The Dolphin

Negative experience: I honestly don’t understand how The Dolphin Leisure Centre justifies its membership prices. The facilities are far below the standard you’d expect for what they charge. The showers are a mess—leaking from everywhere except the actual showerheads! It’s baffling that something as basic as functional showers hasn’t been addressed. The changing rooms are equally disappointing. Most of the lockers are missing keys, making it a hassle to find one that’s usable. The overall state of the place reminds me of a post-communist facility—except for the reception area, which seems to be the only part that looks presentable. As for cleanliness, I have no idea how some people in the reviews claim the place is clean. From what I’ve seen, the cleaning standards are far below acceptable. They could do a hundred times better in that department, and it still might not feel up to scratch. This place has so much potential, but it needs a complete overhaul—better maintenance, more attention to detail, and a stronger focus on customer satisfaction. Until then, I can’t recommend it, especially at the current prices.

Fantastic experience: Busiest centre. Great place. Friendly staff

Positive experience: My first visit, but won't my last. Could do with more disabled parking spaces and clearer more consistent info on parking procedures. Nice and clean inside, staff were all really helpful and pleasant. Esp a swim instructor called Lynn.

Fantastic experience: Clean and warm, I enjoy my regular visits .

Negative experience: Awful customer service. Me and my wife pay our membership to use the health suite for self guided hydro therapy. The pool was supposed to be closed during the day and at latest 3:30pm. I arrived around 4:30pm and there was a sign on the door which read: due to unforseen circumstances the pool is closed until further notice. The pool was closed entirely for 2 days. Since this is the only thing we use our memberships for, and without notice the pool was no longer usable I complained. The staff on the phone were unhelpful as they simply said that they don't know when it'll be open, eventually 1 member of staff could confirm that but would be open the next day. Essentially the days which we had planned to go to the centre for the week were closed without prior notice, which means we paid for the service and did not receive the service. When I asked for a refund of 1 weeks membership, they suggested that a goodwill gesture would be 2 hot drinks from Costa.

Positive experience: It's a helpful place ,I been a customer since 2019,but something quite new start happening at the health suit ,staff participating in bullying customers I think every people age need to respect with dignity, I do feel sorry for that women ,she even cry at the changing room ,since then didn't seen her again

Fantastic experience: Delightful venue.

Positive experience: Have a full membership, health suite has a nice changing area but the door scanners can be a bit dodgy, same with the self check in units, nice costa

Fantastic experience: Went for the roller disco - great fun. Combination of adults hashing out their younger years at high speeds, and then just kids being kids. Recommended for all levels. Marshall's are really good too; if someone fell, they were on it in a heartbeat.

Fantastic experience: Great staff

Fantastic experience: Highly recommended clean tidy safe place friendly helpful staff

Fantastic experience: I had a swim and it was nice

Positive experience: Decent badminton courts. Organised. Shame about Costa closing earlier than I'd like

Positive experience: I took my daughter here who’s 7 months for swimming the other day, my mum came along too. It was the first time my daughter has been swimming so we went to the training pool. It was fantastic! The pool was perfect temp, only a few other families in the pool. The staff at reception were really kind too, lent us a coin to use for the lockers as sadly they’re cashless. I would give 5 stars, but the family changing room could be a bit cleaner but it wasn’t too bad, much better than the triangle in my opinion.

Fantastic experience: Nice place and very friendly staff! Thanks!

Fantastic experience: Took my little girl swimming here she loved it

Positive experience: It would be a 5 star place if the changing rooms were cleaner and particularly if the people in the health suite with inappropriate behaviour ( particularly young people, making a lot of noise, splashing and playing) were invited to get out. This is a place where people generally go to relax ( some people to rehabilitate) so a quiet and clean space is really essential. Other than that everyone that works there has been great so far and the gym is great too

Positive experience: Lovely pool and staff

Negative experience: I agree with some reviews the staff at trampoline are not just strict but rude too. This doesn’t just apply to bounce and play sessions where I take my toddler occasionally but outside of that too!

Positive experience: A nice local leisure centre, with friendly staff, Costa, soft play and playground. Parking can be tough though, busy with tight spaces and I do sometimes fear for my car.

Fantastic experience: Много хубаво място за релакс.

Fantastic experience: Great stuff, gym equipment and price and very clean.

Fantastic experience: Great leisure centre with lots of parking. Staff are friendly and the children's swimming lessons are great value. On site Costa available.

Fantastic experience: Great leisure center. Organized and clean. A great spot for kids

Positive experience: Surprised, well equipped leisure centre, friendly staff too

Fantastic experience: Was there this week for the first time. Absolutely loved the experience. Staff is amazingly friendly and the facilities are really good.

Fantastic experience: Really nice, clean and professional place

Fantastic experience: We attend the bounce and roll sessions in the sports hall with our little one, and they are great. Lots do do and he really enjoys it. Only gripe is the parking, which can be a bit difficult during busy times

Fantastic experience: Clean and easy gym. My partner and I gave up waiting for the Puregym to open and it was a great decision. The staff here are lovely and the gym feels well looked after. Swimming pool will also be a bonus in the summer.

Positive experience: Nice quiet lane swimming session. Changing rooms a bit too grubby but then it is 4pm on a Sunday.

Positive experience: Good leisure centre. I used a swimming pool and a court for badminton. Very versatile (lots of different activities available). It's busy in the evenings. Thanks.

Positive experience: Built in the '70s and you can tell but they keep it up-to-date as best they can. Swimming pools are decent albeit without the fancier elements of newer pools like the Triangle in Burgess Hill. Staff are friendly and helpful.

Fantastic experience: Loved it, very good health and fitness venue with many healthy activities.

Fantastic experience: The heart of the community if you ask me. The staff meet with all manner of people and keep smiling. I spotted a real life merman in the swimming pool. He said he felt welcome and enjoyed a hot chocolate in the cafè every Sunday after inflatable time. I interviewed the gremlin who lives in the swimming pool lockers and she said she especially liked the temperature and ambience. Five stars. Moreover a shy tyrannnosaurus rex from Ansty said she'd never felt more confident since attending the legs, bums and tums class.

Negative experience: Boring no slides

Negative experience: It was good at the beginning, but in the middle of your session we got kicked out. It my my birthday party session and we only got half the time we paid for. We are all fuming. Will not be returning any time soon and do not recommend.

Negative experience: It was fun at first,changing rooms were disgusting but when we got half way through my bestfriends birthday party they kicked us out and said "Were sorry your session is up" we were clearly annoyed as my friends mum payed for an hour and a half but only got half the time.We are furious

Positive experience: Visited for the first time today with my toddler and newborn. We had booked online for the active play and bounce, Monday at 10am. When I arrived I could not park anywhere! So busy, also cannot park on surrounding roads. Eventually parked but I was now 15mins late for the session. I told the lady on the reception who was not the slightest bit interested. So my toddler only had 30 mins instead of the 45 mins. The staff in the session were quite strict with the trampoline which I found a bit over the top. Overall quite a stressful experience, which the staff did not help with! Maybe they need to consider moving the times of the sessions to avoid the parking situation.

Positive experience: Really nice, up to date and clean facilities. Lots of classes to choose from and council support available on memberships for those under financial stress. The car park is a bit inadequate for peak times

Positive experience: Lots of classes, good gym. Not perfect and you could grumble but for the price I think it's good value.

Fantastic experience: Really enjoy aqua deep sessions.

Fantastic experience: Absolutely gorgeous!!!

Fantastic experience: Pleasant staff great coffee

Positive experience: Good leisure center with pool and gym. Plenty of lessons and different activities for all.

Fantastic experience: Went swimming with the little one, but missed didn't understand the instructions for the slots for swimming. So we arrived at the end. The friendly staff explained the slots are and moved us to a more appropriate slot for little one to have her first taste of a swimming pool so all was well. Thank you for sorting this out for us. We had a great time

Negative experience: Needs a refurb it’s very old dirty and skanky. Drains stink in every toilets and nothing is clean. Disappointed the gym shuts at 9.15pm when the leisure centre is open until 10pm. Most equipment is damaged or broken. Courts also are very run down! The triangle is much nicer!

Negative experience: I'm currently in the Haywards heath "Dolphin Places Leasure" and it is filthy!! I have been a member here for a little over a month and at first I thought I saw it on a bad week, however no I did not it always has empty cleaning stations / sellotape around equipment to hold it together/ trip hazards everywhere / TV's don't work on the running machines/ closes at 9:15pm however cleaning with a hoover clearly starts at 8pm, and this is fun breathing in hot hoover dust..... genuinely disappointed cost v what you get.

Negative experience: Pool viewing area is rank, wouldn't hurt to give it a clean every week, hasn't been cleaned for a year a reckon

Fantastic experience: This afternoon over the phone at 12.45 I had to cancel a cardiac class (just a change in circumstances) booked for tomorrow, 10.00 til 11.00 and a very kind female member of the reception staff asked if I was ok. It was heartwarming to hear her concern and I would like to thank whoever that was. I'm sure she'll know who she is. Very thoughtful in this fast paced world!

Positive experience: Went for a competition held at the dolphin but good facilities for eating and drinking

Fantastic experience: Awesome staff and gym goers

Positive experience: *Update 2024* They have improved the gym and have made an effort on improving maintenance generally, well-done. Good addition of a water fountain near reception. Thank you. Shame that there are now less running machines and still some maintenance issues remain. But certainly is better. *Previous review* In pretty bad shape. The health suite showers are covered in mould on the walls and there is literal mould growing out of the vent ducts, like mushrooms. Yup, all the visitors breathing that. Stranger Things comes to mind. Ceiling tiles missing for months in that shower room. Rust holes in the shower walls. Had to complain for floor there to be cleaned and remove smell of piss a couple of weeks ago. Jacuzzi is timed and not button operated. Suspicious stains on floor in smaller pool in heath suite area. The showers in the standard mens changing barely work and there is usually a puddle of stagnant water in a dip in the floor. The broken hairdryer in this changing room has not been repaired in as many years as I've been a member. Same as the broken toilet in the health suite changing room. Seems like all the toilets that aren't near reception have not been renovated since the place was opened. This is reflected by non working taps etc. Similar situation in many other areas of the facility, with worn carpets and stained ceilings. The gym plays music with YouTube adverts. Although the gym is more than packed at peak times with teenagers, the staff refuse to open the second zone downstairs which was once an overflow...why? To save on staffing costs. Two stars only because it has all necessary equipment and there is a sauna. £56pm is fairly overpriced considering the poor maintenance and the refusal to open a gym overflow. "Oh but it costs to heat the pool" I never use your pool, please create a separate membership for people who want pool access, if heating it costs so very much.

Positive experience: As a gym, it has the essentials and basics, but no more. For beginners and casual gym goers I think it's adequate. For anyone a bit more serious about their training, I'd recommend elsewhere.

Positive experience: Great facilities and really good instructors for classes and a wide variety of gym classes. These classes do get very busy and actual mostly full. Good bookable system online for a member in which you can book in advance of 14 days prior to activity. And you can opt to receive e mails to take bookings from cancellations. The Centre is though really in need of a makeover certain parts are looking very tired and need replacing. But overall great staff and good value for money.

Fantastic experience: Found it to be a nice environment with lots of good equipment and clean .

Positive experience: Friendly atmosphere. Good ambience. Gym is a bit overcrowded

Fantastic experience: Great for sports activities.

Positive experience: It's a leisure centre...

Fantastic experience: Staff were very helpful kind knew Thier stuff

Fantastic experience: We attended the bounce and roll group and found it great with lots to do

Negative experience: This place is in desperate need of a refurb all over, starting with those awful showers!

Fantastic experience: Great gym Nice pool

Negative experience: Well, its a council gym so that tells you everything you need to know about how its run. They refuse to book you in classes at reception (even though it has been done before and was incredibly straightforward), and instead direct you to download and book via their useless app, which is slow and inaccurate. The equipment is old and none of the staff really care about being there; I constantly see them smoking behind the building and talking about each other. A subpar establishment in its entirety

Positive experience: I used to go to the gym in London and loved it. Not so much here, though. The gym is full of treadmills, cross trainers, and bikes. Where are the ropes for upper body workouts, no stairmaster, and no bike that works the upper body simultaneously. The space for weight training is very small. The few weight machines are always bus, and the place to do stretches is too packed. I'm not impressed. On the other hand, the classes on offer in the centre are brilliant. Yoga, Pilates, Aqua fit, and bodybalance, to name just some, are worth going to. Health suite is okay. Could do with better cleaning. Love the sauna and steam room. Only drawback,when doors are not locked, anybody can come in, even if it is exclusively for members, who pay extra for it.

Positive experience: Joined the gym a couple of months ago. Overall I like it, but in keeping with many gyms is the wasted time of youngsters perpetually transfixed to their phones! Frankly, if really ticks me off. 20 seconds of exercise followed by 4 minutes staring at a screen is unacceptable. Unless you're listening to music or follow a workout app you really don't need a phone in the gym. Management, please sort this one out; I'm not alone.

Fantastic experience: Lovely place to take kids for different activities. Very friendly staff

Fantastic experience: Absolutely love it here, I'm a teenager and just wanted a place that had a gym and a swimming pool where I can go on my own and with my family. It is very clean and the staff are exeptionally lovely. I had problems the first time I went because I didn't know how to work things and they were very quick to help me. What makes it better is that there is a cafe and a play area there aswell which can get a little noisy but not horrible. It is very secure you will need a pound to use the lockers (you get the pound back). Lovely place - do not listen to the bad comments because they are either just boycotting this place or don't know what a leisure center is. (ESPECIALLY the comment that complains about the shop - like " omg there's a shop that sells swimming gear in a swimming place how terrible ".

Positive experience: Great leisure centre, cafe, easy parking

Negative experience: Appalling experience in the swimming pool. I tried twice but nope I won't go to the Dolphin ever again, unless they start to know what a Fitness Lane Session is. It is a very crowded place. They allowed too many bookings. The pool is so crowded that the water is very choppy. People go randomly clockwise or anticlockwise, so it is even dangerous. During what they call Fitness Lane Sessions, most of the people walk and chat, preventing you to touch and turn. No one bother to make sure that basic rules are followed. Chaos is everywhere. In the facilities I have to try several cubicles to find one with the door locker in working order. Poor timetable too.

Negative experience: Do not bother to get your child to this holiday camp, waste money and time. Staff rude and know nothing, cant event look after a 9 year old boy. Wont be bother to let our kid go here ever again.

Fantastic experience: Great night of skating great floor ,cool people

Negative experience: Reception team is terrible. Nobody know nothing. Really bad.

Positive experience: Lovely staff and a great facility, pool/changing rooms is sometimes a bit grim but overall great

Fantastic experience: Took my 14 month old grandson swimming,for the 1st time family pool not child structured like burgess hill. But in its favour it is alot quieter than burgess hill, which was a good thing.

Fantastic experience: Great staff i bring my son he autism we went to skating today starff mr Lennon give my son a lot help from 4:30 to 6:00 no renounced to teaching skating for my son thank you so much

Positive experience: Nice morning swim, nice and quiet, teaching my 4 year old to swim.

Negative experience: Customer service is awful and all about hard sell. My experience of the pools and the centre in general is, outdated and dirty. My child was attending gymnastics which I felt was very unorganised and run by some under qualified staff. After trying to cancel several times they still kept taking my money, everytime I told them the problems they tried to sell me other times or "better more advanced classes" This was never the case, when I gave them another chance, it just got worse. When wanting to cancel I was always told they would ring me back and never did,.thus resulted in me paying for months of classes my child never attended, then finally when cancelled I was told to pay another month's cancellation fee! Or... I can't come back. I won't be back. Poor treatment, disorganised, rude and dirty. One star instead of none because the Costa is actually a nice one & their staff aren't rude.

Negative experience: Children's pool was freezing cold my 2 year old had blue lips after 10 minits in the pool we will not returning to the dolphin

Fantastic experience: Staff are very helpful....

Positive experience: I just use the Dolphin for swimming. The reception staff are excellent and always remember us. The pool is good. My only complaint is the cleanliness of the showers and toilets in the members area. The floors always look ok but the toilets and inside the shower cubicles are very unpleasant, and they seem to get worse every visit.

Negative experience: It's an ok size centre with stuff to do but the biggest downfall is the customer service from a majority of staff

Fantastic experience: Decent sauna,steam room and pool. Didn't use the other facilities

Positive experience: Good general centre, where I had booked a swim session. I have used the gym before, and it is well equipped and you can generally get out of your session what you want. Today was a swim. I attended same time last week, and it was quiet then and the pool had 3 'lanes' - a slow lane, a fast lane and the broadest part for general swimming. Today it was busier yet there was another lane. You could either swim in the slow, fast or very fast (?) lane. There seems to be no rhyme or reason as to why the number of lanes is different from one week to the next, much in keeping with what happened pre COVID. Still, I was able to complete my swim as I had hoped. The showers are nice and hot, not too hot. The changing rooms, lockers and showers have been recently updated and they are nice, though there are still a lot of cubicles with broken locks. Still, a good overall enjoyable session, and I would recommend this centre.

Fantastic experience: My best mate works at Costa

Negative experience: Website booking system is horrendous. Easier to call to book .

Negative experience: This is a classic example of bad management. The facilities are excellent. But everything is so badly managed. Website and booking system is awful. Confusing pool rules, with some pools open, some pools not, and across odd times. No floats due to “COVID” policy while everyone packed in together in the changing room. Soft play closed at peak times. Local councils really need to change their leisure providers.

Positive experience: Idk lol good

Negative experience: Decided to use the pool on a lunch break from work (I have a swim membership and usually go to the Triangle). It's not as nice a facility as the Triangle. The changing rooms were quite dirty (or at least, the couple that I looked into to get changed in were... I found one that looked clean on entering but then noticed in the top corner a build up of dirt and grime and some gum). The building is quite dated and a bit 80s. The staff weren't in the best of moods when I got there I feel but that's okay - i'm not there to chat to them. I'm there to swim. The parking lot was difficult to navigate as a first time goer here. The car park is split into two it seems so I took a few minutes to work out where to go. The car park was busy and the space I got had a massive pot hole in it. Again - can deal with that - i'm there to swim. The actual pool itself is fine. I like that there's a deep and a shallow end rather than one homogenous depth which the Triangle doesn't have currently. It is quite cold though. Overall, I prefer the Triangle. I would only come back to this pool to use on my work lunch breaks. I would recommend anyone who can get to the Triangle to swim to go there instead. As a pool, it's... totally fine if you can deal with the above mentioned points.

Fantastic experience: Felt very safe and well organised.

Fantastic experience: Very well organised and use of the gym was great. Good to be back and thanks to the staff for all of their hard work

Positive experience: Memberships are very expensive with no options for gym only etc. I find myself having to pay for lots of things I dont use. Some of the staff are also very rude. Gym and pool facilities are nice, I can't comment much on other facilities as I don't use them.

Negative experience: This gym has followed the EA approach of microtransactions. Lost your card? £2.65, Miss a class because your train is cancelled? Pay £3 because your in a ridiculously wide two hour window. Staff are rude as well - had a woman painfully lecture me as if I were a child that "these cards are NOT cheap! go find yours!" after I expressed nearly £3 was a bit much for a replacement piece of plastic. They also sold on contract management to a terrible company who if you look them up - have a terrible and long history of mismanaging accounts. Can't wait to cancel this contract, the classes I actually want to take are booked up the instant they are available and they've done nothing to add more time slots or increase capacity in some way.

Positive experience: Having a return at the time in 2019 so a mess but looks like it will be impressive

Positive experience: Their it systems are rither down or very slow. Hard to book activities on phone too. Have tried their phone njmber but unable to speak to booking team since 2 weeks.

Negative experience: Guys reception is really poor in terms of service, sometimes even unfriendly. Have asked several times about kids activities, given an email address which do not reply to you.

Fantastic experience: It has all sports activities including squash and swimming.

Fantastic experience: Very helpful personnel, clean spaces and equipment,. Can be a bit too crowded at a time but still acceptable. Nice place for workout

Positive experience: A reasonable range of facilities. Some need a bit of updating. A range of classes with really friendly instructors and staff. Parking can be difficult at peak times.

Negative experience: Hard to get to safely by foot. Everything is smaller and not worth the trip rather go to the triangle in Burgess Hill.

Fantastic experience: Great facilities