I recently stayed 3 nights there. I have stayed several times in this hotel and my 1st time was in 2002 a few months after the hotel was opened. And this is this stay in 2002 who enrolled me in Accor program (Sofitel privileged guest at that time). I always liked this hotel which was way better than any of the other Hilton/Hyatt/Mariott that was available at that time. Unfortunately, my business and leisure trips have not bring me to Chicago for several years and it was 6 years since my last stay. So I was very happy to stay here again in the lovely city of Chicago. Overall I had a good stay but, unfortunately, far from being top notch.

Booking - the problem of resident/resort fees

The 1st inconvenience started at booking when I discovered that this hotel was among the ones practicing the robbery of resident fees/resort fees. We had discussions about that in the dedicated thread. This is IMO a truly scandalous practice. Now that Mariott is currently being sued for this practice in the US, I hope it will make soon jurisprudence. At the time of booking, I exchanged emails with the Room Division Supervisor, who finally accepted to waive this fee. I am copying here the exchanges I had with the hotel, as they are quite interesting:

• me : “I was looking at booking in your hotel and saw that you are charging a resident fee of $15.71/night. Can you explain me what this is ?”
• hotel : “We have an amenity fee of $17.62 per night with tax included. We have this fee because we offer Wi-Fi, coffee and tea, newspapers, 24 hour fitness center, business center, etc. This fee is applied to every reservation per day.”
• me: ”Thank you for your answer, but I have to say that I am quite surprised by it. You are basically telling me that you are charging a non-optional fee for some basic services that are normally included in the room rate ? Why don’t you have also a surcharge for air conditioning, toilets, towels, etc ? The screenshot #1 is from the webpage of your hotel describing the services proposed. Some of them have a red dot indicating there is a additional charge for them. Fitness center, wifi, business center are not flagged with this red dot, meaning that they are included in the room rate. Furthermore, most of the amenities you have listed are part of LCAH benefits (wifi including the premium one for Platinum members, fitness center, newspaper) - see screenshots #2 & 3. So there is clearly no reason to charge such a fee and, in any case, it should be waived for LCAH members.”
• hotel: “I also would like to clarify the confusion regarding the amenity fee. Amenity fee is a daily mandatory fee that is applied to all reservations regardless the Le club membership types. As it is your first time stay here at the Sofitel Chicago Magnificent Mile, I would love to make it one time courtesy and take care of this charge for you for this stay only.”

It was not my 1st stay (and I clearly stated that in my communications, but it doesn’t really matter here). Finally all good, but customers should not have to go through this. As my stay was pre-paid, the resident fee was also charged upfront, so it was decided that it would be used a credit for incidentals.

Check In

Check-in was a pleasant step and the Accor Feel Welcome was a true thing. The front desk attendant was really great welcoming Platinum guests. I was kindly upgraded from a classic/king to a nice Luxury/King room on one of the highest floor, with view on the J. Hancock tower. Certainly nothing to complain about at that step. The drink voucher was given at check-in.

Picture of the lobby:

Room

The rooms have been renovated since my last visit and I was happy to see that the hard product of this hotel was still very solid. NIce room with the lovely MyBed.

Typical nice north American Sofitel bathroom. Toiletry products were Hermès soap bars and Lanvin shower gel/shampoo/conditioner/body lotion. Note that the Lanvin product packaging has changed (it is now in blue/violet vials).

View from the room

This 1st evening, coming back from dinner around 9 pm, I realized that I did not receive the welcome gift along with the usual welcome note. Also there was no turndown service this evening. The following morning, I wanted to enquire at the front desk but it was busy and so I sent an email to the generic hotel address about those 2 points. This email has never been answered, which I don’t think is a sign of caring attitude toward a Platinum guest. But apparently this email was read as, the 2nd evening, someone knocked at the door to bring me the welcome amenity and the welcome note signed by the GM.

Some of you who have read the thread about LCAH welcome amenities are already aware of the miserable 3 small biscuits I have received. I have never seen something so miserable in a Sofitel. OK, I admit that the 15% discount at CDA and bar is a nice benefit, but they’d better not bring such a ridiculous welcome gift as this is almost insulting, especially when you look at it in conjunction with what is written in the welcome note “please enjoy our freshly prepared welcome amenity as a token of our appreciation”. OK…

Turndown service was also provided on the 2nd and 3rd days.

Something minor but…the free newspaper provided was a photocopy of a French newspaper. OK great, but everyday the copy provided had only half of the pages (the odd ones)…so totally useless.

Dining

Both the restaurant and the bar have an outdoor seating for the summer.

Although I always enjoyed, in the past eating at Café des Architectes (it was a good restaurant), I was disappointed by my dinner there this time. I took the lobster pasta. I am glad that I saw the word lobster on the menu, because the dish was basically a big plate of pasta with tomato sauce and 3 minuscule pieces of lobster. Totally uninteresting. They advertise in the rooms and lifts/lobby that they have a new chef that has revisited the menu, but I was not impressed and it is for sure a downhill compared to what this restaurant was before.

The bar 

Nice modern atmosphere. Staff was a bit robotic/lack of warmth. The drink voucher cannot be redeemed for Champagne contrarily with Washington. Only the classical house wines and soft drinks/beers. A bit cheap for Sofitel IMO, even if the proposed white wine was very good.

Overall

Check-out was quickly expedited. The resident fee was already correctly deducted.

The fundamentals of the hotels are still very solid. This is a good hotel with nice rooms in a great location : at the corner of Chestnut/Rush/Wabash, 200m from Michigan Av at the Hancock tower. But several things were not on par with my expectations for a Sofitel and loyalty handling and with what they were providing before. With the exception of the great agent who checked-me in, I found most of the other staff member lacking of warmth and caring attitude, although they were never rude. I did not appreciate that they did not take 30sec to respond to my email about welcome gift and turndown service. And of course the problem of the robbery fees that you should not hesitate to challenge.

I have written a note to the GM today, not as a complaint, but for constructive criticism. We’ll see what will be his answer.