We visited with friends who had given us gift vouchers for afternoon tea. We phoned ahead on route as there were some delays on the motorway and we were coming from some distance. We were firstly surprised to be told that the hotel didn't recognize our booking. We assured them on the phone that we did have a booking for afternoon tea and that we would be arriving shortly. When we got there, the receptionist was still insisting that we had no booking and immediately blamed us for not following the correct booking procedure using the vouchers. She said that we had incorrectly made the booking with the voucher company and not directly with the hotel. Fortunately, we had brought evidence of emails with the hotel where they had indeed confirmed the booking and had even contacted us to ask for dietary requirements. This eventually seemed to spur her on to investigate further, which she had had plenty of time to do prior to our arrival. Eventually, the restaurant manager confirmed that yes, we had a booking and that it was the fault of the hotel for not transferring the booking over to the restaurant diary. No apology from the receptionist. After a short wait in the hotel bar, we were shown to our table. We had a pretty window table and the room was very attractive and comfortable. The restaurant staff were also very pleasant. The afternoon tea itself was disappointing. We had ordered one vegetarian afternoon tea, but when the food was brought to the table, there didn't appear to be a separate vegetarian portion. We told the waiter that we were still waiting on the vegetarian portion we had booked but it turned out that the vegetarian sandwiches were among the non-vegetarian sandwiches on the one plate. As a vegetarian, this is completely unacceptable, but having had the wait and fuss of actually getting our table in the first place, we decided to stay quiet and press on. I decided to just pick off the tuna from the side of my "vegetarian" sandwiches and eat the other side of the sandwich instead. The fillings themselves were unremarkable and generally quite tasteless. The scones were good, though there was no butter supplied and the cream was definitely NOT clotted, which is always a disappointment. The cakes were also very good, particularly the strawberry tarts. Unfortunately, 2 of our party opted for coffee instead of tea. Despite being served in a cafetiere, it was quite bitter. We asked for pouring cream to disguise the taste, but they only had double cream, so we went with that. Having been seated right at the end of service, the room started emptying pretty quickly and the staff began setting up the tables for what I presume was dinner or breakfast, so we finished up and didn't linger. All in all, a rather disappointing afternoon, having made the journey from Helensburgh especially. There are many better quality and cheaper alternatives for afternoon tea much closer to home, so I definitely wouldn't recommend this for a special day out, and certainly not one for those thinking of travelling any distance. In particular, I would suggest that the hotel itself provides better training on customer service skills for their front of house staff, namely reception. Defaulting to blaming the customer for what was evidently a fault on the part of the hotel, without proper investigation, was lazy and very unprofessional and set an unfortunate tone for the rest of the afternoon. An apology at least from the receptionist on the day would have been appreciated, as would a more proactive approach to investigating the error in the first place. Much kudos to the restaurant manager however for dealing with the issue professionally, being polite and courteous and finding us a table at very short notice, given that our booking had not been processed correctly in the first place.

We held a Naming Day ceremony and Afternoon Tea for 70 guests on Sunday.
From booking right through to the end of the event the staff were amazing. Susan the events planner guided us through the organisation giving guidance and help where required and was really helpful.
The staff were very helpful and attentive on the day.
The food was really good and both the ceremony room and the room we had afternoon tea in looked really special.
I would definitely recommend having an event here. We would book again.

I was given a voucher for afternoon tea at this hotel. I'm sorry to say, it was awful. I am gluten free, I was given two ham sandwiches, not even cut nicely. The cakes were all from Tesco, I know, I've tried most of them. There was only English breakfast and herbal teas available - boring!
The standard afternoon tea had by my companion was slightly better but not much. At least she had a selection of sandwiches!
The whole experience was so disappointing we left after 20 minutes and went somewhere else.