Royal Oak in Elmbridge

I have waited weeks before leaving a negative review but my experience has sadly been appalling. I made a Christmas Day Booking through their online booking form at the end of October and paid a £30 deposit. I then received multiple confirmation emails. A week later I received a call informing me that this booking shouldn’t have been accepted as the Pub was full on Christmas Day for some time. Given the inconvenience this caused and the delay in informing me, the apology was fairly minimal. I was told my deposit would be refunded. A couple of weeks past and I still hadn’t had my deposit refunded. I sent an email which was ignored. I called multiple times, once being told to ring back when they’re less busy which is encouraging to know that returning deposits for unfulfilled bookings, after several weeks, is not seen as a priority. I then called up again today, over 3 weeks since the promise of my refunded deposit, to be greeted by a disinterested staff member who said the manager won’t be in for several days and that she’ll get them to phone me when they return. Hopefully this review will finally see my refund processed before having to take further action. *Deposit has now been refunded.

An utterly bizarre experience. No music or noise to speak of, so the room was deathly quiet. Despite this we had to get up to get our drinks and ask for our food order to be taken from the 3 staff leaning on the bar. Food is expensive and horrendous. £100 for 4 mains and 4 drinks, we couldn’t wait to leave

No service. On a walk this evening with my daughter and the dog and decided to pop in for a swift pint. No one serving at the bar and a elderly lady was already waiting to be served. After 2 minutes a barman came along and said ‘I’ll serve you in 5 minutes or so. I’m busy at the other end’ and he walked off. Well, we walked off too and gave it a miss. No way to run a pub. Quite ridiculous.

I had high hopes for our afternoon spa day at this hotel, especially with the inclusion of afternoon tea in our package. However, the experience was incredibly disappointing from start to finish. When we arrived at the restaurant, we were left standing at the host desk for about 10 minutes, which was frustrating given that multiple staff members were walking around doing nothing. Eventually, we were seated, but then had to wait 30 minutes for anyone to even approach us. When the waitress finally arrived, she didn’t provide us with a menu, offer tea or coffee options, or even ask about allergies or preferences—basic things that should be standard practice. She simply asked if we were the table for two for afternoon tea and left it at that. After placing our tea and coffee orders, we waited an additional 45 minutes for the afternoon tea to arrive. During this time, no one checked on us. When the tea finally came, it included salmon sandwiches—something we hadn’t been aware of as we didn’t see and a menu and would have asked to be left out due to my mum’s allergy. The staff would have known this had they asked us about allergies or even given us a menu, but they didn’t. When we pointed this out, the waitress rolled her eyes, took the plate away without a word, and returned only to drop the corrected plate without even asking if everything was okay. The food itself was a major letdown. The sandwiches were soggy, the cakes were stale and tasteless, and while the scones were decent, they hardly justified the price or the overall experience. For a hotel that boasts of its spa and dining, the service and food quality were shockingly poor. Overall, I was extremely disappointed with the service, the lack of care, and the low-quality food. Even on quieter days, the pace is ridiculously slow, the staff are rude, and the food just doesn’t meet any reasonable expectations. I would advise others to think twice before booking here.

So we arrived for a meal at the carvery on site, having booked a table for 14. No-one on the staff even seemed to know we were coming. Downstairs staff told us to go upstairs, the upstairs staff rudely told us to go back downstairs. When the meal finally started it was accompanied by what sounded like a de-tuned radio being played over the speakers. I went for a walk on the site to get away from the noise, whereupon I was rudely accosted by someone demanding to know who I was, saying "the members have been asking". I was just walking along the pathway. The entire time, a very loud high pitched noise was blasting out of some speakers outside reception. Why? Clueless, incompetent, rude staff, noisy, full of people who see themselves as above you. We won't be back, I'm sure. Edit: to respond to the claims made below by the 'owner': 1) None of us ever met this David Hanlon guy. 2) The 'trying to find jump leads' involved one member of staff saying 'I'll see what I can do' then disappearing and not coming back; we were stuck there for hours. 3) No fewer than four members of the family had staff members be rude to them. Why allow non-members to book into the carvery if we're just treated like this when we arrive? People reading this might think that we were problematic or difficult - we weren't, we were nicely dressed and well-behaved, but we weren't members. So we were treated like vermin. Thanks.