Hilton Garden Inn Ann Arbor — Attraction in Ann Arbor

From the moment I landed, until the moment I checked out, the customer service and attention to detail was superb. Your team delivered the utmost customer experience that included exceptional guest service which surpassed my expectations by a long shot. For a moment, I thought I was at a 5 Diamond Resort... Not a bad feeling knowing that I paid a lot less but received the same service. I will start with when I arrived. I received this beautiful text message asking, "is there anything we can prepare in your room before your arrival?" "Let us know if you have any questions and we hope you enjoy your stay." :) - Justice This wasn’t all of it, but it was what mattered. So, seems like a standard, easy way to give that little extra touch, but this doesn't happen that often, if at all. The simple, but beautiful text message went a long way. Being that I am one of those who truly believes in exceptional customer service and delivering that customer experience that the customer won’t get somewhere else, I could not keep this to myself….I was in town to train a new manager for our Property Management firm and since I was going to be meeting up with our local leadership, I just had to share this with the Branch President who shared and made it part of the leadership meeting since a huge part of what we talk about is what can we do to go that extra mile, give that extra touch and change someone’s day, especially in our current times. This is what we need! This was more though… this was Justice separating herself and Hilton from others by executing the customer experience perfectly. What was it that Justice did that sealed the deal and executed it so perfectly? I will now share my response and let you know what came next. My response was typical, as I am quite the funny guy (at least I think so) I sent back a “Thank you, this was a nice message.” ‘” I will be at my office around the corner for a few hours and should be checking in around 5ish.” ‘” Unless you have a never-ending supply of ice cream that can be set up in my room, I should be good lol.” ‘” Thank you for the message.” Her response was simple, but brilliant… “Sounds good!” ‘” Thank you very much!” – Justice. These weren’t the last of the messages as I decided since my office was only .7 miles, I can at least drop my bags and walk over so I wanted to confirm it was ok I come earlier than I originally told her. To my absolute surprise and disbelief, I walk into my room, get situated and find a sticky note on the refrigerator/freezer that says “I hope you like vanilla” 😊. Yes, a pint of Vanilla ice cream and utensils waiting for me. Justice thought about my “funny comment” and while checking me in, pretended all was normal knowing all along what she did. This right here was what sealed the deal for life! I cannot take away from the four others I interacted with as well. All of them… top notch, high quality, sophisticated and friendly. You have a lot to be proud of and I will continue to share my Justice and Hilton Hotel story. At our company, our first pillar starts with the employee and one of our values is service. With that, we practice the 5-star service standards. What you are training, and your team is executing is like no other. I can see the morale they share as it resonates out to us, the guest. So,...

Update: While I appreciate your response, I take exception to some of your clarifications. You do charge for coffee in the lobby. Either that or someone at the front desk has created their own signage and is accepting cash payments daily for it, as members of my party can attest to. Not only that, I received an email response from Hilton directly stating "As per Hilton brand standards for DoubleTree by Hilton, in-room waters, as well as restaurant and lobby coffee, are charged for lower-tier members." That seems pretty clear-cut. Please do not lie, just admit you are following procedure and charging for coffee.

As for the pay breakfast, I'll assume it was simply a misstatement upon check-in and not an intentional attempt at trying to deceive guests although I have my doubts.

As for the bottled water, please see the referenced Hilton quote from above again. You do charge HHonor members for water if they are not at a certain tier level. As I mentioned originally, I admit to not reading the tags closely enough to recognize this at the time. My mistake, I am a low-tier member and not eligible for the free water and the charges are accurate. But your clarification is incorrect....all HHonors members do not receive complimentary bottled water in-room. Again, I ask you not to lie, and just admit you are following procedure and charging for water.

I still stand by my original review, and your response does nothing but reinforce my intention to avoid Hilton properties in the future.

Original Review: For myself and my family, I stayed a total of five combined nights in three rooms recently for a wedding in the area. The rooms were fine, mostly clean and in decent shape. The property was the same, not amazing but not terrible either. One room complained the water pressure was terrible, but the other two rooms it seemed OK. The staff was overall friendly and helpful. Our rooms were not ready when we arrived at 3:30 (check-in at 3:00), so we had to wait around about 1.5-2 hours before we could actually access our rooms. We were told at check-in there was a free continental breakfast, but that was not true. The next morning we found the only breakfast options were all pay based. There was also no complimentary coffee in the lobby, each cup cost $3.00. Upon check-in I was greeted as a HHonors member, it was on the TV screens when we entered the rooms, etc. So when I saw the bottles of water in the room that said they were complimentary for HHonor members, I didn't think twice. I admit I did not read closely, as they apparently specified they were only free for upper level HHonor members, not the lowly basic members like myself. So that was an unexpected $12 charge that came through after check-out. Not going to break the bank, but after spending just under $1,200 for the rooms....getting nickle and dimed for coffee and water seemed quite petty. I will actively avoid Hilton properties going forward...

stayed here one night to escape a little Michigan winter gray, using the pool with the kids.

selected this hotel for the kids pool pics and reviews from a Google search of hotels with cool pools in the area.

this hotel did not disappoint! it was really great! used my Hilton Honors app to book a room.

stopped at red robin on the way in for a kids style lunch. checked in at 2pm, and Justin at the front counter took great care of us! we were in the room and changing within minutes! nice.

the room: we had a two queen room on the fourth floor. I travel a fair amount for work, and kinda take a look around the room to see what shape it's in. I'm not picky, but I just like to look for indications of how the hotel is kept up. the room we had was simply great! the bathroom was clean, all drywall and wall paper was in great shape. tub, very clean (nice) tub/shower faucet worked great, and had hot water very quickly. nice big tv in the room. a fridge. beds were comfortable. the room was great. real nice and comfortable.

pool: the pool was great for our 5 and 10 years. it's L-shaped, and had a zero entry young kids area with a little water slide and some other kids water features, then a larger 3'-0" deep area, ending in a 4'-0" deep area complete with basketball hoop at the end of the pool.

Jacuzzi: this was a good sized hot tub, and was nice. I enjoyed spending time in it, then cooling off in the pool. no issues here.

lots of towels in the pool area, and a lot of pool noodles, balls, and frisbees. pool area was clean too.

great pool experience.

when I made reservations, I picked a room that included the breakfast option. I think it was about $12 more. totally worth it. breakfast is $11.95 each, and we had two adults and two kids in our room. a great bargain. omelets & waffles made to order, and other breakfast bar offerings, fruit, today, banana bread, boxes of cereal, scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage, etc. it was really good.

all in all, I would highly recommend this hotel to anyone. no issues at all...no...