Mercure Paignton Hotel

The hotel is new and the finish is excellent, the public areas looked great decorated for Christmas. The staff were very friendly and helpfull although some clearly lacked experience their enthusiasm more than made up for this. There is an excellent choice for breakfast consisting of a full English, fresh salmon & mackerel, fresh fruit, pastries and fruit juices as well as self service hot drinks. The rooms are a good size we had a sea view which was nice regardless of the poor weather, beds were comfortable and the bathrooms have been fitted to a high specification although the design of the shower screen does mean some water does flow into the main bathroom area.

My wife booked this and she was aware the hotel is dog friendly where as i was not, both of us were surprised to see just how many dogs were in the hotel i was unsure if the dogs were staying in a 4 star hotel or if i was staying in a 5 star kennels. Whilst most of the dogs where no trouble every now and again there was some barking but my main issue is the fact that they are allowed in the dining room at breakfast and although there is seating reserved for people with dogs that is away from the servery area some people chose to bring them into the area where the food is laid out, I even saw one woman who had 3 dogs and was clearly on her own take all 3 dogs up to the servery area to get her breakfast even though another guest asked her if she would like her to watch them whilst she got her food. this was obviously not seen by a member of staff because the next day she was told by a member of staff that she was not allowed to take her dogs in that area. The breakfast is a buffet style therefore you help yourself to all the items on offer and i regularly saw people feeding their dogs from their hand and making a fuss of them only then to return to the counter and handle the serving spoons and tongues! On New years eve morning we decided to have a coffee in the reception area before heading out for the day and my wife sat in the very nice pink sofa in that area when we got up to leave she was covered in dog hairs and she had to return to the room to get changed and the following day we did see someone lift their dog up and place it on this sofa, this area is carpeted where as most of the ground floor is vinyl tiles the amount of dog hair in this carpet was disgusting by the time we left after 5 days and no amount of vacuuming is going to keep on top of that. I feel the hotel needs to set some rules in place for dog owners and set aside some areas that are dog free and i also wondered if every room in the hotel is dog friendly?