instead he said they would not able to accomodate us and would charge us 10 euros per avocado. This was quite disappointing after having paid 100 euros for breakfast vs not having elected for breakfast. it was a complete scam.

Terrible owner and service provided by him. He runs the hotel and the day to day management.

Owner is completely dishonest. We paid for a hotel and Spa and the swimming pool was out of service for 5 days out of our 7 day stay. We made several complaints about this but no action or compensation was offered.

We finally demanded compensation to the owner who promised to get back to us but thereafter completely hid away.

We had requested vegan and vegetarian breakfast and got confirmation before the stay. For breakfast we were charged extra 10 Euros for Avocados each meal even though there was no accommodation to our requests.

The owner seems to have no sense of responsibility or accountability and no sense of hospitality. I can't understand how this establishment has a five star.

The reception, ski room and staff are excellent but unfortunately the owner is a manipulative liar and customers should stay away from him.