Unfortunately all the( bad) reviews about this hotel are true. This one of my worst experience in a hotel for many years...

I was in Kiev for business at the begining of this month and as the radisson was full I try the Premier Palace Hotel. what a mistake!

It is hard to imagine that you are in a top hotel. The services are terrible from the front desk to the room service.

The rooms are small and very old fashion. The food average at breakfast.

I will not come back to this hotel at any prices.

I agree with many of the previous reviews, in saying that the PPH is Kiev's best, or rather most luxurious hotel. It certainly boasts all the facilities you'd expect in a hotel of this price calibre: prime location, glitzy atrium lobby, good range of restaurants, luxurious rooms, marble bathrooms with floor heating, beautiful pool and wellness area, state-of-art conference hall etc.

The hotel's biggest downturn however is that nobody has told its staff yet, that it is a 5* property. With very few exceptions, staff attitudes range from arrogant to blatantly rude. You often get the feeling that the hotel defines luxury simply by asking high prices. This can get a bit tiresome for the guest after a while, and the hotel will have to change its attitude very soon with the upcoming opening of further 5* properties in Kiev (there is a Hyatt expected to open in May 07, a Hilton and an Interconti are apparently being developed by 2009). At the moment however, the PPH has the monopoly in Kiev's 5* segment and they are aware of it.

The rooms are tastefully and expensively decorated, comfortable beds (blankets seem a bit small), heavy curtains, a lot of dark wood, blue and gold/yellow. The lighting is a bit dim, which makes the rooms fell a bit dark. Try to get a room on one of the higher floors (4+) and avoid the ones facing Shevchenka. The windows are not very well isolated, so they are quite noisy from the traffic. The rooms facing the inner courtyard and roof pool) don't have nice views, but they are really quiet and seem to be a bit more spacious, however some on the 3rd floor are facing a 2 meter high wall just 1 meter away from the window, therefore a bit claustrophobic.

Breakfast is included in the room rate, which is a definite plus, and the views from the rooftop restaurant on the 8th floor are for sure a highlight during a stay at this hotel. The breakfast buffet is of good quality and variety, but not extraordinary. I haven't tried the other restaurants, except the hotel bar behind the lobby, which is quite cosy, but mostly full. An eclectic mix of western businessmen, local oligarchs and occasionally some prostitutes.

From the facilities and amenities the PPH is without a doubt 5*, the staff and friendliness is far below average and difficult to accept at this price tag. If your company pays the total bill, this is not a cause of major concern, but it still leaves you with a somewhat frustrating feeling after each stay (2 for me so far), that won't make you yearn for your next stay at this strange place.

When you rent a car, especially from one of the fly-by-night, non-reputable rent-a-car companies, you had better check the car for scratches and other defects, both in and out, and make sure that you mark them on the rental form. Otherwise, you might be asked to pay for damages you haven’t made.

Guests of the Premier Palace Hotel in Kiev should do the same. When you enter the room for the first time you should ask the porter who brought your luggage to wait for a few minutes, go over every corner of the room and the bathroom and make a list of all the small scratches and all the defects. Otherwise, you will be hit by management of the hotel with a hefty bill for damages.

That is what happened to me. I checked in one evening this month and the next day I saw an envelope under my door. There was a letter from management informing me that the cleaning lady found that I had damaged the bath tub and that they were adding 1,500 Ukraine Hryvnia (UAH) (about $300) to my bill as a repair fee. I went to the bathroom and couldn’t find any damage, so I called downstairs and asked that someone come to my room and show me where the damage was. A few seconds after I hung up the phone, there was a knock on my door. The floor manager and the lady who cleaned my room stepped in and showed me an almost undetectable mark which looked to me to be a manufacturer’s defect in the plastic bath tub, far away behind the plastic curtain which assured management of the hotel that the guest would not notice it.

A few hours later, with the help of a $10 tip, another cleaning lady on that floor was laughing and told me that the hotel was probably making more money off those mysterious defects than on the rooms.

The façade and the public areas of the Premier Palace are grandiose, with an old world beauty. But when you arrive to the rooms (which are also sizeable) you, again, realize that the owners of the hotel, being only a short time ago part of a socialist country, interpret capitalism as making money by any means, even by way of not investing in it. The walls are naked, but for one painting which cannot be considered art. Although my reservation was for two people, the room was equipped for one. One bath towel, one hand towel, one bar of soap, one robe – one of everything. When I asked the manager-on-duty why my wife and I should use the same towel, he answered: “When we are asked for more towels, we bring more towels.”

And all of this for a room that costs between 1,890 UAH ($378) to 8,100 UAH ($1,600) a deluxe room, per night. But the rate is actually much higher. In the small print of its advertising, the high season is much more expensive, and the Premier Palace Hotel’s high season includes the months of February, March, April, May, June, September, October and November.

There are a few more traps that hotel guests must be aware of. The hotel nightclub (a strip club) should be entrance-free for hotel guests (that is what the brochure in the room promises). When you enter the club they play dumb (bad English) and charge you $40 for the entrance fee. Another trap is the taxi service the hotel offers to its guests. The hotel has an agreement with a local taxi company to provide a “reliable transportation service to our guests”. Say “no thank you.” The charge is 570 UAH ($114) for a ride to the airport while a taxi that we hailed on the street, just at the entrance to the hotel, charged us 150 UAH ($30) for the same ride.

There are only two luxury hotels in Kiev. If you want your pocket to feel safe and not to be en guarde 24 hours a day, choose the Radisson SAS – the rates are a little higher, but you will end up paying less.

I have stayed at the hotel about 12 times. Frankly I would pay the rack rate just for a table at the bar.

It's a very high standard (albeit not Four Seasons) hotel with a very high level of service.

Beware, do NOT stay here if 1) you are travelling with and trying to convince your boss you are a serious and boring guy, 2) you are with your wife/fiancee (unless she is Russian, Ukrainan or is very open minded) or 3) you are travelling with children.

If any of the above is the case, stay at the Kiev Radisson (the most boring IKEA designed sterile hotel I have ever stayed in).

The eye-candy is ridiculous, the oligarchs are omnipresent and the vodka is chilled.

What a great hotel.