Picturehouse Cinemas Reviews 108

I am being spammed by Picturehouse. I have tried to unsubscribe on several occasions but without success. I go through the process but it always comes back incorrectly claiming I have multiple accounts under a single email address which, of course, is not possible under a well written web site.
They are driving me bananas.

I'd give the front of house staff 4-5 stars, but membership and tickets are expensive compared to other cinemas locally, also their customer services run limited hours or simply don't answer the phone. I've been a member for quite a few years, but probably won't renew next year. Their prices are getting a little ahead of themselves for outside London.

Great cinemas and a nice comfortable place to go see a film. Expensive and no fancy screens, however its always quiet and so inviting its like being in your own living room.

Bromley Picturehouse is a beautifully restored 1930's art deco 6 screen cinema. A lovely spacious feel, pleasant, helpful and polite staff. Very clean generally and spotless toilets. An airy, stylish large cafe at the back is underused and very quiet. They now are offering toasties etc in addition to main meals. We eat there whenever we go, even if not seeing a film. Having this lovely amenity in Bromley has been especially important to me as I continue to shield due to medical treatment. No crowds and a clean spacious environment. Interesting films and niche attractions such as a Japanese film series at present. Definitely not a cinema for those who want to eat, slurp and rustle all through a film while lying stretched out on a recliner. Can't understand why it is currently underused. So pleased it's my local cinema.

On the 1 November I fell down a few steps due to no strip lights. I thought at the back of the cinema it was level and was unaware there was a small stair. Next minute I was on my back and felt a twinge in my foot and it swelled up that night and was very uncomfortable next day. Nothing has been broken but it could have been much worse due to my age.

I complained to Picturehouse and received this reply.

We can confirm that the step lights at the back of the screen were off due to a technical fault which has since been identified and rectified. Our sincerest apologies from the cinema team for not noticing this sooner, and we thank you for bringing this to our attention, and are glad that you were not too seriously hurt.

I am a Member and have supported them since they opened and as a goodwill gesture they have only offered me 1 free ticket and a short extension to my Membership. A lot of my friends want me to take legal action as their offer is insulting. I have taken legal advice and I am entitled to compensation but I appreciate cinemas have suffered in the pandemic and this course of action is the last resort.

It saddens me as Picturehouse in Bromley has a lot of potential but they don't seem to promote it or appreciate their Members

What a pleasant change to watch a film where half the audience didnt think they were in a restauranium. No 2 foot long hot dogs, no 2 kilo popcorn and no 2 litres of Pepsi
Just a film to watch without the munching and slurping.
Excellent I'll be back

The old Fulham road Cineworld was a bit scruffy and outdated, so Picturehouse have a done a good job refurbishing the theatre.

Staff are disorganised and need retraining in customer service.
After the movie, our group ordered some food in the upstairs bar and sat down in one of the big, comfortable booths. Half an hour later our food hadn't arrived. We were all having some good laughs together so hadn't noticed how much time had passed. One of my friends went to the bar again to enquire after our order. About 15 minutes later a waiter arrived with out cutlery, and little while after that, brought over our meals.
No apology or explanation was given for the delay. Complete failure in common courtesy never mind providing a good service experience.

We took it in stride and didn't kick up a fuss as we all live round the corner and didn't have any where to be for the rest of the day. That said, I expect most people would be pretty upset.

The Gate Picturehouse in Notting Hill is a beautiful old cinema and deserves to be valued. Unfortunately, Picturehouse run it.
They choose bad movies, as it turns out, but that is not my concern here.
Picturehouse are a Tesco Clubcard 'partner'. That means that when you collect points, you can use them to go to the cinema. Great, right? Well, not so great. A very expensive mistake as it turned out.
I did manage to pay for my tickets using clubcard vouchers online. I had saved a lot over years and decided to have a little freebie treat with my family.
Unfortunately I was delayed, so my family members tried to get snacks using the vouchers i gave them- £51 worth. Picturehouse told them it was worth one popcorn. Unaware of how it worked they accepted this one popcorn. Then, on the phone on route, I told them it was worth much more than one popcorn, and they tried to use it again. Of course it was void because that is how they work- it must be used in one transaction. They had to pay for the drinks and snacks because they were already in glasses/cartons. It came to £46.
I was furious, but the movie had started and I could do nothing. I tried to take it up with Tesco Clubcard next day. Tesco Clubcard informed me that we had used the voucher in one transaction, so it was void, end of story.
They acted like this was our mistake. It was deliberate on the part of the Gate staff who clearly did not want to part with snacks for any sort of discount.
They deliberately did not give us itemised receipts which Tesco also used against us somehow.
I am disguted with them, and with Tesco for backing them up on it.
I won't go back. I am also changing where I shop. My £170 per week family shop no longer goes to Tesco.

A lovely little cinema very friendly staff a nice clean refurbishment very decently priced very very clean superb a little gem of a place we must keep in Cannock
Well done to all the staff visited tonight wonderful evening
Will definitely visit again 👍👍

terrible experience trying to order tickets for a wolf alice film. code didn’t work.

My wife & I recently took our daughter (age 17) to the Picture House Bromley to see a film rated 15. For some unfathomable reason, the person checking our tickets demanded that my daughter show proof of age – she helpfully added “have you got your passport?”. Well – duh – No we hadn’t brought our passports. We thought we were in England, but it seems it’s all a bit “State Security” at the Picture House. Give some people a little power and they feel they have to wield it. We asked to see the manager and, of course, he would only support his colleague: effectively “Very sorry but get lost”. I could understand their stance if my daughter looked a young 17 but she doesn’t. Any “normal” person looking at her would say of course she’s over 15 … but not at the Picture House. It was extremely embarrassing for us to be put in this position – effectively my wife and I being called liars in front of my daughter. I’m not quite sure how this would have ended since I was not in a mood to give in … but fortunately, after about 5 minutes of searching though pictures on our phones, we found an old photo of my daughter’s passport which confirmed her age. The morals of the story: when you want to go to this cinema the border guards may need to see your passport so make sure you carry it at all times, that common sense and reasonableness are in short supply so don’t rely on them and - well, given the circumstances with the cinema closing this is maybe a moot point but: I will never be going back!

Fulham road renovation was a ‘cut and paste’ job of fake Art Deco brass decoration.
A new layout of food area... same cafe and ‘private members’ areas... dingy and as before.
Bathrooms no different.
Seats different but I had to put my feet on seat in front to keep my recline.
ALL FOR DOUBLE THE PRICE TICKETS!!!
It was better before when nothing different and tickets were £9

I don’t normally write reviews but I was gobsmacked at this joke of a renovation.

Terrible service, booking system was down - money got charged and no automatic refund offered. Not contactable through email and only one number functioning. Really ruined my mood.

Had two different issues and both times nobody answered my emails nor replied on twitter. It's like they are straight up ignoring their customers. Cinemas are nice, but customer service needs a major improvement.

Had an awful experience in the Ritzy. Staff were rude, unhelpful and dismissive despite having severely fallen short on their standards of service. Told to contact customer service who haven't even sent a confirmation they have received my complaint despite it being over a week. Reached out on twitter and also had no response. Poor service and won't be using picture house again despite previously being a member.

Non existent telephone customer service. No one answers the phone. The ladies (The only people I’ve dealt with below the assistant manager) are rude and the customer service assistant manager (male with initial S) is useless! He doesn’t care about long standing members at all! Not one bit! The customer service here really does ruin the picturehouse experience. I’ve been a member for six years and I think I won’t renew because the customer service has been horrendous over the past year!

I tried to look for an alternative cinema to watch a film. My local is in Clapham but their booking site made me feel unsafe and deceived by them. I went through the process of having to create a membership in order to book tickets. However they also provide paid memberships which is not what I was looking for. I was looking to book some tickets and obviously this involves creating an online account for advance tickets. However it seems that they have tried to hook me into a membership and the language on their site is very vague and unclear about what I have signed up to when I was only trying to buy tickets. In light of the quite vague and opaque process - the alarm bells started ringing about this organisation and the email I got back from them after creating an account started referencing that I had a membership. It was unclear exactly what they meant and how it all works. Additionally the process of membership involves email preferences for communication and I deliberately set these to not receive regular emails or marketing but when I signed in I could see that they have defaulted the preferences to receive what I consider to be spam emails. For these reasons I have now been inconvenienced and distressed to craft an email in order to get them to cease and cancel any account they have made for me and cancel any membership - they allow only 15 days for this and I am concerned that since clause 4 asks for a membership number which they haven't provided and clause 5 allows 15 days to cancel and clause 5.2 is potentially vague in that they will try to frustrate the cancellation process by making you request a cancellation template form.

Very unhappy with the experience and the poor language and clarity of their site has deeply unsettled me. The experience has made me feel that you just can't trust any of these Indies these days as they seem quite unscrupulous in the way they have in my impression and experience sought to deceive me.

I like Picturehouses and visit the Brighton ones, they are good cinemas with a slightly better range of films than the commercial chains here. I do wish though that the website had not been changed. Now impossible to use and book and l have given up trying - please put the old website back or create a website that actually works!

Recently renewed my Picturehouse Plus card - £78 for 8 “free” tickets. For the second time they ran out of 2 free whiskeys blaming the supplier and then yesterday tried to charge £31 for 2 tickets to see Matthew Bourne’s Romeo & Juliet saying that the “free” tickets couldn’t be used for special screenings but assuring me that our membership got us a discount of £5 on the ticket price. In fact the normal price for retired folk for this screening in other venues is £15!

Needless to say I won’t be renewing my membership!!