Kata Palm Resort & Spa

Overrun with Russians they are everywhere. The only place they were not in was the bars & restaurants because they buy everything at 7 11 sending the small businesses broke. And they are rude push in front of you & generally lower class of tourist. Unfortunately we won’t be going back.

Kata Palm resort is centrally located on Kata Road and really close to Kata Beach. This is the greatest selling point of this hotel. Nearby are shops: currency converters, taxi’s, buses, mini marts and more restaurants than you can count. We stayed here in September for 10 days and we found the staff incredibly friendly. We arrived after a gruelling trip from Australia and the staff immediately made us feel welcome despite our late arrival (11pm). The cleaners were also friendly and tidied up our shoes every morning (or until we worked out how untidy we left our shoes). When our air conditioning broke the staff from maintenance had fixed it within 10 minutes We stayed in a deluxe pool access room and loved it. The room was large and opened up immediately to the pool. The bathroom was just big enough for two people in a squeeze. The décor was fantastic. The mini bar prices were really reasonable and cheaper than any other hotel I have stayed in. Also, the water bottles were recycled glass (great for the environment) and large. Often you have to buy water when travelling but the water bottles were so big we rarely needed to do this. The pillows and sheets were scented, which we loved, but people with sensitivities may have trouble with this. The pillows were also lumpy. We swapped them a number of times. There was also a little bit of mould in the bathroom. We also had to change our sheets on arrival as they were dirty. Lastly, the TV reception was terrible and we stopped using it. The Wi-Fi was brilliant so this didn’t concern us greatly. There were other concerns. The hotel is dated and needs to be upgraded. Some of the décor is looking really old and the resort just isn’t keeping up with modern trends such as having air conditioned areas, no porter service early morning and pamphlets were old with incorrect information. There are constant loud repairs going on around the resort. When we arrived, the statues recycling water wasn’t working so there were plenty of people working hard to get this fixed. We had our nephew over (4 years old) and there were electrical cords dipping in the water and we found a large butcher knife left on our balcony from chopping down foliage. This caused concern for our safety and our nephew’s. The pool is often full of leaves and can be a little gritty on the feet. However it was generally fine if you don’t mind bits of foliage in the water. Because we stayed during off-peak season the swim up bars were closed which was unfortunate. However, we kept getting our hopes up as they advertised throughout the resort they were open. Lastly, we contacted reception to discuss our nephew staying over for 1 night. They wanted to charge us THB 520 for a sheet and 750 for breakfast! We had him stay with another family member because of this. The breakfast was ok and looks very large upon arrival. However, you are paying a premium price for what little you get. The service in this area was less than desirable and we also had to contend with a lot of flies. The breakfast area looked really nice by the pool and on the other side there is a Koi pond. We found it much cheaper to walk 3 minutes to Chanalai Romantica resort next door which was half the price with amazing service, décor and music. These concerns can be overlooked if you are prepared for them. The location and low price works in Kata Palms favour. It is very quick to walk to the beach and there are many shops to enjoy along the way. Kata beach also have some very good restaurants right on the beach at good prices. I would definitely stay at Kata Palm again.

The hotel has a nice and lovely property. The food taste and quality does not reflect Thai cuisine. We missed the "Thai smile" in the service. Overall an expensive experience with low value - we will not come again.