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ScoyleyA
66
New Experience in a beautiful resort
4.0 of 5 bubblesReviewed Feb 11, 2018
We visited Club Med Samoens on 7 Jan and while we were expecting a few teething problems being a brand new resort, we were pleasantly surprised and had a wonderful week. We travelled from Australia with with 2 families, with 5 kids ranging from 10 mths to 14 years, with kids never having skiied before. The Resort links in with 5 other ski domains to give you a huge amount of choice for fantastic skiing. The ESF instructors were excellent and despite the early challenge of trying to determine the right ski level for everyone, they are flexible and attentive to everyones needs.

As described in many other posts, the lifts are a problem (and would be for those who have very young children in prams, etc). Our family simply used the stairs and didn't bother with the lifts at peak times. We also had a room on F-floor which was convenient to the Ski room and mini clubs. The ski room was very busy on arrival day but that's to be expected in a large resort. Pre-register your information for boots/ski's sizes online and they will be waiting for you in your locker.
The rooms were beautifully decorated and very comfortable (bed was very firm so we simply requested a mattress topper which was provided). Bathrooms were very nice and loads of storage.
The main restaurant is also busy but being a party of 9, we didn't have too much trouble finding tables large enough. So many food choices with beautiful fresh ingredients. Suggest some small labels to advise what dishes are.
The Skyline Restaurant is fantastic, spacious and welcoming with fantastic food/cocktails. Highly recommend for later breakfast, and lunch. A smaller selection than the main restaurant but less hectic and never seemed full at these times.
The reservation process for dinner is tiresome though. Who wants to stand in a line for 30 minutes at 5pm after a long day of skiing to be that last person who just missed out on a table and to be told 'try again tomorrow'. There are better ways of managing this booking system.
The pool, hammam, sauna are great but the outdoor jacuzzi is way too small (and cold) for a resort this size.
The staff are amazing, always friendly and smiling even after a very long day. Our kids loved the nightly shows, and the GO's go above and beyond to make the kids feel welcome.
I read with interest that people complain about the size of the resort and the amount of people at the restaurant. Yes, its big. Yes, it's busy. That's what Club Med is. If you want the boutique, quiet experience and to avoid the crowds, book a small chalet down the road. But surely by booking this type of holiday you should expect a lot of people (and lots of children!) who are there because they want to learn to ski and then be able to enjoy all the facilities that the resort has to offer.
Our family certainly did and came home with wonderful experiences and memories. And while we probably won't go back to Samoens purely because of the distance, we would certainly consider another Club Med ski holiday in the future.
Date of stay: January 2018
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    320 - 325 of 2,994 reviews
    Reviewed February 11, 2018 via mobile

    The Club is brand new and looks amazing but has a few problems. The way they designed the building makes very difficult to go from one place to another specially if you are staying in the A or B floors. Is a feeling that you are staying at the staff accommodation area. As old clients of the Club Med I expected to have my rooms allocated much better. In order to go from my room to the ski room or the dinning room I needed to take 3 different elevators. The elevators are really small for the amount of people the club holds so sometimes it would take 10 minutes to get to the dinning room.
    The reception manager tried to help us but the option we got 2 days after we arrived would save us one elevator and still have yo take 2. Do we decided to stay with our rooms.
    One afternoon I decided to relax and booked 2 treatments at the Spa. One after the other. As soon as the first one started a big noise of a motor sounded right outside the massage room. The Club staff was cleaning the area from the snow and although I complained many times during both treatments nothing was done. The noise was so strong that I didn't get to relax and enjoy the massage. I spoke to the spa manager and also to other managers at the club and nothing was done. I paid 200 euro including tips for the staff (as they were no to blame) and it was a waist of money and time...

    For a club of that level I expected something different. At least discount one of the treatments.

    The entertainment was great. Arturo de Artistic Manager is great and did an excellent job all week. The best shows I've seen in the clubs I've been.

    I would like to say some good words to Mr. Cleidson Reís that took care of a problem we had with the cleaning of the room and was very attentive to us.

    Also the reception staff, Tiphany, Luiza and Pauline.

    At the kids club a big thanks to Alon. He is amazing with the kids.

    In general is a great place but is a shame that there is no attention to some important details.

    Date of stay: February 2018
    Trip type: Traveled with family
    3  Thank ilanaweissman
    This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
    Club Med Ψ, Guest Relations Manager at Club Med Grand Massif Samoens Morillon, responded to this reviewResponded February 11, 2018

    Dear Ilana Weissman E,

    Thank you for your very detailed review. We appreciate you providing us with your comments, as they help us understand exactly what the problems are and what needs to be improved. We are very happy you enjoyed the staff hard work, and the activities proposed to you. We hope to see you soon again at Club Med

    Yours sincerely,

    Report response as inappropriate
    This response is the subjective opinion of the management representative and not of TripAdvisor LLC.
    Reviewed February 6, 2018 via mobile

    We tried out Club Med Grand Massif with a group of adults for a skiing week.
    Our stay was indeed quite disappointing. However, to start with the positive: the hotel complex is brand new, the rooms are quite nice, reception and the service employees were very friendly and service oriented, the spa was a quiet and nice place, the food was ok with an
    adequate variety and the skiing resort is indeed fantastic. But that‘s it. The big disappointment was caused by the fact that the hotel complex is huge with a material planning flaw and far too many guests to provide a relaxing atmosphere, that I was hoping to finde. The worst problem were the elevators. There are clearly far too few elevators for the number of guests and the elevators are definitively too small to cope with the logistical needs (in particular in an hotel with families with strollers etc) of such a big hotel. What made the problem even worse was the fact that during our entire stay some elevators were out of order. Thus, the time for getting from the rooms to the restaurants or to the ski locker room were unacceptably long. In many parts of the hotel the guests even need to change elevators to get to the restaurant, the spa, the ski locker room or to the garage. So one was exposed twice to long waiting times. At meal peak times (or after any animation events in the main social area on floor H) several elevators would pass by fully packed and let us (and many others) wait long times (>15 min from our room to restaurants, bar or ski room). Very, very annoying. The situation was worsened because the room service personnel used the (few available) elevators also for their logistics - even at peak times. Is was barely possible to enter the elevator when the room cleaners occupied the elevators with their carriages.
    Another important point: one has to accept (and this was a surprise for me at least), that the hotel is rather a huge hotel for families with young and youngest kids and their entertainment than a place that is ideal for adults seeking nice and relaxed atmosphere. There were literally hundreds of kids around (which by itself is of course no problem) and the whole atmosphere especially around meals, any kind of events in the afternoons and in the pool area was not the one adults would hope to find in a four star hotel in a winter sport resort.
    The main restaurant is a huge hall encompassing all the hectic of so many people dining - more or less - at the same time. Only after 9 pm it got more quiet. At peak times there were waiting queues at almost every food station. Also, due to the large amount of tables the (yes, always very friendly and hard working!) service personell had difficulties clearing the tables in due time - leaving a partially messy visual impression of a shopping mall food court.
    The restaurant on the top level M was nicer (seated meals in the evening) but generally guests are only once a week allowed to dine there.
    The last disappointment was the check out where (besides the already described chaos with the elevators caused by large numbers of departing guests with lots of luggage, strollers and skiing equipment) we had to find out that (of course inadvertently) several debits on the individual bills were wrongly charged (of course immediately corrected, but still annoying). This should not happen.
    For me it was the first Club Med experience and I would hesitate to try Cub Med again because I am seeking a different place with a more relaxed atmosphere for my skiing vacation, at least at the price level of this institution. There are other club concepts more appealing to me. The most important duty of the management is to find a solution to the elevator chaos.
    Thanks anyway to the Club Med Team, you were great: friendly and always trying to do your best! And chapeau for facing these challenges every day......

    Date of stay: February 2018
    Trip type: Traveled with friends
    8  Thank KlausG678
    This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
    Club Med Ψ, Guest Relations Manager at Club Med Grand Massif Samoens Morillon, responded to this reviewResponded February 8, 2018

    Dear Klaus G,

    We are sorry to hear you did not fully enjoyed your vacations at Club Med. We are happy you appreciated the hard work of our amazing GO team, which, as you said, is trying its best to make the customers spend a great time at the resort.
    We hope this will not prevent you to return to a different resort, do not hesitate to contact us if you need advice on the destination, depending on your needs and requirements, we are here for you.

    Have a lovely day,

    Yours sincerely,

    Report response as inappropriate
    This response is the subjective opinion of the management representative and not of TripAdvisor LLC.
    Reviewed February 6, 2018

    We are a group of experienced (male) skiiers who have been skiing together for 20+ years. The new Club at Samoens in many respects is ideal for us. A great location - Flaine, next door can be horribly overcrowded and the resort lacks charm - but the local skiing among the trees in Samoens, Morillon and Les Carroz is excellent, particularly in fresh snow, and is rarely overcrowded.

    We were lucky to have a brilliant ESF instructor (Adrien) who speaks good English who knows how to combine just the right amount of advice on ski technique with a great sense of humour. 5 stars to Adrien! The Club itself is brand new, the rooms are spacious and have a lot more than average amounts of storage space. The food is, as ever, excellent and the staff invariably helpful, courteous and friendly...

    There are some BUTs.... This is partly to do with the logistics of getting around the building. The rooms, bar, restaurants, pool etc are spread across two blocks and eleven floors and at busy times this can involve long waits for lifts, which seem too small to cope with peak load. For some completely quirky French reason there are no "up" and "down" buttons to summon the lift, so there are frequent wasted stops. Grrr..

    The final gripe, and it is a serious one, is one that we hope would be eradicated very quickly. In the last 2 days of our stay at the club (28 Jan - 4 Feb 2018) and on the journey home, 7 members of our party of 12 went down with a Norovirus-like diarrhoea and vomiting bug. Without going into graphic details, there was clear evidence that other guests were similarly stricken. One wonders whether cruise ship style hand sanitation and other measures are needed in a hotel with 1000+ guests and 300 staff? Obviously, this wasn't pleasant for those who got the bug, and I haven't downrated my review as a result. Call it bad luck, I suppose.

    Date of stay: January 2018
    • Trip type: Traveled with friends
      • Location
      • Sleep Quality
      • Service
    6  Thank Grey H
    This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
    Club Med Ψ, Guest Relations Manager at Club Med Grand Massif Samoens Morillon, responded to this reviewResponded February 8, 2018

    Dear Grey H,

    We are sorry you did not fully enjoy your holidays, because of the illness you contracted on the last day.
    We are however pleased to hear you enjoyed the resort and the ski instructor, which are important parts of the holidays obviously.

    We hope to welcome you soon again,

    Yours sincerely,

    Report response as inappropriate
    This response is the subjective opinion of the management representative and not of TripAdvisor LLC.
    Reviewed February 6, 2018

    Everything is relevant to cost and I would not have a problem with anything I'm about to mention if this was a £4,000 holiday, however it cost more than double this price so we would have expected something a lot better.
    This was our 6th Club Med Ski holiday so we were aware of the standards and the quality of service which Club Med would usually provide.
    Having heard excellent reviews about this ski resort we were delighted when we found Club Med had opened a brand new 4 trident hotel, we couldn't wait to book.
    We arrived on New Years Eve staying until the 7th January and this experience has deterred us from staying with Club Med again.
    Our disappointment began in the airport with the Club Med rep who greeted us to arrange the transfer, there seemed to be no organisation and it was utter chaos. After giving our name and the resort, she moved onto the next family and instead of putting us into relevant groups and taking note it appeared as though she was trying (and failing) to memorise everything and getting confused as to who was going where. Sheer incompetence and lack of communication led to people getting inpatient and wandering off to find refreshments, in all we were waiting over an hour whilst the rep had to go and find the passengers again. What made it more frustrating was that the driver had been there all the time and was waiting to take us.
    When the rep had eventually got us all to the transfer bus, (three families in total) we were shocked to see that it was only an 8 seater minibus, it was so cramped and it was full to capacity with no where near enough luggage space, bearing in mind there were skis as well as cases, it meant that some of us had to have heavy luggage on our laps for the 1 hour transfer from the airport to the resort.
    Upon arrival at Club Med the GO's were out in force to welcome us and tag our luggage. Our spirits were lifted and as we disembarked everyone was excited. We made sure all our bags were removed from the mini bus and despite the GO's telling us to go inside and leave our bags in their care, I stayed present to ensure our bags were tagged correctly. We were told that our bags would be taken directly to our room and skis to our allocated locker.
    Disappointingly, at 1pm our room wasn't ready for another 4 hours, so we had lunch and then sat in the spacious reception area to kill time and wait until the ski hire centre opened, where we needed to go for our sons boots and skis.
    By the time we had got our son kitted out, three hours had passed since our arrival so we had expected to find our own skis in our allocated locker. However, we discovered that our skis were not there. After enquiring with multiple members of staff in the locker room and ultimately with reception making several phone calls, it came to light that the bus driver had taken the Skis back to the airport. How on earth could this have happened when they were tagged? We then had to arrange for them to be brought back to the resort.
    The hotel itself is as expected, brand new, tastefully decorated and very big, located on the hillside with numerous different floors and levels. Our room was located near the bottom on Level F, with very dark zig zag corridors from our room to get the lift upto Level H where reception is located. We then had to walk to a separate lift which takes you up to the relevant floors for Ski Lockers, Mini Club, and the restaurants. It literally is like a maze, and god help yo if you forgot something in your room, it'd take you a further 15 minutes to get there and back again, and twenty minutes if you decided to wait for a lift, they were SO slow, and always very busy, it was soul destroying, much quicker to use the stairs.
    Although the reception area was light and airy with plenty of seating the rest of the hotel seemed cramped and was so busy, I would compare it to a busy railway station;people having to side step each other trying to get to their location, never making eye contact and rarely seeing the same face twice.
    In comparison to other Club Med resorts this place had no soul or atmosphere and absolutely no alpine feel whatsoever.
    The staff were always polite and helpful and the food was of the usual Club Med high standard, buffet style with a wide variety to suit all tastes. However, mealtimes were so busy and hectic you constantly had to side step and remember to turn round slowly with your food, in order not to bang into anyone and knock plates out of hands!
    What we did find disappointing was unlike any other Club Med locations we couldn't order any soft drinks with our meal, the choice was beer, wine or water, thats all. Even the Orange Juice machine was switched off other than at breakfast time.
    All of the above I could normally tolerate, however, the final straw for us and the incident which has spurred me on to write this negative review is the cigarette smoke constantly blowing through the three air-conditioning vents and into our bedroom, bathroom and toilet. We found it was worse during the evening, and after a full day skiing when all we wanted to do was come back to our room and relax, being confronted by a smoky room was horrendous, especially being non smokers.
    We rang reception to complain and they sent a security guy to our room, possibly thinking it was coming from someone smoking in an adjacent room. However, he agreed it was coming from the ventilation system and alarmingly there was no way of telling where the source was.
    We spoke to Benjamin on reception and asked to be moved rooms, after a hours wait and further calls to him he advised that there were no other rooms available so we then asked for tape so that we could tape over the vents ourselves, they couldn't assist with this either. We ended up sleeping with the balcony door wedged open just to get some fresh air into the room, obviously it was freezing cold so we all slept together in the same bed in order to keep warm.
    At no point since we complained did the hotel manager attempt to get in touch with us.
    We advised that we would be taking the matter further, having paid £8,200 for a family of three, we expected far better service, there was even no one on duty to assist with our bags upon departure, and we were told we would have to make several trips down the lengthy corridors and carry our own luggage from our room to reception.
    We work hard to pay for our holidays, but this wasn't a holiday it was a nightmare where we literally couldn't wait to return home.

    Date of stay: January 2018
    • Trip type: Traveled with family
      • Location
      • Cleanliness
      • Service
    6  Thank ElizabethL3681
    This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
    Club Med Ψ, Guest Relations Manager at Club Med Grand Massif Samoens Morillon, responded to this reviewResponded February 8, 2018

    Dear Elizabeth L,

    We are sorry to hear you did not live the holidays you were dreaming of. We apologise for all the issues you had to face, and kindly invite you to contact us at customer.uk@clubmed.com, to discuss your issues directly with our customer relations team. We will be happy to assist you, and find a satisfying solution for you.

    Have a great day,

    Yours sincerely

    Report response as inappropriate
    This response is the subjective opinion of the management representative and not of TripAdvisor LLC.
    Reviewed February 5, 2018

    I never thought I would write a negative complaint about Club Med since this was our 6th trip with Club Med but here it is. We have booked two rooms in the Samoëns resort and have suffered constantly from a lack of hot water and pressure in both rooms that prevented us from taking shower during half of our stay.

    We complained about it very quickly - a technician came late and concluded he couldn’t do anything and would need to send another technician on the following day. No technician came back and I had to go to the reception to enquire about it - I was surprised the reception desk had no file about it, didn’t seem to follow-up on the issue on their own and didn’t send another technician until the evening because I had to remind it to them multiple times. Once a new technician came, he was still unable to fix the problem and again referred to the need for another technician to look at it on another day. I asked the reception to change our rooms but they said the hotel was full unless we were happy to be downgraded to a single family room which we have obviously refused since we were 5 people...

    Same logic applied on the following days - I wasted hours at the reception on multiple occasions and never received any update. I could only observe that again no technician had been sent yet to fix the issue and there was again no follow-up from the reception desk nor anyone assigned to ensure the issue would be properly managed. Another technician got sent and concluded no fix was possible. I complained another time to the reception and they said they would move us to other similar rooms (we were surprised that these rooms became suddenly available while we were told there were no available rooms on the previous day). While this was a clear disturbance for us to pack and unpack again our clothes to move rooms, we accepted as we needed to get fully functioning bathrooms. After 4 days without being able to shower our baby, our 2 children, my wife and I...

    On the next day, we called the reception to complain about a constant noise coming from the venting system above the bathroom doors in both new rooms. This constant noise was preventing our sleep. Once again, nothing was done and there was no follow-up by the reception. I have complained about that horrible noise a second time but the problem was never fixed and we never got any follow-up about it.

    We have complained about it by email to the customer service - they said they had 28 days to respond to us, the deadline has passed and still no news while I chased them again. I guess they didn't think it was important to respond to a client complaint...

    So I will now raise this with the Small Court Claim to force the Club Med to act and take their responsibilities.

    Date of stay: December 2017
    • Trip type: Traveled with family
      • Sleep Quality
      • Cleanliness
      • Service
    9  Thank Frank B
    This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
    Club Med Ψ, Guest Relations Manager at Club Med Grand Massif Samoens Morillon, responded to this reviewResponded February 8, 2018

    Dear Frank B,

    We are sorry to hear you faced so many difficulties at the resort. Please feel free to send us another email, at customer.uk@clubmed.com, we will for sure assist you and find the best solution for you. We apologise for the long wait and hope we will find a satisfying solution for you.

    Have a lovely day,

    Yours sincerely,

    Report response as inappropriate
    This response is the subjective opinion of the management representative and not of TripAdvisor LLC.
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