Join Date: Dec 2002
Location: Pleasant Prairie, WI USA DL FO (until 2/04), NW silver '03, NW gold '04+'05 Plat '06+ (thanks, Leo!), DL SkyClub
Programs: DL Plat/ Million Miler, AS, Hilton, Marriott Bonvoy, Piggly Wiggly Pig Points
Posts: 2,265
My baseline for hotel reviews is one question: Is it clean and does everything work as it should? The answer is adjusted on a hotel specific curve because you don't expect a Motel 6 to be a Marriott but, then again, you also don't expect a Marriott to resemble a Motel 6. The negative grading of this hotel is in large measure because of what it fails to do that it should for the type of property it is as well as the rude and utterly condescending dismissiveness given to prior reviews about things that could easily be fixed.
On the surface, my room, though small, appeared clean. Appeared clean but there was a lot of dust that was easily inhaled. The room needed a deep cleaning. The room was well lit and there were ample power outlets. The shower could have been stronger and the door leaked water onto the bathroom floor. There was a nice wall mounted television though for a hotel that welcome international guests CNN should have been in the channel lineup. No pen or paper. Window cannot be opened. I did not encounter the noise some people complained of. There was an adequate (and cute) mini fridge in the room but no microwave. This was mentioned in prior reviews and the hotel response shows its rude condescension toward its customers.
The hotel management said staff "went out of its way" to warm something up for a guest who complained that it wasn't warm enough. While it may not be feasible to have a microwave in every room it certainly is doable to have at least one for guest use in the lobby area. Carrefour down the street had one selling for 55 Euros. It would cost the hotel next to nothing to have at least one microwave available for customer use. 55 Euros is cheap and not cost prohibitive. Yet instead of fixing the problem hotel management responds in a rude manner to feedback here.
The fitness center is a bit above average except that it needed a bench in the weight area which is a curious omission. There is no guest laundry. The hotel location is within 15 minutes of the airport but there is no airport shuttle. The hotel would instantly be more popular if it did have a hotel shuttle. The hotel is designed for people with cars and parking is fairly good. The underground garage is 11 Euros per day but surface parking on and off the hotel grounds is free and the on street parking is often better than the hotel's own spaces. Neighborhood appears safe. Grocery stores and a mall are six minutes away if you have a car. What is seriously lacking is public transit. There is no bus, train or metro stop nearby and no hotel shuttle. The nearest bus stop is fairly far away and the service is like one bus per hour. The Madrid public transportation is extensive but poorly coordinated. City restrictions make if difficult to drive into Madrid. The available public transit options require several transfers and what would be a 20 minute drive could take 80 minutes or more. A hotel shuttle would be popular with guests. There is a gas station next to the hotel.
I found the hotel staff to be mostly pleasant. The desk people were nice and helpful but the breakfast area staff appeared sullen and not very friendly. The sullen and not very friendly attitude is prevalent in much of the Madrid area beginning at the airport where people whose job it is to assist travelers act like they are doing you a favor if they should do what they are supposed to do which they often don't. It's too bad that all of the hotel staff isn't as good as the front desk people but even then there are issues. For example, when I checked out this morning I was advised that someone else's meal was billed to me. Not good and I certainly wasn't pleased by this. Although it was taken care of it should not have happened in the first place. If someone else did charge something to my room the staff could easily have had the guest sign the slip with their name as one example of carelessness.
The noise that some people complained about in the rooms didn't seem to be much of a problem and I was on the third floor. What was a big problem is what goes on downstairs. It's bad enough when people stand around the entrance doors smoking cigarettes which sends cigarette smoke into the lobby, dining area and even the elevators but even worse when they are smoking marijuana blunts. This is very unhealthy and disrespectful yet hotel staff and management permits it. Very wrong.
There is no business center. For any hotel these days that's a big omission and even worse when it's near an airport. At a minimum there should have been at least two computer terminals and a printer for public use, maybe more. This is 2025. It's a newer hotel. Act like one.
There is a decent hotel breakfast that is complementary with many choices. There were prior reviews complaining that some of the food wasn't hot enough. I checked this out and it's true that the eggs and bacon trays are more lukewarm. It would not take much to turn up the heat on the warmers for those two trays. But, as I said, when people wrote reviews complaining about this the hotel management takes "note" and then does nothing to fix the problem.
In summary, this hotel deserves a diminished rating for failing to do simple things that could make it better and for being not only inattentive but also rude and condescending toward customer feedback. The microwave issue is illustrative of this. 55 Euros for a little microwave is not going to make the hotel go broke. Go down the street and buy one. While this hotel has good points that is attenuated by the fact that they are just things that it should have so it's not like they are exceptional. Not every issue is easily addressed, to be sure, but some are and those that are should have been rectified long ago. (As I said, the microwave is a good example of this. Not only it is a cheap fix but the hotel could kill two birds with one stone by getting one and putting it down in the breakfast area so the people who say their food isn't warm enough could put it in the microwave.). Instead, the hotel management blows off and insults its guests who take the time to provide legitimate feedback. Shame on them. They are definitely in the wrong business.