Hotel’s other guests hit by security chaos

THE luxury hotel where Meghan and her mother stayed the night before the wedding has awarded compensation to other guests for disruption caused by its round-the-clock security.

The bride and her mother Doria Ragland rented a wing at five-star Cliveden House Hotel in Berkshire.

But other guests at the property, made famous by the Profumo scandal of the 1960s, said they were given no warning they would be banned from parts of the hotel during their stay.

The guests, some of whom paid more than £700 a night, were given a note on arrival which said access to the grounds would be restricted on Friday and Saturday.

However, they were not warned about the police patrolling the grounds of the Grade I-listed stately home and questioning guests in their cars when they arrived.

Members of staff were not told about their high-profile guests until last Wednesday, giving them little time to prepare.

A Canadian woman, who had booked a suite with her husband and two children at a cost of £750 a night, said it took almost half an hour for her family to drive from the gates to the hotel’s car park because police questioned them so thoroughly.

‘It was crazy, I was so angry,’ she said. ‘ We had to show them ID, then they would call ahead and wave us through, only for us to be stopped again by another group of police.

‘There were sniffer dogs and hundreds of cops all over the grounds, checking every last detail. We had just flown in so were exhausted and jet-lagged and just needed to get to our rooms. It was brutal.’

The hotel notice said: ‘Access to the main drive in front of the house is completely restricted between 10.30am11.30am on Saturday.’ But the woman said: ‘I was out here at 6am with jetlag and the cops said, “This is on lockdown, you can’t be out here any more.” I couldn’t believe it.’

She said that after complaining to the duty manager she was offered ‘very fair, very generous compensation’ and that ‘the everyday staff including managers have been wonderful’. A Londoner who paid more than £1,600 for a weekend stay with his partner was also seeking compensation. ‘We were completely restricted and we should have been alerted beforehand,’ he said.

Cliveden House Hotel has been contacted for comment.