Rating: ★★☆☆☆ (2/5) We stayed five nights for our 15th wedding anniversary — a trip we'd looked forward to for years. The setting delivered. The service, for a resort priced alongside Aman, Rosewood, Ritz-Carlton and Raffles, genuinely did not. What's excellent The overwater villa is beautiful and immaculately maintained — real credit to the housekeeping team, the most consistent part of our stay. The house reef straight off the deck is the highlight; snorkelling was superb and the activities team were helpful with gear and guidance. Breakfast at Alba is fantastic, with excellent variety. The island itself is lush and lovely. If your holiday is about the villa, the reef and the water, this place is hard to beat. Where it falls short Almost everything on the service side felt standardized rather than personal — efficiency without warmth. No upgrade, and a flat welcome. As a Platinum member we were not upgraded, and no upgrade was offered at any point. The in-villa welcome amenity was two small chocolates — honestly less than I've had at a Courtyard. It set an impersonal tone from the door. You have to chase service. The recurring theme of the stay. The resort was very lightly occupied, yet we repeatedly had to go out of our way to find someone for basic things. At this level, the service should come to you. Inconsistent dining and billing. Some restaurants charge for water, others don't. The same dish at Alba tasted noticeably different on two visits, and Cargo was inconsistent too. A complimentary starter once arrived soggy, as if it had been sitting out for hours (replaced promptly when flagged). I was also overcharged on one bill. Renovation noise — and a brush-off. There was daytime renovation work in the villa right next to ours, with a fair amount of noise and dust. It didn't wake us in the mornings, but since much of the point of a villa like this is unhurried time in it, the disturbance was real. When I raised it with our butler, it was gently waved away — "oh, they come in a little later" — with no offer to move us or otherwise address it. The response said as much as the noise. Butler: efficient, not personal. Our butler was easy to reach on WhatsApp, prompt, and a genuinely useful single point of contact for reservations, buggy service, yoga sessions and the like — I did appreciate that. But it was standardized service, the same for every guest, the kind you'd get at a Courtyard. At no point did it feel like anyone was trying to make our stay special. Bottom line The hard product — villa, reef, island, breakfast — is superb and genuinely delivers. What's missing is the personal, anticipatory warmth this brand is supposed to be built on. Everything works, but transactionally. On a milestone trip we'd anticipated for years, that's what we came away noticing — especially having experienced warmer, more genuinely personal service at other St. Regis and Ritz-Carlton properties at lower price points.
