ANDY Murray’s luxury hotel has sparked a TripAdvisor investigation after a clutch of five star reviews appeared – before it even opened.
The Cromlix Hotel in Kinbuck, Perthshire, is due to open its doors today (tues) but five, five star reviews have already appeared on travel website TripAdvisor.
Reviewers, writing in the past week, have praised to the skies everything from the Wimbledon-colour tennis court to the “fabulous” Victorian building and the duvet covers which “have to be experienced”.
Wimbledon champion Murray has invested well over £2m in buying and refurbishing the Cromlix, even drafting in legendary chef Albert Roux to plan the menu.
The hotel has confirmed that around 100 guests had stayed at the hotel as part of a “soft launch”.
An insider confirmed that “most” of the guests stayed for free at the hotel, where rooms cost up to £450 a night.
A spokesman for TripAdvisor, which has been hit by several scandals over fake reviews, said they were looking into the reviews to see if their guidelines had been breached.
The spokesman said: “We don’t allow incentivisation with our reviews.
“If we find a hotel or business to have offered their guests something in return for a good review, we consider that to be a biased review and it forfeits our guidelines.
“If someone sees a review on the site that they are not convinced is entirely genuine, we would encourage them to report it to us using the link on the site and we would investigate.
“In this instances, I have referred the reviews to our investigations team.”
One review, which was posted last Thursday, said: “My wife and I were fortunate enough to be invited to the soft opening of the hotel having had our honeymoon night there many years ago and eaten there many times since.
“The staff were amazing, the food was stunning, the public areas were luxurious and the Bruce Suite was gorgeous.”
It added: “There was understated luxury everywhere, right down to the Arran Aromatics toiletries in the rooms. The duvet cover on the bed has to be experienced.”
Another review said: “We could have spent hours in our ‘spa’ bathroom, it was fabulous.”
One reviewer appeared a little confused, describing the visit as “solo” but writing that “We enjoyed a stay in The Bruce Suite, a bed to die for and a bath to soak away the woes of the week”.
The Cromlix hotel has already been shrouded in controversy after it was revealed that three neighbouring families were to be evicted to make room for hotel staff.
Residents of the Square, which is situated next to the hotel, slammed the hotel proprietor while many critics in the nearby town of Dunblane, accused the sportsman of being “greedy”.
Norbert Lieder, managing director of Inverlochy Castle Management International, which is running the hotel on behalf of Murray said: “As part of our soft launch Cromlix has welcomed over 100 guests to experience the hotel and facilities and give us their feedback.
“We are delighted that many of these guests enjoyed their experience and chose to leave a review on TripAdvisor.”
