We had booked a stop over in Doha to break up the journey home, and I chose the Hilton because they offered day rooms. The flight from Perth landed at about 0530, so I wanted to be sure that we could get into the room, take a shower and relax as soon as we arrived.

We took a taxi from the rank to the hotel and it cost about 60QAR. The system is very organised and whilst an Uber would have been cheaper (and was on the way back) it was just easier to take an official car.

We arrived at the hotel before 0700 and were not exactly impressed. The check in manager told me that I should have booked 2 overnight rooms instead of a day and night room, despite the fact that I had emailed the hotel in advance to ask about linking the reservations. Eventually after much back and forth we were given a room. I had paid for a Deluxe Sea View Room and when we arrived on the 3rd floor were greeted with a twin bed guest room with the grubbiest windows I have ever seen in a hotel.

For any guest, this would have been a crap room, especially as it smelled of cigarette smoke, but for a Diamond Member it was unacceptable. I went back to the desk to complain and showed the manager that we had been downgraded from a Deluxe to a Guest room, instead of being upgraded; a fact which he disputed. I told him that I was not happy, and that I was requesting that he ‘make it right’ as the hotel marketing campaign goes. He said there was nothing he could do but would let us know when the other room we had booked for the night was ready.

As you can see from this photo, the hotel is huge, with over 20 floors. I contacted the Diamond Help Desk via the app, detailing the complaint and was amazed when they got back to be within 30 minutes

They came back to me, and said the manager would email me, which he duly did. It was the same guy I had already spoken to, and he had obviously been given a talking to as his manner was much more pleasant. I could see in the app that the room had gone from a Sea View Guest Room to the King Executive and then to the Executive Suite. I think that this was because they processed the Diamond upgrade and then a service recovery on top of that.

The suite was amazing, and did make up for the debacle in the first place, although I would have been happy with the room I had paid for at the start all along!

The living room had great views across the bay and the bedroom was as big as the first room we had. There was a guest toilet, a dining table, and a huge bathroom.

You get an idea how big it was from this map on the back of the door.

The views from the balcony were great, and it was nice to sit out and watch the sun set. The Four Seasons is the building in front with the white domes.

One floor below was the Executive Lounge which had a pretty uninspiring selection of food during the day, but in the evening had some decent snacks, cheese and beer on offer. It made a reasonable snack in lieu of dinner. We had eaten breakfast in the main restaurant, and had something by the pool outside at lunch.

At about 8pm we headed to bed as we had a 0345 wake up, to leave at 0415 and be at the airport 2 hours before the flight. Uber was used on the way back and cost 40QAR.

After a shocking start, the Hilton did redeem itself, and whilst I might stay somewhere else if I ad another overnight in Doha for variety, I did enjoy the stay. I know a few people who have used it as a day hotel between Qatar flights out to Penang and Chiang Mai and they really rated it – lots of photos of them in the pool with beer!