Recently stayed here for 2 nights in the tower suites with city facing views. Paid approximately $300 per night NOT including daily parking fee....I'll get to that. Overall it was a pleasant enough stay. The location was great. The lobby was beautiful. My check in was fast and easy. We got there very early and feared we wouldn't be able to check in for a few hours but they let us get our room at 11am. I think this exception was made bc I signed up for the "President Members" program or whatever it's called before my trip (it's free -do it if you are planning on staying at a Fairmont Hotel). My room wasn't as big as I thought it would be but according to seasoned San Fran travelers the Fairmont has some of the bigger rooms in the city. Even so, felt a tad cramped but this wasn't a big deal. Grief #1 - we had dinner reservations in town first night and needed a cab to take us there. Got down to lobby 20 minutes prior to reservation. It took the doorman exactly 20 minutes to get us a cab. A lined approximately 16 people deep formed (and I was close to the front of this line) and the Fairmont staff failed to get additional doormen or staff to assist the mounting line in getting their transportation. For a hotel with this type of service reputation I would assume management would act to triage the situation such as this. Sadly, nothing was fixed and the lone doorman was left fighting to get guests cars from the parking lot, greet arriving and returning guests as well as trying to flag down Taxis all at the same time. Needless to say we were late for our dinner but gladly our reservation was still honored. Grief # 2 - my wife and I went to the Laurel Court bar for a pre dinner drink the second evening. Making sure we didn't make the same mistake as last time, we arrived in the lobby a full hour prior to our dinner reservations. Well, wouldn't you know it took about 15 minutes to even place our drink order. Mind you there were only 5 other patrons in the bar....total. Next, after we got our drinks it took another 20 minutes for our waiter to even check on us. By now we had to get our check. Thankfully the check arrived quickly. I guess they wanted us out of there rather than serve us. I would have had another drink had the waiters cared to check on us. But I guess they were pretty busy chatting to each other behind and around the bar instead. Oh well. Grief # 3 - this one I can't really complain about but I am including it here for your education. It will cost you about $60 per day including taxes. Thankfully I had done my research first but had I not it would be safe to say I would have been a bit upset. This parking fee is a tiny little footnote that is hard to discover when booking a room here at the Fairmont. All in all I would say that while nobody at The Fairmont was mean, quite the contrary actually, I would classify some aspects of the operation as unprofessional. You can have a winning personality and a never ending smile but when you fail to take care of a paying customer it's still unprofessional. My only staff compliment goes to the parking garage attendants who were extremely professional and helpful at every moment. I found myself calling upon them for my car and going straight down to the garage instead of the front because my car was always waiting and they always had great recommendations and were very helpful and prompt. Kudos to whomever manages that part of your hotel operation. Otherwise, I received service overall comparable to a Holiday Inn. Wish I had paid Holiday Inn prices. Im not a traveler who complains about costs otherwise inwould have added Greif # 4 to $80 breakfast pricetag for 2 at Laurel Court restuarant at the Fairmont (i get over it bc it's an "upscale" hotel). But i do expect a certain level of professionalism to accompany the costs rather than just everyone being so nice. But hey, the location is great and apparently the rooms are bigger than most other hotels....so I've been told.
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