Exceptionally overpriced and overcrowded - simply an upmarket charter resort. We visited as a couple in February 2024, on our babymoon looking forward to a relaxing stay experiencing the finest 5-star hospitality from the Jumeirah group. Sadly, we experienced the complete opposite. We paid $950 / night, room-only - excluding breakfast. Having stayed at multiple high-end 5-star resorts globally, we are comfortable paying high rates for a luxury and premium experience. Sadly this hotel is neither, the price point is outrageous. If you are a couple - this is not a couples resort - it is an overcrowded family resort where they pack you in - do not consider if you are looking for a relaxing holiday. Context: before arriving, we stayed nearby at The One & Only The Palm. For that we paid less - $870 / night including breakfast. The difference between that experience and this one was night and day. The Kerzner group (One & Onlys owners) put Jumeirah to shame on every single metric. We went from having an experience we wanted to tell all our friends about to one that we wanted to leave having felt completely miss-sold. Key points below: Marketing material is misleading - some snippets from their Instagram: 'Settle into idyllic bliss when you stay at our seaside oasis'. 'Unwind with a romantic staycay for two at our beachside oasis and experience comfort and opulence like no other'. Mostly accompanied with imagery of young couples. - The marketing imagery is pictures of the pools with two sun loungers spaced generously apart. The reality: banks of 4 sun loungers right on top of each other crammed in with little personal space. The marketing copy is deceitful and misleading. - You have to scroll back to August 2023 (75 instagram posts previously) to find any mention or images of families/kids. Yet the resort was 95% families. It is fine to be focused on families, but don’t miss sell it so couples like us have our one special holiday of the year ruined. Al Naseem is not exclusive - it allows other hotel guests in - Al Naseem sits at a considerably higher price point than the other Jumeirah hotels in the complex. However, aside from the bedrooms - we cannot see any benefit to paying considerably more. Other hotel guests were allowed to use Al Naseems sunbeds, their breakfast, their bars and their restaurants. There was seemingly no benefit to having paid for the "premium" hotel. Zero exclusivity. Pools & Beach - There are 3 pools in Al Naseem. The two main pools were crowded beyond belief - rammed at every spot. Absolute bedlam, noisy kids running everywhere. Way too full and nowhere near a 5-star experience. Sun loungers are reserved from dawn. - This meant couples huddled around the smaller adults pool looking for an escape. Imagine paying this much to then feel you have no option but to hide in one small corner of the hotel -The adults pool is surrounded by hundreds of rooms with kids on the balconies making noise. - Kids were frequently allowed to dine at the adults pool - likely due to overcrowding of other areas - The spec is markedly below par for the pricepoint: sunbeds are cheap looking and the towels were like ones you'd get at a 2/3 star hotel; thin coarse and fraying - looked old and tired. Whereas the One&Only had plush thick soft indulgent towels on spaced-out sunbeds with seclusion. - Small point but plastic glasses for drinks at your sunbed just felt again cheap charter resort feel - Minor feedback. The adult pool is modest in size and the depth is shallow. So to have 3 lifeguards sat permanently around the small pool felt overkill given no kids were allowed and it is shallow enough for anyone to stand. Safety is important, but this made you self-conscious with three sets of eyes watching you in such a small area. - Beach: entire beach is rammed with sunbeds - the spacing meant they felt on top of one and other. We tried to read our books and sink into our holiday, no chance with kids so close. - Beach: Despite being thousands of dollars more per night, Al Naseems sunbeds are no nicer than any of the other hotels, and anyone can use them from all hotels. Restaurants - The breakfast queues at the main restaurant - The Palmery - were like a scene out of Benidorm. We asked a staff member as we stood in the queue to even get into the Palmery if there was anywhere quiet and she looked embarrassed and said not a chance - This was overflowing because they were allowing guests from the other hotels to access The Palmery - what precisely are you paying extra for then? - In the evenings, restaurants were so booked up that you felt like you were clambering to get bookings - not relaxing at all. Not premium in any way. We discovered this was in part due to the fact that all guests from all hotels had free reign to book all restaurants, plus they also allowed non-hotel guests to book. - Every restaurant for 5 nights had the same service issue - we sat and waited 15 minutes before even being offered a drink. Not 5 star. Food & Drink prices - Dubai used to be known for service. Nowadays it is known for astounding prices. But even then, Jumeirah took it to another level. £11 for the cheapest beer (small bottle), £9 for a water, £20 for the cheapest glass of wine (yes, glass, not bottle). - I noted that hardly anyone was ordering drinks around the pool which was odd - this indicates to me that even this high-paying crowd was put off by the eye-water price points. The revenue generation team in head office would make a lot more profit by amending their prices ever so slightly so their bar staff arent stood twiddling their thumbs most of the day. Other guests - This is a sensitive point, but its important, as I suspect this is what is driving up the prices. We estimated over 70% of guests were of one particular nationality - a nation who's president invaded their neighbour in February 2022. - These guests were frequently rude to staff and obnoxious which made for uncomfortable viewing. The resort staff are lovely hardworking people and deserve to be treated with dignity. - A number of these guests had bodyguards / burly aggressive-looking entourages with them. Not relaxing at all on holiday. - The key point here is that this nationality is currently unable to travel to many countries globally, as the majority of the democratic world has temporarily blocked them. I sense the resort is taking advantage of this and inflating its price points. You could say this is supply and demand. I'd caution it is opportunistic short-term thinking that will harm their brand long term. Other issues - Pigeons nesting and pooing on our balcony, not cleaned once - Water completely cut off on final night, not able to shower - Noise in corridor outside room, marble flooring meant you could hear everything - Housekeeping knocked the same time every evening to ask to clean the room, despite us always having the same restaurant reservations and asking them to come back. Again, true 5-star resorts with attention to detail will have known your dining reservation times and visited when you were out. Positives - The staff were hardworking and lovely - The room was nice. Not $950 nice, but nice. Jumeiras response - We flagged on day one to allow them the chance to turn the experience around. The managers were fair and listened - however after two days of lengthy phone calls and debating, we were only offered some modest resort credit and half board upgrade. They didnt once mention the premium lounge access which could have turned our experience around. - We subsequently discovered half board did not cover any of the nicer restaurants and you had to pay high supplement fees to access any of these - The main point here is that when you've worked hard all year to pay for a very expensive 5 star hotel, the last thing you want to be doing is spending hours in your room scheduling call backs to speak with management. Defeats the point of a holiday! - When they realised the level of disappointment and how we pointed out that One&Only had personal touches at every opportunity, we were sent some petals for our bed and a bottle of €5.50 wine. This in itself, kind of says it all about the Jumeirah Group, why would a 5-star "luxury" hotel charging $950 a night have a €5.50 bottle of wine on-site in the first place! - The management did agree that there were multiple "Pinch points" but that shouldnt really be a problem for a guest paying this much - Finally on the day of checkout, after 5 stressful and ruined days of holiday we sat with a very professional and courteous senior director who listened and offered to cover more of our resort costs. But importantly, all managers refused any refund of the $4,500 we had paid. Citing it was "impossible" given we had paid via a third-party booking app (Expedia), which we found disingenuous. Summary - It felt at every corner that money-making comes before anything else for the Jumeirah executives. Whereas the One & Only placed guest experience at the forefront of everything. - We walked away from Jumeirah feeling completely let down, not heard, not taken as valued guests but for the first time ever, feeling completely duped and robbed by a hotel chain. A masterclass in over-promising and under-delivering. - For the first time in our lives on holiday, we just wanted to leave and get back to work!…