Le Totem, Flaine - M Collacott. Date of travel: Jan 2008
Le Totem Club Hotel is right on the slopes and a great location. That is the only good point I am going to make.The bar prices at €6 a drink (£4.70) were expensive, the rooms are of poor quality and need sorting. The plastic cups in our bathroom were dirty and never changed. They are probaly still there for this weeks poor guests. The dirty towels where left on the side of the bath for 2 days and not taken away, the toilet seat was unfixed on one side so kept slipping. The fan in the ceiling was stuffed with toilet paper, the large window didn't close properly which made the room cold and drafty. The restaurant service was extremely poor the staff were untrained in even the basics of restaurant service. We had to wait most nights for at least an hour before our main courses were brought out after the starters. with only half the table being served before the staff moved on to the next table. We never got our desserts for 2 nights, the food was virtually inedible, the risotto was so stiff you could stand a fork in it, some had balsamic vinegar poured over the top to try and take away the rank taste. All of our party left 70% of their dinner. The scrambled egg at breakfast is not made with fresh eggs but with a mixture bought in ready made. I know this as the manager told me when I complained about the fish smell it had. They all smelt it and agreed but carried on serving it from the buffet breakfast, if you can call it that. Having a 200 plus guest hotel is no excuse for not being able to cope. I was told that because our group was so large, '43' that this was why we had bad service. So why did a party of 25 also have the same problem we had? I talked to one of the restaurant managers, he had no exprerince at all and was taking advice from me on how to change and improve things (training would be a good start). The other restaurant manager was nervous and obnoxious and could not deal with the whole situation. I spoke to the hotel manager at great length and she told me she was going to change things so that the following evening would be better organised. But the next night was even worse, and she was not even on duty! We all sat down at 7.30, but as normal one table in our group did not get there main course untill 9.15. The rice was again a slop. We were always the first to sit down for dinner and the last to leave. There was loud music coming from the kitchen, most of the time. I travel all over the world and can honestly say that this is the worst restaurant service I have ever encountered, and am sure that if the other guests staying at the Totem hotel were to read this they would agree.