Sandals Emerald Bay

MichellelovesSandals wrote a review July 2024
Modesto, Illinois

Great vacation spot.

This a fabulous vacation destination. Views. Excursions. Food. The staff is about 25% friendly. But the ones who are make it worthy if going. I will only stay at a Sandals. The staff here are not an example of the other 5 Sandals we have stayed at

Date of Stay: June 2024

276paule wrote a review July 2024
Louisville, Kentucky

Exuma 2024

This was our 4th visit to this resort and most everything was great as always! I'd like to acknowledge those who stood out during our vacation. We had an excellent butler team and will request them next time we visit there. They are Juvens, Kevin and Anfroy! They made our vacation take a notch up! Also we'd like to thank Jaleen in the Bahama Bay, La Shante who was the hostess in about every restaurant we entered, and of course Tamia in the Drunken Duck! Thanks to all these people and several others who made this trip enjoyable. Our only complaint was Sandals didn't clean up the beach like most resorts. They'd said their tractor was broken, but garbage and dead sea gulls were an obstacle when going to the beach. The resort next to them was very well kept! If they'd have given me a rake I'd have cleared a path from our chairs to the water. Overall the room, food, grounds and general friendliness of the employees was excellent. We'll return.

Date of Stay: June 2024

cathymJ8600RL wrote a review July 2024

Don’t recommend

If you are used to high end all inclusive resorts this one is not for you. The goods - it is beautiful here, pool is fun, dinner food is good. Bads - half the restaurants aren’t open at night so good luck getting a reservation, a couple restaurants required pants but they have no air conditioning and it was in the high 90’s, although our room air worked ok many complained they had no ac, the drinks at the pool were bad and they say high end but top shelf is Tito’s and Jose Cuervo here. I will never come to a sandals
Again. Secrets resorts are wayyyyy better

Date of Stay: July 2024

zacharysU4080UG wrote a review July 2024

Do not recommend

I was under the impression that this was a high end Sandals location. While that may have been true 20 years ago, the resort struggles to keep up with competitors. The resort is beautiful and the food is good for the most part.
However, the air conditioner was out resort wide for 3 out of the 5 nights. It was so humid that the floors were saturated with condensation, our clothes in the dressers were wet, and the room smelled of mildew. This was unsafe and a few guests allegedly slipped and fell in their rooms.
The staff were extremely nonchalant with the matter, not taking the initiative to apologize and would only recognize the issue if guests brought it up. This is not the service I am used to through Sandals/Beaches. Unfortunately I would not recommend not only this resort but also the company as a whole for the terrible way they handled the situation.

Date of Stay: July 2024

yadayadasowhat wrote a review July 2024

Major disappointment

Air conditioning was broken for 4 days which really ruined the stay. All the rooms, restaurants, and bars were hot and uncomfortable. But for some reason the bathroom by the quiet pool had working AC. Staff kept saying it was being worked on but it was never fixed. This can really be a medical emergency for some guests. It simply can’t take this long to fix. You would think the resort would be overly sensitive to this given its tragic history.

Customer service is very poor. Most of the servers and bartenders are very unfriendly. Don’t properly greet you when coming into a restaurant or bar. No smiles. They really look miserable to be working at this resort. You feel like you’re putting them out being there. Service is a baseline expectation for an upscale resort. They need to retrain the entire staff.

Pool, beach and grounds are really nice. Ocean color and sand are really amazing. Pool has a strange vibe to it. They tried doing some trivia, games, and activities but there wasn’t much interest from guests. It’s a chill atmosphere. Either revamp the playmaker format or just cut it out of the resort. Not enough chairs by the main pool. The butlers reserve most of them for their guests. We heard from other guests that had a chair by the pool that the butlers move your stuff from the chair if their guest who paid a little extra for butler service wants it. I get wanting to give extra attention to those who paid more for butler service but shouldn’t come at the expense of mistreating other guests. Also, there is plenty of room to add more loungers. It’s a mystery why they don’t have enough.

Restaurants had good food overall but are all over booked. Couldn’t get into several at all during the stay.

Sandals app had incorrect restaurant times and days open. We pointed this out to the concierge but she didn’t seem to care. IM feature in the app is useless. Sent an IM and never received a reply.

Overall great property grounds and beach but poorly managed. Not in line with the image Sandals is going for.

Date of Stay: July 2024

Wander33860993037 wrote a review July 2024
White House, Sumner County, Tennessee

HORRIBLE CONDITIONS w/ NO RELIEF

I am an emerald status Sandals guest and attorney. This resort is dying. I arrived home after an eight night stay. Six of those were without air conditioning. There was a black ooze in the first room coming from the AC vent before it broke down. They moved me. My new room was 85 degrees at night. The entire resort had no AC. People were passing out and sleeping in ice baths. My bath tub would not drain. The steam room at the spa was broken. The spa elevator was broken. The ice cream display was broken. There were no ice cream toppings, only crumbs in the display which were there when we arrived and there when we left. I was overlooked by my butlers and did not eat lunch until the 4th day. I am allergic to nuts. Upon arrival, my butlers served me nuts. It happened three more times and once in a restaurant. This has NEVER happened to me at Sandals, EVER! (Why ask on a preference sheet or in the restaurants what you are allergic to if you aren’t going to listen? This is life and death.) They left hot cheese and nuts in our room each day in 85 degree temps as if it was safe to eat after being out for hours. The ice cream place asked us if we minded melted ice cream. Yuk! Dangerous hot dairy again! At our candlelight dinner, the waitress asked us if we had a lighter. The laundry service was closed. The butlers flat out told us they were waiting on 11 rooms at a time. I don’t care to know that. Ergo we felt guilty even asking for food etc. The last night, people slept in the pool it was so hot. Knobs on furniture and doors would fall off in our hands. I met with a manager who was real nice but told me corporate had tied his hands and they would only give me three free nights IF I purchased four more. I want the eight nights I bought for $13,500! Because of all the broken things, we were scared to scuba. Our life was not worth the risk. Here are a few photos. I am reaching out to corporate for a fair remedy. Otherwise we will not do Sandals anymore even though we are so very close to our free week. I’d rather be at home than endure this again. They are too top heavy. They kept pointing out a multi million dollar home in which their GM lives. Sandals needs to sell that home and overhaul this property. The days of charging this sum for subpar accommodations and service is over! The employees need to be trained but I even felt sorry for them as they too were embarrassed at this money pit profit scam. They literally begged me to complain to corporate about the conditions of the property. Through social media I learned this problem has been ongoing for over five years!!!!! Fortunately all of us who were there together and endured this are keeping in touch. As of now they still have no AC. Beware!!!!

Date of Stay: July 2024

913drewr wrote a review July 2024

High expectations

The grounds and water look great. The beach is expansive with plenty of space. The restaurants are great. The rooms need major help. Neither of my doors ( front or sliding) deadbolt locked, metal parts in the shower loose and/or broken, my window is sealed shut, all vents in the bathroom don’t function, any knicks and damage to trim/wall has mostly just been painted over and the AC HAS BEEN BROKEN SINCE BEFORE WE ARRIVED!

Any one of these problems, except for the AC, can be overlooked on their own but to have all of them with an AC that has been down for at least 4 days and counting is terrible. If the cost of the room was $150, then you get what you pay for but it’s far from $150 a night. It’s over $1,000 a day. It’s really unacceptable. Too much money spent on marketing and not enough on the property.

As a company, if the whole AC goes down for days, it’s time to fly in professionals to get the job done ASAP. AC repair is happening behind my building, I can attest, there’s not a lot of urgency. It’s hot AF in these rooms with no airflow, high humidity and at least for me, only my sliding door opens, my window is caulked shut. Happy birthday!

Sandals left a letter on our bed that said they would like to give us 3 free night in a future trip… but we have to buy 4 nights to get it. It’s a nice offer but after this experience, dropping over $5k again to get a cpl nights free is not happening. If they offer the same with 1 night paid, that’s a fair deal because they completely left us stranded here for days with these problems. Shelling out that much money so Sandals can have a 2nd attempt at a 1st impression…. Nah.

Leadership matters when leadership is needed.

Date of Stay: July 2024

Vacationer745191 wrote a review July 2024

Stay away if you want to enjoy your trip

This is the worst all inclusive resort we have ever stayed at. The entire resort lost air conditioning for 3 of the 4 nights we were there. The staff did not inform anyone as to what was going on, or when it would be fixed. Half of the restaurants weren't open each night, and the ones that were made you wait over an hour and were understaffed. The website advertises a luxury experience, but the rooms were old, they smelled moldy, and when the AC went out the floor became slippery and hard to walk on. There is no ventilation in the bathroom/shower area of each room so it is always at least 10 degrees hotter then the rest of the room. None of the employees seem to actually care if they are there, or if you are having a good experience, and the managers do their best to avoid any actual interaction with the guests, even when requested. The drinks were bad, there was limited choices of liquor, and everything was lower level. We requested waters to our room multiple times due to the extreme heat in the them and never received them. The resort and staff ruin a beautiful island, and sandals management in general has made us choose to never visit one again.

Date of Stay: July 2024

CaptainCookieDaddy wrote a review July 2024
Roslyn, Long Island, New York

Nice resort

It’s a nice resort. The beach is amazing. The water and sand are perfect. The pool is nice. The food is good. The staff is pretty friendly. The rooms are nice but unfortunately the air conditioning was out while we were there due to a system issue. Everything else was good.

Date of Stay: July 2024

TMesq wrote a review July 2024
West Chester, Pennsylvania

Air conditioning failure and management response - totally not cool

We arrived on Wednesday, July 3, for a five-night stay. We were greeted warmly and shown to room 7101. Our evening Wednesday was generally what we expected from a visit to Sandals, with a few minor issues - a puddle on the floor from the refrigerator, wet spots on the rug, and the rug being dirty. The room also smelled a little musty. All of those were very minor and so we overlooked them. Service and food at Barefoot by the Sea were lovely, although the flies were aggressive. The beach was beautiful, although it was overrun in spots with a lot of seaweed.
The air conditioning went out sometime in the middle of the night during our first night. It was not restored by the time we left on July 8. The temperature in our room was 82 degrees every night. Other guests we spoke to said that their rooms reached 86 degrees. No one reached out to us or offered fans or a transfer or any solution. We requested an oscillating fan several times and were told none were available. We asked to be put on a waiting list for a fan and were told one didn't exist. We only finally received a fan Saturday night when a member of the housekeeping staff found one for us but we had three full days and two nights without even a tabletop fan. We left numerous messages for the hotel manager and the director of client services. No one ever returned our calls. When I reached someone at the front desk, she told me she had a long line of people waiting to discuss their issues, and I was welcome to come down and stand in line in the lobby - also not air conditioned.
Various staff told us a similar issue had occurred before, and they were surprised that no one had planned for it again.
We finally received our first communication from management Saturday night. The letter didn't state when repairs would be completed and only offered as a solution three free nights of a visit IF WE PURCHASED FOUR OTHER NIGHTS. It would be deeply insulting and tone-deaf to try to sell a four-night visit at a time when we were absolutely miserable from the heat and unable to get the most basic customer service. In addition, the conditions posed a health and safety risk for anyone with an underlying medical condition, the elderly and the obese. After other experiences with conditions that resulted in customer deaths at this resort, we expected that customer well-being would be a top priority.
We had booked an excursion for July 5 in the afternoon. We received a call that morning saying that our excursion was canceled. No reason was given. The caller also stated that we had double booked tours for that date but our paper records and the Sandals application stated that we booked one tour on July 5 and one on July 6. We did not doublebook. Our refund receipt it said that the customer mistakenly booked the wrong tour. We did not. We were prepared for and looking forward to the tour since it was an opportunity to escape the oppressive heat at the resort.
The restaurants were all too hot to sit and dine in. We had reservations at the French restaurant but they could not accommodate requests to take dinner to go to find someplace cooler.
In addition to the non-functional air conditioning, the lack of management response, and the cancelation of our excursion, we also experienced the following:
Furniture that was broken or looked shabby and water-stained
I reached for water in the mini-fridge and a roach popped out of the cabinet.
A musty, mildew smell in our room and eventually nearly overpowering in the hallways.
We reached out via the Sandals application to get assistance when on-site efforts were unsuccessful. The application says they will respond in 24 hours. We didn't receive a response until 72 hours later - after we were home.
No exhaust fans in the bathrooms or in the toilet area, making the room where the toilet was hotter than other parts of the room.
The shower only provided warm and hot water. Thus amid high temperatures and no air conditioning, we could not take a cool shower.
There were inadequate chairs and umbrellas by the pool. Those there showed a lot of wear and tear with rips in the umbrellas.
This experience is not what we have enjoyed in the past (this was my third Sandals having been to St. Lucia and Antigua previously). We were very much looking forward to a romantic getaway in a tropical paradise. Instead, we experienced heat exhaustion and unrelenting heat with no management communication except a sales pitch. This is simply unacceptable.
The highlights were beautiful grounds, gracious housekeeping staff and other front-line employees, easy commute from the airport and gorgeous ocean views. Unfortunately we were not able to enjoy those as planned due to facilities issues and abysmal management response.

Date of Stay: July 2024

kstrong823 wrote a review July 2024
Coral Springs, Broward County, Florida

HORRIBLE experience.

Horrible! Horrible! Horrible! I will never, ever, go to Sandals again. The air in the whole resort went out on day 2 of a 6 day trip. It was HOT with no options/alternatives offered. We were in one of the most expensive rooms in the resort - our floor was wet and slippery, our medication even melted - which means we could not take it.

It was MISERABLE. All they said was they were working on it. Meanwhile, they were still checking in people as if nothing was wrong. And then they had the audacity to give guests a letter stating they will comp 3 days if we buy 4 days. The most insane thing I have ever heard. And they do NOT give refunds.

The ONLY good thing was the wait staff. It's one thing to be on vacation and be miserable as you try to vacation - however, staff members were working hard in that heat, particularly the butlers, with no relief anywhere on the resort for them.

You know people work really hard to save up for and plan for a vacation. Vacations are meant to be relaxing and enjoyable. Obviously things occur that are out of our control and even out the business' control. But how you handle those situations is what matters. They handled it horribly: no a/c-no options/alternatives; continuing to check in guests knowing there was no ac; not offering any type of refund; forcing us to spend more money at the resort to get compensated for something that should be refunded; and not having any relief for their staff.

Do better Sandals. Your guests and employees deserve better.

Date of Stay: July 2024

gloriapU3431KZ wrote a review July 2024
New Orleans, Louisiana

I will be back!

Everyone was so friendly, the food was amazing, especially at Bombay, rooms were very clean and the views were breathtaking. Lloyd at the piano bar was a phenomenol bartender. Ene, by the pool, was very friendly, superb bar tender and fantastic representative of Sandals. Loved, loved, loved this trip!

Date of Stay: July 2024

346jameyb wrote a review July 2024

You might want to reconsider….

My wife and I visited this resort twice in the past. Our first trip was July 2020 on the opening week after Covid and we couldn’t have asked for a better experience. We loved this resort so much that we booked it for the following year.

We had air conditioning issues in our room the following year in 2021. I had to keep disconnecting the thermostat in order for it to work. Multiple calls to the front desk and a maintenance worker (still there to this date) would come if we were lucky maybe to look at it and wouldn’t do a thing.

My wife and I love Exuma so much that we saved for two years for our trip this year. We reserved a butler room cause we wanted to stay in a larger room. Upon check-in on July 6, the butlers lounge was needless to say HOT! The butler concierge was very non-chalant about the entire resort not having air conditioning and it had been broken since July 3. I started realizing that how hard would it have been for a simple email to be sent out to upcoming arrivals. We could have rescheduled for the following week!!!

The entire management team should really be looked into for this!!! They all seemed to be extremely hush about the situation to everyone there and those being checked in. No updates were ever given regarding air conditioning. We felt really sorry for the workers there that were working in the conditions presented cause they were doing their very best.

We couldn’t sleep in our bedroom for three nights due to the room having a temperature of 86-88 degrees. The room had started to smell mildew after the first night with only one ceiling fan working on high. One of the bedroom windows would not open and the other had a window lock made of mortar, yes I said mortar!!!!!

My wife had to “sleep” if she could on the floor and I slept on the loveseat. She said the loveseat would keep her hotter than the floor. We had to sleep like animals in a room costing over $1k a night!!!!!!! We were able to finally switch rooms on day 4 out of 6. Only one side of the building had air conditioning working.

The compensation offered to us and everyone else would be for three nights based on the cash amount paid per night for the trip this year. The problem with this is that we had $1500 as ssg points and when we inquired about possible returning next year, the cost of two nights would be almost as much as what we paid for five nights this year. No re-credit of our points would be given back to us, so I would advise to look elsewhere then staying with this brand (Sandals/Beaches). Everything with this company seems to be a genuine money grab!!!

The staff, excluding front desk management and higher, really went above and beyond to try to keep guests comfortable. The island really is beautiful and we will return but we will look into renting a house for our next trip.

Date of Stay: July 2024

BobMims wrote a review July 2024

Sandals conned us.

We booked a trip to Sandals Emerald Bay on 07/27/2024 and paid in full. On 07/31/2024 we received an email telling us they were closing the resort for renovations. Sandals told us we could not get a refund for 7 to 10 days. In addition we have non-refundable flights. Why did Sandals keep taking reservations when they had to know they were going to remodel. Could they be using the deposits to make money while depriving there clients of money to book on other trips? We can't get the money back for our flights, but maybe we can find a better resort in the Bahamas. Say No To Sandals!

Date of Stay: July 2024

ClaireandJohn wrote a review August 2024

Closing August 15th two weeks notice given

This will be my shortest review ever.

Informed today August 1st that Sandals Emerald Bay is closing on August 15th. for renovations to become a Beaches Resort.

That is just two weeks notice, expected better.

They have obviously known about this for months, we now have two long haul and two Bahamas Air flights to deal with, all non refundable.

Date of Stay: August 2024

X5594IUreneew wrote a review August 2024

Not worth the $

First of all, the actual view from the room is of a burm with weeds. Beyond that is the ocean. Red flag warning the whole time we were there. We weren't allowed to go snorkel or use other equipment in water. The only thing to do was walk along the beach which I did zigzagging thru all the plastic trash. The resort next door had a cleaner beach front. The food was ok. The drinks ok. The workers were not trained in high end customer service. Bottom line is, you pay 5 star price but receive 2.5 star quality. My husband and I changed our flight to go home a day early. I would never recommend this place

Date of Stay: May 2024