Myself and girlfriend had booked a suite for two nights to stay at this hotel to add to the experience of going to see Leonard Cohen in Madison Square Garden. We had read awful reviews about the hotels standard and king rooms so we thought we'd spend extra and go with a suite. We arrived at 12 and was told our room wasn't ready but to come back at 3 and we'd be good to go. During this process, the main porter was barking at staff behind the counter and openly starting an argument with the nice young gent serving us at the time. Extremely unprofessional, but as we would find out, this seemed to be how things are at The Chelsea.
When we came back, we were told they had given away all the suites but they could give us a king or our money back (which they were very enthusiastic about). We were very upset about this and we were offered a reduced rate which only turned out to be the rate of the King room they were offering us ($269). We asked to see the room before we accepted and a nicer porter showed us to our room and showed more compassion and understanding than the staff who mucked up our reservation. The room was a dump but we decided that we probably could not get somewhere at the last minute on a Friday night and would have to stay there. The carpets had stains all over it, paint was peeling off the wall and there was a used towel from a previous guest under the bed. At 269 a night, it was incredibly poor value to say the least.
After seeing Leonard Cohen, we found a good deal at the Millenium Hilton that night and left the next day. At no stage during our stay were we even offered a basic apology for the mistake and every time we visited the reception counter (4 times) there was another bunch of guests being told there were no rooms for them and they would have to go elsewhere.
It looks like whoever is in charge of reservations hasn't a clue what they are doing and it is best to avoid this place. Go in and have a look at the lobby of this hotel but don't step a foot inside one of the rooms.
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