s/o Never Shopping - I'm never STAYING there again!!

[ladyknight1]

While researching hotels in a future weekend trip destination, three of the "hotels" were reviewed as having sand fleas in the rooms. No.

[whiterose]

I remember having stayed in at least one hotel with bedbugs. But it now has a new name- so I am guessing the new management took care of the old problem.

[MissRose]

I was coming back from a concert in Indiana, and needed a place to stay at due to the long drive.  2 of the places I would never stay at again as they seemed to be dark and a bit dingy - both were chain hotels.  One of the places a few of the ceiling tiles were out of place and I went to move them back in place where I found a few scrabble related magazines hidden - I then moved the tiles in place.  Good thing I will not be heading that direction to stay at that place any time soon!

I can't remember the place in Dublin Ireland near the airport I stayed at with one of my friends.  The wireless internet was slower than dial up (as having good net access is important to us), and the restaurant/bar on premises was very expensive.  Good thing, me and my friend found dinner a block's walk away where our combined costs for dinner & drinks was 1/2 the price the hotel wanted for a similar combination then we got a cheap breakfast at the airport the next day.

[CakeBeret]

My in-laws usually get us a Groupon getaway for Christmas, and we go in December or January. Most of the places have been lovely, but this past year was...unpleasant.

The Groupon was for a "king or double lakeview room". My DH called to book and asked for a "king lakeview room". The person was very polite and accommodating, said we could of course get a king lakeview room. Then DH said that we had a groupon. The person's tone dropped about ten degrees and DH was abruptly told that there were no king Groupon rooms. For a midweek stay in the midwest in January, in a hotel with over 500 rooms. DH ended up running through both midweek and weekend dates for the next eight weeks and the man snarled that there were no king groupon rooms for any of those dates.

Fine. So we book the double room. (My inlaws did call Groupon and were told that they couldn't do anything because the hotel was technically fulfilling the terms of the contract.) We ask again at checkin if there is a king room available. Of course not. Let me reiterate that this is an over-500-room hotel in midweek January in the midwest. Throughout our stay the staff who are oh so accommodating with the other customers are cool, bordering on curt, with us. We don't see more than ten paying customers the entire time but of course they don't have any king rooms for us plebian groupon users.

To add insult to injury, this supposed "luxury" hotel had the single most uncomfortable set of beds I have ever encountered in a hotel. I have slept better at the Best Western. I have slept better at a sketchy $29/night casino/hotel in Vegas. The beds were absolutely rock hard, with no give. I woke up in the morning in tears because my back and neck ached terribly and I had slept so poorly. I spent the second night sleeping stretched between a wingback chair and a desk chair.

If they hadn't been so rude, I would have been much happier. If the beds had offered some semblance of comfort, things would have been fine. But the combination of the two? Was the kiss of death for me.

[proudmama]

The Hampton Inn in Darien GA.  We stay at the Hampton Inn often when we travel, so when we needed a place to stay 1 night to break up our 20 hour drive, we decided to stay there.  The room was a little musty, and the carpet could have used sine cleaning, but the beds were clean and so was the bathroom.  We were sound asleep when someone began pounding on our door.  My kids were terrified and my DH jumped to his feet, ready to protect the brood.

Turns out that it was a domestic dispute, where the husband was arrested.  While I know that this was beyond the control of the hotel, the staff could have at least apologized for the disturbance. 

On our return trip, we stayed at a Hampton Inn in North Carolina were the staff apologized if we experience any disturbances since a huge reception was being held in the hotel and assured us if we had any issues, they would address them right away.  Not only were there no disturbances, I got to meet a few of the people attending the reception and they were absolutely lovely. 

So, I'm not writing off the entire chain, just the one location. 

[mathchick]

The Days Inn in Willoughby, Ohio.  I stopped there with Mathprime, Epsilon, and Delta. In the morning, while I was showering, I heard Mathprime talking to someone.  Luckily, Mathprime knew not to open the door.
A man had come to the door and told Mathprime that there was a problem with the room, we were in the wrong room, and he needed to come in.  This was a pull-off-the-highway stop, so we were checking out that morning, and we'd taken the last available room the previous night.  There is no way that this story was legitimate, and Mathprime is under ten, so this guy had to have known that he was talking to a child.
Fast forward to breakfast, where I asked the man at the front desk if there was a problem with our room, and I told him what had happened.  He said that there was no problem with our room, and whoever that was was not someone from the hotel, but he was not in the least disturbed by what had occurred. I don't know if this happens often there or what, but he could not have acted less concerned.  Although I have never heard that anything bad happened, I am not from that area, so I would not know.  I regret that I did not call the police, because I will always wonder if someone else did open her door.

[iridaceae]

Turns out that it was a domestic dispute, where the husband was arrested.  While I know that this was beyond the control of the hotel, the staff could have at least apologized for the disturbance. 

But the staff didn't cause nor want the disturbance. Yeah I apologize for domestics at my hotel but really: why should I? What else should I be apologizing for that the hotel has no part in: bad weather? Lost luggage? Coyotes howling? Having to detour to get here because the road was closed after the Gabby Giffords shooting? Yep. I've had to apologize for all of those. It irks.

[cicero]

Turns out that it was a domestic dispute, where the husband was arrested.  While I know that this was beyond the control of the hotel, the staff could have at least apologized for the disturbance. 

But the staff didn't cause nor want the disturbance. Yeah I apologize for domestics at my hotel but really: why should I? What else should I be apologizing for that the hotel has no part in: bad weather? Lost luggage? Coyotes howling? Having to detour to get here because the road was closed after the Gabby Giffords shooting? Yep. I've had to apologize for all of those. It irks.

a domestic that happens to place in your hotel isn't your fault, but yes, if someone was pounding on my hotel door at night and scaring me/my kids, then you apologize for the disturbance. you apologize for the inconvenience. Bad weather/lost luggage/coyotes? as a customer - if you smile and commiserate with me for two seconds, that is something i will remember and that is something that will lead to write a nice review about your hotel (about staff who went above and beyond), and all it costs you is a smile and a few seconds of your time. if you don't, well i'll remember that too.

[Carotte]

There's a difference between "I'm sorry for the bad weather" and "I'm sorry you had bad weather".
The first one I'll think that if you had any power over the weather you wouldn't be working in a hotel, so apologizing for that is weird.
For the second one you showed empathy and that's making it more likely for me to come back and probably, as Cicero said, made my day just that tiny bit better because someone agree with me about the lousy weather.
Yep, it gets tiring to empathize with everyone about everything, but it's part of the job.

[iridaceae]

a domestic that happens to place in your hotel isn't your fault, but yes, if someone was pounding on my hotel door at night and scaring me/my kids, then you apologize for the disturbance. you apologize for the inconvenience. Bad weather/lost luggage/coyotes? as a customer - if you smile and commiserate with me for two seconds, that is something i will remember and that is something that will lead to write a nice review about your hotel (about staff who went above and beyond), and all it costs you is a smile and a few seconds of your time. if you don't, well i'll remember that too.

I did specifically say that I apologize. Specifically.

 But it irks me that I am apologizing for things I have no control over. We didn't ask the domestic to pound on the door. To check in in the first place. I don't ask the restaurant staff to apologize for the family fight happening six tables over or expect the grocery store to be apologetic because the salad I wanted got recalled due to food-borne illness from the farm.

[proudmama]

I said that the staff had no control over the situation.  I completely understand that it wasn't something they planned. 

I wasn't looking for a refund, nor a break on what we paid.  A simple acknowledgement that we were disturbed would have gone a long way.

[ladyknight1]

The Days Inn near Busch Gardens Tampa Bay.

Twice we had bad experiences there. The only reason there was a second time is because we were give an free night's stay. First time, inside room overlooking the atrium, convention center and indoor pool. The convention center was the site for a local prom. Complete with loud music, until 2 AM. No guests were advised of this, and there was nothing the night auditor could do. A very late night, and a full day the next day with family, so not fun.

The second time, an outside room overlooking the pool. At 10 PM, there were at least 50 teenagers in the pool screaming and when we called the front desk, they had only one person on staff and no security on property. Never again.

[Andicatt]

The Ramada Inn, Batavia, NY.  We were up to visit some friends and play at the casino in Batavia.  We visited our friends for a while, checked into the Ramada and went to the casino.  While walking to our room there were footprints down the red carpet in the hallway and I was thinking someone needed to vacume.  We got back from the casino around 9:30 pm and stopped in the bar/lounge for a few drinks.  We went to our room about 10 pm and that's when I realized the footprints on the carpet were actually cement footprints - nice.  We stayed up until about 11:00 pm watching TV and finally went to bed because our neighbors kept pounding on the wall even though our TV wasn't very loud.  I started getting all congested and couldn't sleep much due to that.  We were woken up about 6:30 by our neighbors. They were using their hairdryer - it sounded like it was right next to our heads because the walls were so thin!  I felt bad because now I know why they were pounding on the wall.  After we checked out we went out for breakfast and within 10 minutes my congestion went away.  Part of that hotel was under construction so it may have gotten cleaned up but I'll never stay there again.

[hermanne]

The independent motel in my parents' town. They were "the only motel on the beach!"

Run-down, weird smell, half-a**ed housekeeping, and what DH called "vampire neighbors". They were up late and the next morning were pounding on the wall and then came to our door to complain about our kids waking them up at 6 in the morning. It was close to 8:00. We weren't even awake half an hour.

Our stay there was supposed to be a week. DH promptly got on his laptop (at least they had wi-fi!) and booked us at a chain hotel nearby. For $10 more a night, we had clean rooms, free continental breakfast, and a pool. Too bad we didn't bring our swim suits.

While DH was on the computer I was packing us up. I got down on my hands and knees to check for toys, etc., that the kids might have dropped. The carpet needed a good cleaning -- or better, replaced -- and I found some old, fuzzy candy just under the bed. I'm glad I got to it before the kids.

[siamesecat2965]

This thread reminded me of my college swim team's training trip to FL my freshman year. We were going down the last week of Christmas break, to train. Coach had booked us into some very nice sounding resort, whcih we were all excited about. We drove down from MD, to Naples, FL, and when we arrived, well, the resort was NOt at all what was pictured in the resort. Not even close.

Coach went in, and then came out, saying we were would not be staying there. I don't know how or waht happened, but we ended up in a lovely Best Western with kitchenettes for our week's stay. And continued to go back there each year thereafter.