Four Seasons Hotel London at Tower Bridge

Beautiful hotel and great service for our group but I must be honest the 5% surcharge to assist them in covering employee wages left a very sour taste in our mouths when checking out. Would never have expected this sort of nickel and diming from a 5 star such as this. To be fair I’m not sure what’s happened to the company that they are in such dire straits to require this assistance from their guests but I imagine it must be quite bad. Otherwise a lovely 3 night stay. Thank you to the staff.

The hotel is in a great location for tourists, which is why I chose it. However, I was surprised and disappointed to see a service charge added to the room rate. That’s not typical, and frankly, it doesn’t make sense, the cost of the room should already cover standard services. What’s more confusing is that they claim the service charge is to help pay staff wages. Isn’t that what the room price is for? As a guest, I shouldn’t be responsible for covering employee salaries on top of the advertised rate. It feels like an excuse to inflate the price after booking, and it left a negative impression despite the good location. The service charge demands are getting OUT OF CONTROL !!!!!!

They add a 'mandatory' 5% service charge to your room, which they also say is 'discretionary', to cover staff wages. This is very shady practice for a few reasons. - it is not permitted to add a 'mandatory' service charge onto goods or services in the UK, it must be factored into the actual price, in this case, the room price. - if it is 'discretionary', then they know that they do not have to pay VAT on this, as it counts as a 'tip'. A charge cannot be both mandatory or discretionary, so they are deliberately muddying the waters. - why are they doing to pay staff wages anyway? I'm pretty sure they can cover the low wages they give their staff when they are charging £800 per room, per night. The main shareholders, Cascade Investments, is worth 45 Billion dollars.