Shah's Village Hotel Petaling Jaya - Reviews - Petaling Jaya

My friends and I stayed in the Shah Village Hotel in Jun 08 and was doubled charged via credit card payment by the receptionist upon checking in and on the upon checking out. When challenged, the staff claimed that the charge during checking in serves as a deposit and they would cancel the claim. However when I received my credit card bills later, they never reimbursed this deposit. I have called the hotel and brought up this matter to their staff. Till date, I have yet to receive the deposit. The staff are not helpful in helping to resolve the matter at all. It's a place to cheat tourists from other countries of their money. Do not go!!!!!

Shah's Village Hotel is exactly as it is described on its website - it does have unique charm and character.
It is also surrounded by palm trees which makes the whole place feel like a beach resort rather than a hotel in the city. You may even miss the entrance as its hidden by the trees.
I hadn't taken a look at the hotel on a whole as what was more important to me was the room in which I stayed at. But I can tell you that, from the pictures displayed on the hotel's website, the lobby does look a little larger than it really is. But it is cosy and quite cool.
A lot of the upholstery (inluding the carpeting on the spiral staircase) is covered in red rich fabric. And as the hotel is only three floors high, you will not find an elevator in sight, though I hadn't actually explored the place or asked around to see if there was one. So it may not be senior citizen friendly.
The hotel does have a lot of character though. I am still struck by how quiet it was, even with a bunch of boisterous children staying there, I couldn't really hear them make any noise.

The rooms
I can only comment on the deluxe room that I stayed in, which was only because I requested for an early check-in and all the standard rooms were booked out.
I don't believe that the hotel has rooms for smokers and non-smokers because they did not ask me what my choice was, and they obviously put me in a smoking room as I found cigarette burns and stains on some of the aging furniture (mainly the side bench, coffee table and dresser). That did turn me off the first hour I was there, but I got used to it after that.
The room could have used a bit of airing out as the muskiness of a typical airconditioned room which has not been kissed by fresh air, hit me the instant I opened my room door with the traditional key in a keyhole technique.
The bright, bold colours of the bedspreads and furniture that you will see in the photos of the rooms on the website, are no longer in all the rooms. My room had your typical beige bedspread with white covers and pillow cases. While the sofa was in a lacklustre navy blue. The dresser, coffee table and side bench look like they had seen better days. What looked like the colour beige is faded and could use a lick of paint. If you want to stay in to watch a little telly, you may want to reconsider as the choice of tv channels is severely limited to the 5 local channels plus one movie channel and a BBC news channel.
I was too tired to enjoy the balcony. It overlooked the swimming pool, which was surrounded by palm trees. Very seaside-resort like, and quiet.

The attached bathroom
That was the highlight of my stay. It wasn't a grand, large bathroom with a bathtub. But it was practically spotless, covered in white tiles. It was clean, dry and came with the basic complementary shower gel, shampoo, bars of soap in the shower and next to the toilet as well as shower caps. Sadly, the hot water tap for the washbasin didn't provide hot water, and you have to know how to turn both the hot and cold water taps in the shower to regulate the water temperature, lest you scald yourself! but I was quite happy that there was hot water and that the bathroom was clean - very important to me!

Staying at Shah's Village Hotel may be worth the RM188nett (including breakfast) I paid for the deluxe room, since I needed my rest, and you do feel like you were in some small town not too far from the city. Another plus is its location. It's about 100-200m from the LRT train station, making it easy to travel to Kuala Lumpur and back.
A two-minute walk out to the main street will take you to the AmCorp mall, which is popular for its weekend flea markets.
A 5 minute walk in the opposite direction will take you to a business district, and just around corner, before you take the pedestrian bridge across to the banks and diners serving local Chinese, Malay and Indian food, there is a post office.
Just next door to the hotel, is Kelab (Club) Syabas. Inside is hidden two clubs, DV8 and Waikiki - with its Hawaiian theme decor. These are the only known clubs to open as late as 5am on the weekends, probably because they're hidden and the sound of booming music cannot be heard unless you made your way in.

If you like old traditional charm in a hotel, then check out Shah's Village Hotel. It's definitely different from neighboring Hilton and just further down, Armada. Prices start at RM155nett per room per night.