Review of Last Drop Village Hotel & Spa 4*

I was looking forward (and paid for) a promise of a full day consisting of an interesting seminar by Yamaha Music UK and great food provided by The Last Drop. I remember just how good the food was here, as my son had his wedding reception in one of the suites. At lunch time, I was one of the last to go to the annexe where the buffet was, as I was in the middle of discussing a few technical issues with a Yamaha representative, so we were actually hardly 10 minutes behind everyone else. When we got to the table, I was absolutely disgusted and appalled at what I saw, no clean plates or forks, it all looked as if there had been a food fight, scraps of food left, there were dirty plates piled up, the remains of god knows what and empty platters, but I would never know what was originally on them. No sign of any staff, no one replenishing food or clearing away dirty/empty plates/dishes. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. Was this really the Last Drop whose reputation for good food and great service is so well documentated? The people from Yamaha were now looking rather embarrassed and were trying to find staff to clear away the debris and organise more food as clearly not enough was provided, but there was no one around to ask or advise the chef, suddenly, a platter of deep fried squid arrived (which no one wanted), and at that very moment everyone was called back in for the second half of the meet, so I actually had nothing to eat. As a diabetic, I was now feeling the effects of my blood sugar dropping and felt decidedly unwell, I left early after informing one of the representatives how disgusted I was with the poor buffet and equally poor service, where were the hotel staff? As I made my way towards my car, I felt compelled to return to the hotel reception to let them know exactly how I felt and what had gone on. I was told, by a member of the hotels' banqueting team that she'd been very busy that day with other functions (no excuse) and that she would have a word with the chef. What use was that? All in all, extremely poor, very disappointing, won't be rushing back. Had I been head of that Yamaha conference team, I wouldn't have parted with a penny!