I was personally recommended this hotel by my bestie who stayed there about a year ago with her friends.
I made bookings over the internet after liasing with a staff member (whom I have now come to believe is the manager/owner’s wife). My friends and I booked for 5 nights in total but with a gap after the first night as we were going to visit Vegas. The staff member offered us a AAA members discount (I think it was about $5-$10) despite the knowledge that we did not hold such membership.
Upon our arrival, we were greeted by its friendly staff and were presented with keys to our room which was clean, spacious, cozy and had a full kitchen. The location was excellent, within walking distance to the subway station, the Kodak Theater and the Chinese Mann Theater, in the heart of Hollywood.
We checked out the next morning as we were heading to Vegas for 5 days.
When we came back to the hotel after our Vegas trip, we were confronted by the hotel manager who insisted at the counter that the rates we were quoted shall be increased for the remaining 4 nights as we were not AAA member.
I was prepared to show him the email with the quote but he didn’t seem too interested. After some argy-bargy, he finally said that he would let it go.
The room he gave us was on their top level right down the other end of the corridor. Noone must’ve stayed in that room for months – it smelt horrible and the bed-clock was set 5 hours late. When we tried opening the windows to let some fresh air in the traffic noise was so loud, we had to close them. The bathroom door would not close properly either. In addition, the room did not have a full kitchen, just a microwave and a small fridge. So even though he did not increase our rate, we got a crappier room than what we paid for.
Over the next few nights, I received dozens of bites all over my body from bugs most likely from the bed sheets. They were so itchy they kept me up all night, and the worst thing was they spread and can be passed on by skin contact. I will upload some pictures later.
We were duly transferred to another room when I showed the bite marks to a staff member on our last night. It was still not the same standard as the one we stayed in on our first night but by then we’ve half given up on the place. The owner came and offered me $30 cash. That was not even enough to cover the ointment and tablets from the pharmacy (they were that bad, I had to take 2 packets of tablets).
Having said the above, the location was really good, the staff members (other than the manager) were super-lovely and helpful, and the cost of accommodation included a generous breakfast. I wish the other 4 nights were like the 1st, because I would have highly recommended the place. But the fiasco with the owner/manager really pissed me off and the bug bites were so disgusting I ended up chucking out some of my clothes. I mean who wants to take tablets when they are on holiday, I felt like a sick patient and I had to be so careful around my friends as to avoid passing them on. All this because the owner wanted to charge us $40 ($10/night) more than what we were legitimately quoted.
If the owner/manager is reading this – if you feel like you outsmarted us by giving us that crappy room, maybe you have, but at the end of the day, you got yourself 3 very unhappy customers.
hotel reviews