I sympathise with the other reviewer... This has been the one time I didn't check the ratings before staying somewhere, and boy, did I suffer for it. The Royce is nothing but false advertising. Sure, the website looks all nice and eclectic, and from the outside and in the lobby the place looks great. Then you get to your room. Cheap furnishings, smells like a Best Western hotel, and looks like one in many respects too. Not plush, inviting and fashionable as the site and lobby suggests. Yes, it really does look and smell cheap and nasty. Then my biggest bugbear - false advertising at its worst. I work in Digital Media, and online access is vitally important to me. Hating being chained to a desk in a hotel room, it's crucial that any hotel I stay at must have wireless. And the Royce's website says it does. When I tried to connect to wireless and called the lobby to complain when I couldn't, they told me that they do have wireless, but you have to see them to get the password, and it will then cost... get this.... $10 per half hour. $10 PER HALF HOUR! That is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard. How can you say you have wireless internet when, you do... at $20 an hour!!!! That is insane. We are in Australia. Wireless internet does NOT cost $20 an hour. I will never return to the Royce. I will never recommend the Royce. This hotel is marketing itself well beyond its means. It is a 3 star hotel at best and should be upfront in marketing itself that way. Oh, stop the lies! Read through the ratings here, and you'll find casualty after casualty after casualty. I feel scammed and taken advantage of. Even worse, I'm stuck here, paid up for a 5 night booking!

This place is so bad in so many ways it makes it difficult to begin! 1. The bed (aka camp bed) in our 'deluxe' room folded down from the wall and was without doubt the worse night sleep I have ever had ever! 2. The shower door wouldnt close and you cant help but flood the bathroom 3. There is no parking unless you want valet parking 4. The dining room floor hadnt been swept from the night before and there were food scraps under the tables 5. The lights in the bathroom didnt work 6. The temperature control was stuck on 18 degrees - Melb in winter is something not limited to outside apparently 7. The staff really dont care about anything you might complain about and just keep repeating 'thats unfortunate' Im in the process of writing to the Victorian Hotels Assoc about their supposed '5 Star' rating - avoid this place like the plague!

We booked a 5 night stay at the Royce over the Easter weekend, and like other reviewers we were very disappointed with the rooms. Our room smelt like an ex-smoking room with lots of air freshener added to attempt to disguise it. The bathroom was definitely not renovated, around the edges of the shower the sealant contained copious amounts of black mould (note to housekeeping... this is something that could easily have been rectified with bleach). Housekeeping continually turned the temperature down to 17 degrees after each room service meaning we walked back into an icebox each evening. The restaurant closed Friday, Sunday and Monday of the long weekend... extremely frustrating for a five star (?) hotel with all decent restaurants at least a 10 minute cab ride away. Minimal room service was available (from the bar menu) and the food was substandard. The final straw on the camels back was when housekeeping managed to clean our room in the morning and leave our room door wide open until we returned (about 5pm) with all of our valuables (laptops/ jewelry etc) exposed to all. We received a perfunctory apology and an offer of a bottle of champagne with advice that housekeeping had "forgotten" to close the room when they finished. We had a lovely trip, but there is no way we will ever stay with the Royce again.

My girlfriend and I stayed at the Royce Hotel in January as a little get away for 3 nights. I would have to say the place was pretty ordinary. Room service rarely answered the phone. The hotel also hosted weddings and so getting to sleep with the loud celebrations and the wedding guests making loud noises out in the street outside your window was horrible! We were constantly woken up because of this. The staff were extremely rude. I would say hi and they would simply ignore me, and they obviously did not know what a smile was. I definitly would never go back there again. Even though it says five star I do believe you'd get better service from a 4 star!

We booked a night at the Royce hotel online. The rating was 5 star, but the room we got was definitely not 5 star. It was clean but a bit dated and stuffy as the windows couldn't be opened at all. The staff were quite efficient on our check in, in the late afternoon. We came back later in the evening and wanted to park our car and were told they had a valet service for $20 (AUD). This price seemed quite high for overnight parking, but for convenience we paid. The next morning on check out we asked about getting our car and were told it would take 10 minutes. We waited at the reception and it seemed that nothing was happening. After about 20 minutes my husband asked about the car (as we were being ignored). The original staff member with whom we checked out was busy with other guests luggage and was nowhere to be seen. We were told that someone would get the car. Another 10 minutes and we asked again. Still no car. It took over 30 mins to get our car and we saw that one of the reception staff had to do this. They explained that someone was blocking the car and that was the issue. The fact that were were ignored and not offered any explanation as to what was going on was frustrating. If a hotel can't offer an efficient valet service then it shouldn't be offered at all. Our lasting impressions of the hotel were poor.