Holiday Inn Milton Keynes East M1, JCT.14, an IHG Hotel - Newport Pagnell

Babs E.

I use a lot of IHG hotels for work purposes. This holiday inn appeared very lovely on the ad, but a lot more tired when I finally arrived. It looked to have been used as a wedding/event venue for many years, and now is just used for the conference facility and rooms. Although extremely clean and well presented, it would do well from a little bit of a spruce up. However, it did come in significantly cheaper than many options around the Luton/Milton Keynes area where I was based for work for a few days. I did book an executive room, the bed was fabulously comfortable, and I had enough pillows to build a fort should I have had the desire to! The room I had was extremely quiet (brilliant) ....the shower very large and powerful (amazing) ... Lots of complimentary tea/coffee/snacks/soda/water. Only real complaints are that the TV was pretty small by usual hotel standards and as it was on the desk to rather than the wall....I struggled a little when I took my glasses off. It did take me about 15 mins to wait for a member of staff to appear to check me out the following morning (I need invoices) so that was a bit of an unexpected delay to my day.
The massive problem is the huge diversion to the hotel. Middle of a building site basically. A huge new estate is springing up around it, and you have to be careful actually getting to the hotel itself. Once in the hotel... there was no noise or dust though. Just a few contractors whom I assume were staying there!

David K.

Avoid, stayed many times with my family and always a pleasant stay until now. Received usual reminder of booking but no mention road closed from motorway and terrible road diversion. Finally arrived. Room booked not available due to maintenance issue. Also reason loo beside bar out of order. Told £20 off as an apology but the alternative room was cheaper anyway. Waived our dog overnight charge. Only 8 guests so understood no breakfast buffet but Reception did not tell us. Next morning buffet was on. You serve yourself hot drinks but this was out of order. Reception said my 2 guests could have breakfast at £12.50 rate. On that morning told £16.50 as they were visitors. I complained, female receptionist apologised saying will charge my card at £12.50 pp. Not surprised checked my account on return home they took £16.50 pp. We were given a drink voucher each for a soft or draft drink, but sadly as a long standing club member and frequent visitor. Swan hotel will get our business in future.

Martinos C.

Location is very good. Service by staff on entry very professional and felt welcome. The rooms and place is very clean and everything in my room was working.

Come breakfast time. We was a large group and the staff was ill prepared. We ran out of stuff like eggs beans and plats . The staff especially the Chinese man was very rude and could do with a little bit more training. Staff seemed overwhelmed and stressed and their uniforms were looking old and not very clean looking. The juice seemed watered as it didn’t taste like the normal orange or apple juice.

Would advise additional more staff when there is an event booked and a refresher training on customer service on staff

GemmaH

I had my wedding here on November 2nd 2024 in the Lovett suite. From the very beginning of my wedding planning the staff were on hand and no question or request was a bother to them. They are an absolute credit the hotel and the customer service they uphold is fantastic.

Myself and my partner had the most amazing day thanks to Kieran, Charlotte and Michael. They could not do enough for us and they were a friendly face to turn to in the chaos of a wedding!

Our family and friends also commented on how fantastic the staff were and how wonderful they helped make the day along with their stay

100% recommend anyone thinking about booking their wedding here.

Travelling21

Hotel needs improvement to attention to detail. Room I confirmed booking wasn’t the same type of room I stayed in. Hideaway bed was not made up for my son to sleep in. Had to go to reception twice to ask for bed to be made. 1st time before dinner & 2nd time after dinner. A friendly staff member who serviced use for dinner came up with my wife and made the bed. Room was generally clean had complementary snacks all looked good except for a snickers bar with a chunk taken out of it.

Bed was not comfortable, woke up twice with pain in hips, kept moving side to side trying to get comfortable. Dinner and breakfast was very good and quality service. Shower was nice. Hotel looked very nice but would think twice before staying there again.

Graeme W.

The hotel is challenged with being located next to significant road infrastructure building works. This results in access to the hotel being limited and confusing.

The management have not been quite frankly suboptimal and not proactive to effectively advise guests of the road access requirements. Putting a comment on the website and a sign on the hotel desk is ineffective and not good enough.

Praise goes to Ice Yung on the front desk to talk me through access to the hotel in real time.

Secondly, I was unable to use my food and beverage reward vouchers. The Manager would not manually process them off my account, advising its an IHG issue. Having spent considerable time with IHG trying to fix, they advised the hotel should process these requests as they have the capability to do so. The Manager just kept on fobbing me off and did not explain truthfully the responsibilities of this.

None of the management team returned my calls and have been totally ineffective. As a result I was charged for my food and drink that I was hoping to cover with my vouchers. Very unhappy guest!!!!

Ammar

My six-day stay at IHD Hotel was deeply disappointing due to misleading promises and poor communication. I booked this hotel specifically because a friend who works there confirmed I would receive a staff discount. However, this discount was never honored because the general manager was absent due to illness. I was charged the full amount of £603, significantly more than expected.
Every single day of my stay, I requested an invoice and clarification about my bill. Each time, I was given different excuses - the reception manager wasn't available, or they couldn't process it at that time. This lack of transparency was frustrating and unprofessional. Had I known the discount wouldn't be honored, I would have chosen different accommodation.
The hotel's location made the situation even worse. It's situated in an isolated area with very limited taxi service, essentially leaving guests stranded once they check in. This made it particularly difficult to consider alternative accommodations once I realized the promised discount wouldn't be honored.

Positive points:
Cleanliness

Negative points:

Promised staff discount not honored
Daily requests for invoice ignored
Poor communication from staff
Isolated location with limited transportation options
No accountability when issues arose
Management unavailable to resolve problems

I cannot recommend this hotel to others. The combination of broken promises, poor communication, and isolated location made for an extremely frustrating stay. Future guests should be wary of any promised discounts and ensure everything is confirmed in writing before booking.

Tara

We come to stay for the new years eve party and from the minute we walked in we was welcomed by the lovely lady on reception. The room was clean and comfortable with plenty of space. The rooms have everything you need to make it a nice stay the bed was comfortable and everything looked clean and fresh