As a part of my job I have to travel a regularly around Europe and stay manly in budget 3-4 star hotels. I am certainly not picky and always bear in mind the price of a hotel room before judging it. However, I do have to say that the Mercure Budapest Duna, is one of the worst places I have ever been. The room and the service you get would legitimate a price of EUR 60,- at max, even in Budapest.

Let me start at the reception: All three concierges I have met were exceptionally unfriendly and snotty especially taking into account the class of the hotel. At the arrival I was asked for a deposit that was actually higher than the total price. They were unable to handle both my Visa and my MasterCard so I had to get the money from the next bank (where both cards worked fine) to make the deposit in forint.
At the fourth of my 5 nights stay I asked to pay the bill in advance as I would be leaving at 5:00 in the morning. This was rejected and I was told that at them moment only today’s checkouts would be handled. When I asked when it would be possible to pay the bill, the concierge told me to come back in two hours, even though there where no other guests waiting at the counter.

The Room: The size and furniture of the room was all right, though the tub as well as the toilet was cracked and the color was flaking of the washstand. The real problem was the carpeting that obviously had not been cleaned or even vacuumed for quite a while. Every day I asked for the carpet do be vacuumed but nothing happened.

Location: I do not agree that the Hotel is located in a "slum", though there are many homeless people sleeping around the hotel (as in every quite corner of Budapest). Still, the Hotel is not actually close to the center (as are many other hotels in that price range like the Carlton) and the river view features a rather ugly concrete bridge and some tram stations.

Breakfast: The quality of the food is not bad, but I have had a wider choice in ALL three-star-places I have been before.

Summing up my recommendation is STAY AWAY!
There are better places (maybe only better places) to stay in Budapest at a lower price.

Mercure Duna is a Very Nice Hotel, it is a Budget 3 stars Hotel, Very Clean, very good Breakfast Buffet which has it all.
Very helpful staff, and the location is fine , regarding that the main Tram station is just in the front of the Hotel. Taxi's ar easy to get.
The area are full of restaurants, and it is a nice shopping area.
One should not expect too much from a budget 3*** Hotel, you really get what you pay for , I paid 65 EUR for Single room , BB which I consider to be of a good Value after all.

Myself and my friends stayed here for a stag night and I have to agree with the other reviewer that it was perfect for that purpose.

The lobby area is large with plenty of seating for those beers before hitting the town.

The hotel is clean and despite my expectation is quite modern and in a good location near the river (easy to stumble home to).

What really impressed me was the Staff's patience. We were not the most rowdy bunch but one of our Member did get a bit sick all over his room. The management could have taken us all to task over this but they were quite discreet and merely asked for a contribution towards the cleaning costs which was quite reasonable.

In our travels to Europe, this was the second time a hotel cancelled or 'lost' our reservation that we had made weeks and weeks ahead of time. We were to spend our last night in Budapest at this hotel. When we arrived to check in the Manager was waiting for us to tell us my credit card had not gone through soooo many weeks ago and that he had been unable to contact our travel agent, so he let our reservation go. However, he insinuated he would be kind to us... and told us there was a room at a sister hotel, the Mercure Budapest Museum. He called while we were there, confirming they were standing by for us. Then he called us a cab. We had to pay for that. He was overall, very abrupt and unprofessional. He was not interested in the fact we had proof of confirmation that said 'paid in advance' and assured us that nothing had been booked because nothing could be put on my credit card! (Interesting since just that morning I had used my credit card to check out of another hotel!)
So, off we went to another hotel, where we were at least welcome!

M & S in Surrey, BC., Canada