My stay at the Nevis Bank Hotel featured a series of problems. First of all, when I arrived at 7pm my room had not been serviced. Staff were quick to remedy this however, this was only the beginning of what turned out to be a lo....ong overnight stay.

The radiator in the room was not working and there was no hot water. I went to the dining room at 8.20 having been told that as long as I was down by 9pm that was fine - the chef was very flexible. The service was extremely slow and other guests' comments were that their experience was similar. The dining room was very cold. Service was so slow - 10 minutes before I was offered a menu to look at and then another 5 minutes before taking my order - that it was 9.20 before I had finished my main course. I was asked if there was anything else I would like but when I asked for dessert was told that they had stopped serving for the evening and the only thing I could get was a coffee or drink from the bar.

I went up to my room and was speaking to my husband on my mobile phone when the fire alarm went off. I went down to reception and it was apparent that staff didn't know the procedures. No attempt appeared to be made to check on guests' safety. When the fire brigade arrived, I heard the lead fireman saying to staff that the alarm had gone off because a break glass had been 'repaired' with sellotape. He said that they had been called out previously and found the break glass in the same unrepaired condition. He would be reporting the hotel and someone would come out to inspect it to make sure proper repairs were made. The fire brigade would have been within their rights to close the hotel down on the spot.

I went back to my room and was in bed reading when the alarm went off again. It stopped but then sounded intermittently for three or four second bursts for 5-10 minutes, which suggests that staff were fiddling with it.

The following morning there was still no sign of heat in the radiator or hot water. I went down to breakfast which was promptly served and was hot. However, I became conscious of a dripping noise and looking around noticed that there was a large cooking pot on the floor which was being used to catch water leaking in from the roof.

I disagree with the comments about staff attitudes to guests with the exception of the slowness of service and response to the fire alarm. I found the staff were friendly and pleasant.

The hotel could do with updating and TLC as another reviewer has mentioned but was clean. The food I had was well cooked. The sad thing is it is possible to see how the hotel could be made really good. All of the rooms and public areas were equipped with flat screen TV but with TV reception so poor (it was only really possible to watch BBC1) it would have been better spending the money on doing things like repairing the break glass for the fire alarm and sorting out the heating.

Although the cost of the hotel is modest, the issues I encountered fell short of even basic standards of service and the issue with the fire alarm was potentially very dangerous.

This hotel really needs to get its priorities right.