Marriott Wardman Park Hotel

Review: My debit card was incorrectly charged for another guests room that happened to be my brother. I did not authorize this charge and was told it would be refunded. I have now waited almost 30 days for this refund.Desired Settlement: I need this charge to be reversed and to be compensated for the fees incurred by insufficient funds to pay my rent payment because this unauthorized payment was taken to my bank account and not remedied within an appropriate time period.

Business

Response:

Good Morning,My name is Scott R[redacted] and I am the assistant front desk manager here at the Marriott [redacted]. I received information from you regarding a recent guest and their billing.I have been working personally with [redacted] on getting this issue resolved; please see attached paper work given to me by my accounting manager stating this information was inputted to our business services department for adjustment. The amounts shown are those requested of the client. Hopefully this information is already visible in their account but this shows proof that the hotel was on top of the situation and did everything in its power to expedite. If you would like to get in contact with me further please do not hesitate to contact me.Scott *. R[redacted]Assistant Front Desk ManagerMarriott

Review: PLEASE SEE THE MESSAGE SUBMITTED TO THE MARRIOTT WEBSITE:

Dear Sir or Madam,

My name is [redacted], and I am writing to inform you of a very unsatisfying experience I had in your hotel over the weekend. My fiancé and I arrived on Saturday, August 31, 2013 and we checked out yesterday morning on Monday, September 2, 2013. I would like to request this property be carefully reviewed due to a number of unacceptable violations to the basics of the hospitality industry.

On an individual note, having personally stayed in hotels of much better quality (and lower) in the past I have a distinct insight into the synthesis between the hotelier and its clientele, and I feel I am as such in a position to comment on the disappointing performance of your hotel with respect to three particular amenities: the elevators, housekeeping, and parking.

I understand the hotel was very busy with a basketball tournament, but it was clearly understaffed in a very basic area - answering a basic question over the phone about parking. I tried to make a call to Guest Services, and no one answered after the phone rang over twenty times; so I hung up. Had this basic parking question been answered, I may have been able to avoid another headache - which I will explain later. This is after we finally made entry into our room after I had to climb over twenty flights of stairs. Yes, I said twenty. Let me explain further:

As I said (and you know) your hotel was very busy over the weekend with a basketball tournament and to say, "the elevators were being used a lot" would be an understatement. When we arrived, the DC Fire and Rescue team was assisting guests stuck in an elevator. Not for the first time, but for the second time that day! It may have been from guests overcrowding the elevators, but I am not the one to make that determination. In any case, there was no one from the hotel staff around to mitigate the risks associated with having less elevators operating on a higher demand. So there is no wonder there were multiple breakdowns. It would have been nice to see someone from the hotel staff managing the elevator situation instead of the DC Fire and Rescue team.

So instead of waiting in line (which was very long at this point) and risking another elevator malfunction, my fiancé and I decided to take the stairs to our room which was on the 10th floor. Once would not have been too bad, but our keys did not work and I had to go back down and get them reprogrammed. Time was of the essence because we had plans in the city. Ten additional flights later, we finally made entry into our room.

By this point, I had a question about parking and decided to call the front desk and received no answer in a reasonable amount of time. Even being placed on hold would have been acceptable knowing someone would come back to inquire about my needs. My question was if I needed to do anything with the parking ticket I received upon entry into the parking garage. By now, I believe that answer is, "yes" so I could have parking billed to my room. I will explain the headache associated with this later.

The housekeeping and service in general of this hotel may have been acceptable in another brand of hotel, but surely not a Marriott. In addition to not having any real practices that have made the experience of staying there personal or memorable in any way. We found our tenure at your property disappointing and the service and amenities not commensurate with the compensation received by the property from me. The drain in the bathtub was clogged and we had to stand in several inches of water to finish our showers. Further, our (disposable) coffee cups were not replaced - forcing me to go on an early morning search of the housekeeping carts to find a replacement.

Nothing was done to personalize the experience of staying there. I could have stayed at a Comfort Inn and been graced with similar service, yet paid half the price. The amenities sounded nice, but real hospitality is being afforded a human experience where the guest is received attentively and feels as if he is so important that he occupies the entirety of the hotel's attention. The Washington Marriott in Wardman Park has failed to realize this.

Now, the parking situation. As I was leaving the parking garage on Monday morning, I pulled to the self-service kiosk and placed my parking ticket into the meter. The meter asked me to please pay $100. Thinking this must be a mistake, I put my ticket into the adjacent self-service kiosk and this meter asked me to pay $104! I was expecting to pay for two nights at the $36-rate and now the machines were not only telling me the wrong rate, but two completely different rates! A nice gentleman from the valet team offered to go inside and make sure we did not already pay for parking and he informed me we did not. When I presented him my credit card, he said I needed to go inside and use the ATM because the credit card machine was down. That resulted in me having to pay unnecessary ATM fees to withdrawal cash.

Finally, it was difficult to obtain a way to formally file a complaint. I went to the concierge desk and requested the contact information for a manager and was simply told to, "go online." I refused and asked for something as simple as an e-mail address because I needed to be sure my experience was not simply swept under the rug. The e-mail address I was given was for a Jared Abney and was incorrect. I am now forced to messily copy this message into a form program on the Marriott website in order to advise of its being sent to various parties, which is ludicrous and further decreases the human relationship between hotelier and guest.

I plan to submit copies of this complaint to a number of other individuals who have interests in the Washington DC hotel community, including the Washington DC Chamber of Commerce and the Washington DC Revdex.com, so that they may assist your preservation of the integrity of your brand against negligence such as the aforementioned. I think you can agree it is important that Marriott retain a certain amount of accountability within your corporate culture so as not to degrade the quality and reliability of all. I hope the Washington Marriott in Wardman Park acts to rectify its errors posthaste so that it might begin providing visitors to Washington DC the kind of service it claims (and seems to have at some point the past) to actively be doing.

I can guarantee if you assist me make the transition to a satisfied customer, I will become a loyal Marriott Rewards member and will cease my plans to send a personalized letter to executive-level leadership at your corporate headquarters in Bethesda, MD. My fiancé and I debated if we should enroll in Marriott Rewards, and at the moment, we certainly have no valid reason to do so.Desired Settlement: REFUND OR COMPLIMENTARY SERVICE

Review: This complaint is in regards to the hotel's response to the arson attack on August 29, 2014. While I understand the attack was outside the hotel's control, their response was not. The hotel failed to facilitate a safe evacuation and the staff acted with a lack of concern for their guest's health, and well-being. This complaint is based on six primary claims.

First, during the initial evacuation of the hotel around 1:10AM, I was in a group of guests that exited via the emergency steps from the 6th floor and basement. When we reached the basement, evacuation signs signaled in two contradictory directions. We initially followed signs to a dead end. Backtracking in the other direction, we were forced to proceed through an unlit hallway for approximately two minutes until reaching the exit doors. Guests lit the way with their phones, but I, along with many other guests, stumbled several times. Failure to have emergency lights strikes me as a grave safety hazard.

Second, during the time we were corralled in the lobby and after staying outside for two hours, I asked the front desk for a bedsheet to warm up (I was visibly shaking at this point from the cold). [I exited in only those clothes I was sleep in (a tshirt and shorts)]. I was told by the front desk that, although these had been handed out previously, they were no longer available. Failure to care for the health of a guest is inexcusable, especially since I find it hard to imagine the entire hotel was out of bed sheets.

Third, throughout the night, hotel staff was almost invisible. When we moved from outside to the lobby around 3:00AM, it remained unclear whether it was safe to return to hotel rooms or not. As the night wore on, I saw several groups of police officers and bomb sniffing dogs, but was never told why. When I inquired at the front desk, I was told they were unaware that the dogs had been brought me in. When I pushed further about the safety of our situation, I was told to just trust the hotel staff that we were fine. However, the lack of staff and the fact that they knew less about the situation than me, inspired no confidence.

Fourth, when I finally returned to my room at 8:00AM, I was awoken 20 minutes later by hotel personnel shouting in the hallway and operating a water pump. I called down to the front desk to request the workers assume a more reasonable volume and was assured the issue would be taken care of. It was not and I eventually just decided not to sleep. I find it inconceivable that management did not initially give such instructions given guests did not sleep the night before.

Fifth, when watching the news that morning, I heard on the local news that the formal statement by the hotel was that guests were well cared for in the hotel ballroom throughout the night. This was deep misrepresentation of the night. We were only moved to the ballroom around 5:30AM (4 hours after the initial fire alarm). For the first two hours, we were kept outside in the chilly night air with no presence of hotel staff until about 2:30AM when they passed out small bottles of water. We were then corralled in the lobby for another two hours, again where hotel staff was largely absent and it remained unclear where one could sit/move around to. At no point, including in the morning was I told of an arson attack. I learned of this only on the local news. Such treatment demonstrates a grave disrespect for guests as it deprived me of any choice. Had I known the situation, I would have chosen to leave the hotel and seek accomodations for the night elsewhere.

Sixth,when taking a shower that morning (still having not slept), the towel I intially grabbed had red/brown stains all over it. I took this to the front desk, and while offered to contact housekeeping services, they did not seem to think this was a health issue of any major concern.

Based on these six reasons, I can only conclude that the Marriott Wardman treated its guests with a lack of concern for their safety, health, and well-being on the night on August 29, 2014. They failed to uphold both professional and moral standards.