First, the positives: hotel is beautiful, with elegant wood paneling, and detailed murals decorating the ceiling and upper walls of the lobby. The large room with two queen beds we stayed in was spacious, modern, and clean.
The onsite Wellingtons restaurant was the highlight of the hotel for us, serving up deliciously prepared dinner entrees. Shout out to our dinner waiter, Brett, who went out of his way to provide outstanding service. Breakfast was a little more disappointing. Normally, it turns out, in-dining breakfast isn't even offered at the restaurant. Only room service breakfast is available. We happened to be staying during a few days the hotel was fully booked with law students taking their bar exam next door at the Albany Capital Center. So, buffet breakfast was offered. But, coffee was not particularly good, and pancakes we had were extremely dry. They tacked on an 18% mandatory service charge without even giving notice about it for ordering extra items not available at the buffet. Hostesses were chatty and not particularly polite, and we were seated multiple times without even so much as being given place settings.
The aspect the hotel fell short on, in my opinion, was the hospitality element. In the hospitality business, especially at premium room prices, you expect the staff to be forthcoming, helpful, and hospitable. Instead, we were presented with a barrage of excuses as to why the hotel wasn't functioning as normally expected. We exited our rooms at 9:30am, taking down our "do not disturb" signs, and saw cleaning staff on the floor. But, for some reason, our room wasn't cleaned upon return. The excuse from the front desk? Unexpectedly short-staffed, due to the influx of law students at the hotel. This wasn't told to us upon checking in.
Another disappointing aspect of our stay was how the cleaning staff let the hall vacuums rip prior to 9:30am, in front of rooms like ours where we had requested a late check out the night before for a little more rest, and our "do not disturb" sign was still up. This happened multiple mornings in a row, actually. When confronting the manager regarding this issue, he was rather complacent and essentially shrugged his shoulders, not even offering so much as an apology.
So, overall this hotel did have a lot of excellent potential. But, unfortunately, due to improper planning to have adequate staff on duty, and what appeared to be somewhat dysfunctional management and lack of accountability, it fell short.
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