BigE

The website still says "club level rooms available" under "Guest Rooms". Anyway, you're not really missing much.

You should still get your platinum welcome bonus (500 pts), regardless of what they said.

nazca8

It's too bad they closed down the lounge. For those of us with kids going to Legoland or San Diego, it really helped to be able to feed the kids something in the morning at the lounge. Still a very nice Sheraton property though.

DesertRat

Bad news. The lounge was well-serviced despite the legoland crowds. It saved us $40/day between breakfast and snacks, and I thought it really set the hotel apart from the many others in the area.

multivariate

I am staying at the Sheraton Carlsbad this week. I've probably stayed at this property 8-10 times this year. The person who checked in before me was a SPG gold, and upon check-in was given a suite upgrade and told all about the great lounge at the property. No upgrade for me as a plat, but not an issue.

When I tried my key the next morning on the lounge - I found it didn't work. When I asked at the front desk, the agent looked for my corporate rate code, and said "This is now a corporate lounge, and your platinum status no longer works for access. We only open the lounge to select corporate groups."

Is this unique to this property, or is this new "corporate lounge" strategy popping up other places? Also, is starwood giving upgrades preferrentially to hotel specific corporate SET groups ahead of SPG loyalty status?

I guess to the defense of the property - I will say that it always was annoying having some other SPG member with 12 kids and grandma coming in while I was getting some breakfast before a day of meetings.

I'll ask the manager later - but this would be a most disturbing development.

GIVE ME MY WATERY OATMEAL OR ELSE!

j

Starwood Lurker

It is probably unique to this property as well as other Sheraton-branded resorts that operate a lounge.

No, not as a general rule, but this property may be doing so.

Best regards,

William R. Sanders
Social Media Specialist
Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide

[email protected]

Totoro

Lurker, may I solicit your comment on this Club Lounge closure?

I was under the impression that a Club Lounge is part of the Sheraton brand standard and will be open 7 days per week in the future. Sheraton properties without a Club Lounge will at some point open one. How is it that a Sheraton property closes their existing Club Lounge?

Is this property being reflagged as another Starwood brand?

Starwood Lurker

The Sheraton Club Lounge brand standard does not apply to Sheraton-branded resorts. JMHO, but it never has in the past; probably never will in the future.

Best regards,

William R. Sanders
Social Media Specialist
Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide

[email protected]

Totoro

Thank you for the clarification. I never thought to make such a distinction.

michelle227

Stayed here for one night late last week...it was convenient to where I needed to be and the rate wasn't horrible.

While the room was certainly OK space-wise, I was not thrilled with having to make three calls to the front desk in the first ten minutes to report problems that should have been picked up on by housekeeping and reported to maintenance...not the least of which was that the light switches by the door were not functioning.

Then there was the dead plug in the opposite corner of the room.

Oh, and no functioning television...yes it was plugged into the wall.

One of the three, I could almost see just being one of those things that happens occasionally. But for three issues like that to exist is, to me, indicative of staff that don't communicate. I don't expect to see that sort of a situation at an SPG property and certainly not one that is hitting me up with a resort fee.

No apologies offered from the front desk on any of the three calls (nor any sort of an offer to move me to another room, which should have been quite doable since the place seemed deserted that night) and nothing at checkout when I made a point to mention the numerous problems.

JerryFF

Just stayed 5 nights on points. Generally satisfied and would return if in the area.

Pros -
Property quite spacious and attractive, both inside and out.
Rooms adequate, actually a little larger than expected. Reasonably well appointed.
Staff very friendly and helpful. Concierge excellent, one of the best I've met. Front desk folks very helpful when SPG computers went down and they could not access my SPG account and checkout. Worked everything out after we left.
Restaurant (Twenty/20) much better than average hotel restaurant, both for lunch and dinner.
Large pool with plenty of chairs. Service reasonable
Third floor room in building 1 - mostly quiet and convenient.
Parking convenient.
Offered Gold amenity at checkin - complimentary drink or 250 pts.

Cons-
Plumbing previously reported not good at hotel. Sure enough, toilet backed up 1st day we were there. But plumber came within 10 minutes after we called and fixed it - no problems thereafter.
Housekeeping - cleaning ok but didn't replace products as needed. Again, they did come quickly when we called.
Elevator a bit slow but never to the point of significant annoyance.
Daily fees -
While more and more this is becoming the norm, this place charges $24/day - $12 resort fee plus $12 self parking. I do think even within the industry, this is excessive.
As previously reported, no lounge.

We would return if in the area.

BTW, there is a new Hilton in Carlsbad that advertises itself as a beach resort. It is a very weak competitor with the Sheraton - if you like the Sheraton, do not be tempted to stay at the Hilton.

TravelScholar

Staying there next week. We're driving down from Las Vegas, and will have two rooms and two cars.

1) Is there any less expensive parking available nearby? $24/night to self park 2 cars for a week is really going to add up.

2) What is "included" for the $12/night resort fee? Any way around this? We exchanged SVO points to Starpoints for this booking and were not informed of this fee. I only found out about it looking up this thread on FT ahead of our stay.

CIT85

I've ben looking for a hotel within easy driving distance of San Clemente for upcoming business trip. The resort fee plus parking makes this hotel not a good option.

JackE

(1) Nothing nearby that I saw during a recent stay.

(2) Internet was included, at least. I don't remember what else was; I wasn't really paying attention.

One thing about this property is the restaurant charges a "neat charge" if you order liquor neat! I've never run into that before. They backed off when I disputed it because it was not disclosed on the menu.

SaigonCyclo

Perhaps you could park at the Carlsbad Crossings Golf Course located next door (about 4-5 walk), but not sure what their overnight parking policy is?

Regarding the resort fee, it's waived for Platinum members.

CIT85

I finally decided to try this hotel and stayed there for 2 nights. No real upgrade, although the standard rooms are quite large. $12 Resort fee was waived for Plat. Self parking was $12

Plat continental breakfast benefit was worth $15 towards anything on the menu. I had smoked salmon Benedict both mornings with coffee and did not pay for the coffee overage. Very nice breakfast benefit.

Happy hour from 4-6 PM had 1/2 price pizzas that were quite good.

Very nice stay. I'm glad I decided to give this hotel a try, even though it's ~30 miles from San Clemente.