Why is it good for business?

Staying in an apartment rather than a hotel can make a lot of sense. It's like owning your own place for a day or two. You have all the freedom of having a kitchen, being able to cook if you want to, making a cup of tea costs nothing, nor does making a piece of toast.

You've got a sitting room as well as a bedroom, and additional features such as a washing machine, which again add nothing to your bill. So Think apartments have got that right. I'm sure there is a demand from business people who are tired of being holed in a hotel room, and want some of the comforts of home at their finger tips. Additionally with a good sized living room you could organise a small meeting here if you wanted without having to pay extra.

This set of apartments is well located for the City of London, City Hall, and is ten minutes walk from London Bridge Tube station, there's even a nearby ferry service to Canary Wharf.

The apartment

This two-bedroomed apartment had reasonable sized bedrooms, decent-sized beds, and two roomy bathrooms with strong, power showers, so ideal for two colleagues travelling together without having to share a bathroom. There was a freshness about the place, set off by its turquoise and oyster décor, and its clean Scandinavian look.

In the kitchen, two teabags and two sachets of instant coffee and milk are provided, which seemed a bit on the mean side, especially as there didn't appear to be a shop in the complex. Surely a couple more teabags wouldn't go amiss in a two-bedder? A small pot of real coffee would be a good addition, especially for late-night arrivals. There was a kitchenette running along one wall of the living room, with all the necessities, enough pots and pans, cutlery, a kettle and a toaster. The whole modern well-equipped kitchen area sparkled which made it all the more frustrating that the kitchen units didn't have any handles – and to open each cupboard it was necessary to grapple with the bottom of the door.

Problem two was a lack of any kind of handy welcome pack with useful instructions. All I need on arrival is two pages of A4 saying how to use the cooker, how to work the heating/air conditioning, where to find essential items and make them work; perhaps a useful note about a nearby supermarket and restaurant would also be good news. Nothing was to be found anywhere. It was one of those hot and sweaty London summer evenings so when I found what I thought was the air conditioning I tried everything to switch it on, to no avail. There were huge windows but getting those to open seemed to necessitate having a key, which was not on my ring. All very frustrating. If you are anything like me, time is short and you want to whizz in, settle in, make sure everything works, check your email and then get a bit of downtime and maybe a meal. But lack of information definitely slows you down.

I discovered a washing machine in a cupboard in the hall, but most people would have missed it. Some of my problems were solved when I managed to hunt down one of the security people to help. There wasn't any air conditioning, he told me, which I think is a definite drawback for summer stays, as London can be very humid. He also tried to grapple with opening a window for me and failed, but returned later and made it work. He told me there should have been an information pack and promised he would try and find one. (It turned up later, so he obviously was as good as his word). These teething problems need to be tackled.

A place to meet

Location-wise Maltings Place is a reasonable place to ask people to meet you. And for an informal meeting the living room in your apartment is as good a space as many small hotel meeting rooms, and you can obviously prepare tea or coffee for your colleagues. There aren't any large meeting rooms available in the complex yet, but it might be something that they look at providing in future. Otherwise the other options would be booking a meeting room in a nearby hotel, such as the Bermondsey Square, or going for the coffeeshop option.

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