Budyong Beach Resort Doesn't Know Customer Service
When we travelled to Bantayan Island last weekend, March 25, 2012 with my colleagues and friends, we opt to stay in Budyong Beach Resort. That was my first in Bantayan, I have no idea why my supervisor asked me to handle the itinerary while we have team mates who had been to this place before.
Anyhow, here's my experience with the resort. A month before, I researched about it and found their landline as well as mobile number. I sent out some messages asking if it is indeed their number, they responded immediately and figured it was Margie, the secretary whom I had been conversing with. I reserved one room good for 15 persons; she said it is an air conditioned room with its own refrigerator. She also asked me to make a down payment to finalize the reservation. They will not make the reservation official unless there's no money guarantee, so I deposited 50% of the amount. Everything seemed to be going accordingly.
After a week, I inquired if they also cater island hopping and if they can prepare a lechon (roasted pig) for us. Margie said yes for both and we agreed for Php 5000 including Php 500 worth of hanging rice which was intended for lunch and Php 2500 for the island hopping.
For me, everything was all set until I called the resort two days before we leave to verify everything's been set. Then I found out that Margie is not anymore with the resort, and then I came to talk to Jennifer, the new secretary. She verified the reservation but the island hopping was not been taken care of. It was a good timing since Kuya Eddie, the person in charge about island hopping was present. So we settled everything and last Sunday morning we went in to Bantayan Island.
I just sent a message informing about our arrival and the free ride came just on time. It was a pink four wheel drive with the resort's name labeled in front. It was easy to recognize though.
When we reached the resort, we figured out that the big room was not yet available, there were still guests inside and will check out at exactly 12 noon. We decided to get another room good for four since we were twenty but it is still being cleaned and will become available after 30 minutes. We then decided to leave our things and headed to the market area to get some breakfast.
When we got back, the small room was already ready. My supervisor came to ask for the receipt since we will be documenting our expenses. We were surprised when the other front desk officer said she can't give us a receipt for the amount we deposited for down payment. My supervisor argued and asked why, according to her it's because we deposited it and they didn't receive it in cash. It was a lame excuse since the money is still with them and in the first place, we have the document which can prove that we have deposited it to the owner's Alliance bank account. It took a couple of minutes before the lady give us the full amount in the receipt.
We were ready for our island hopping when we realized we need to place the pork we brought inside a refrigerator, in short, we need to use the big room now. But since the big room was still unavailable, we asked the front desk if they can let us place the pork in their kitchen's fridge instead, they responded with a big NO. Reason was the kitchen is a different entity and is not part of the resort management. We were just tired of arguing so we politely ask if we can leave it with them and once the big room is available, place it inside the fridge. Fortunately, they agreed but sad to say, when we got back from the island hopping, the pork we asked them to place in the fridge was still in the front desk area. It was already four in the afternoon!
Instead of being pissed off, we just gave way and placed it ourselves, good thing it was still in good shape for dinner. I personally didn't like that lady, I don't know her and I can't judge her right away but by the way she answers us back, it looked like she has some kind of bad attitude. It was not good for a resort to have a front desk officer like that but anyway, we just get along with it.
Most of us stayed in the big room because it was air conditioned of course. But unfortunately, the air conditioner was very poor. We were sixteen inside the room and we never ever felt any instance of coolness. We switched it to its full speed and its fullest cool mode yet, it never made the room cool at all. And then here came the refrigerator problem. When we placed the chicken meat and the pork inside, we can't close it anymore! We arranged the stuff inside, took some soft drinks out but it won't close at all, we just let it be a bit opened then, placed some two liter coca cola bottles to keep it at least shut.
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| Fridge won't close so we placed two 2litre coca colas to keep the door shut. |
The good thing about the room was the the beds, there were five two decked beds, the bottom part is good for two persons and the above part is just a single bed. We just added one extra foam for Php 250 for the excess person. We had two comfort rooms inside which were actually good. There were showers inside and the water supply seemed to be abundant.
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| Two deck beds, three on the right side and two on the left. |
The second day came and we had challenges with cooking our breakfast. When I asked Margie before about their kitchen tools, she informed me that the resort has a dirty kitchen we can use. But cooking in the resort was a bad experience though because the free tools were mostly broken, we have to buy our own wood for the fire. There's only one ladle available and was currently used by some other guests, I realized that all guests need to share their dirty kitchen's tools yet they only had prepared one set for each kitchen tool.
We still tried to cook but then we found out that the frying pan had holes on it. We ended up begging the resort's kitchen for another pan. They agreed for Php 50 rent. Wew!
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| Three of our friends taking a quick dive before checking out. |
The beach has a long shoreline but with a not so good landscaping on it. I must say the shorelines of Quinale Beach Bar and Anda Global is much beautiful than the Budyong Beach Resort. The sand was not that surprising though, still the sands of Anda, Bohol are pretty nicer than those. I am not sure why but it looked like Budyong has no night life at all, we were able to visit the neighboring resort and they have colorful disco lights and a bar with available food and drinks. I guess Budyong is best for couples and those guests who want to have some privacy and some peace of mind.
Some other photos:
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| The resort's welcome board |
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| Rooms a few meters away from the beach shore. |
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| One of the beach front rooms good for four persons |
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| This was our room. |
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| Nice nipa hut rooms, near the beach shore... |
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| The Beach Front Rooms |
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| Motor bikes and bicycles are commonly used as transportation |
Overall, I would say that the resort doesn't have any idea what customer service is, so if you by any chance want to go to this resort, be reminded that the people who manages the resort are just ordinary people and are not trained for any customer related services.
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hi! got a quick question po regarding your Budyong Beach Resort experience - hope you can text me at 0949.325.0616. maraming salamat!