Royal Exhibition Hotel in Sydney

If I had been given the chance to see the rooms, or at least the reception area, I could provide a fair opinion. But no. My husband and I made the reservation for Friday, November 28th, and completed the pre-check-in the day before. We had already planned our entire Friday morning.
Upon arriving at the 'hotel,' surprise! There was no access whatsoever. There is no visible door for the reception (if one even exists), and I had to knock persistently on a window for the person inside to finally attend to me.
The shock grew when we were told we had to wait outside on the street with our luggage until 10 AM, which is their official opening time. We had contacted the hotel previously to arrange an early drop-off for our bags, but they never mentioned we would be left waiting outside the property for hours.
This lack of access and service forced us to contact Booking.com immediately. Since we could not wait on the street, we were forced to secure and pay for a second hotel.
I was willing to pay a cancellation fee or an equivalent charge, but I requested a refund for the unused reservation.
Ultimately, Booking.com did not resolve the issue. We ended up paying for a second hotel, and no one took responsibility or offered any compensation for this completely unacceptable situation

UNPROFESSIONAL MANAGEMENT, TOTALLY AVOIDABLE HOTEL.

WHAT an unprofessional management this Hotel has! We had booked a Family suite which had 2 interconnected rooms as we were travelling with kids. The reservation was made 4 months ahead of our travel.

Just 1 week prior to our arrival the hotel cancels our room reservation with the reason that the room is damaged and offers us 2 rooms which are not interconnected. Non connected rooms don't work when one is travelling with kids.

And the worst thing is that they continued to advertise the Family suite room on their own website as well as other websites for our dates as well as dates after our arrival date. And for much higher price than what I had booked.

We requested the hotel to please accomodate us in another Family suite, it cannot happen that they HAVE ONLY 1 FAMILY SUITE IN THE WHOLE HOTEL, but the staff was totally non cooperative. We had to pay more than double to get a room in another hotel at such last minute.

The very purpose of booking well ahead is to get preferred rooms at good rates and imagine if the hotel at its whims and fancies just goes ahead and cancels the booking at the last minute. TOTALLY PATHETIC MANAGEMENT, THEY HAVE NO IDEA WHAT CUSTOMER SERVICE IS OR WHAT INTEGRITY IS!

No explanations provided for why an alternative suite room could not be provided to us.

If you want peace of mind avoid this hotel. Did not have any such experience in the whole of Australia during our trip.

They have a good location but the uncertainty can spoil all your travel plans and budget too. Totally avoidable hotel.