The Westin Houston Downtown — Attraction in Houston

First bad thing, we spent out first night in the bar watching the game. Had a great bartender at first. He went on break, 3 youngers ones were working the bar. We sat directly at the bar. We wanted a second refill, these guys were at the other end of the bar talking and on their phones. I sat our glasses on the drain pad so they could see we were ready, after 15mins of being ignored my wife asked if they were working (my wife owns a company in customer service, we are great tippers usually 25-30%), so she has no problem speaking up. The bartender came over and very sarcastically refilled us even slammed our drinks in front of us causing my wife's to slightly spill out. The assist manager Kat promptly spoke to him, he apologized, we tipped him well, and left satisfied. What I did not know is that when my wife spoke up he called her the "B: word out loud. We did not hear it, but the next night, same bartender told me "Hey man I am sorry I called your wife the "B" word last night, although I appreciate his acknowledgment, it was probably better that I did not hear that the first night or there would have been no tip at all. On to the food. Even after all of that, we still ordered food from the bar to take to our room (pricey food, but it is a hotel). My wife got the chicken nachos. There was a ton of sour cream, ton of peppers, but only a sprinkle of chicken and cheese. She only ate a few bites. We said nothing, did not complain. The next morning, going to give it another shot, room service for breakfast, ordered TWO classics, room service brought up one set of silverware one napkin, ok anyone can see by what we ordered 2 people are eating. We did not call back down for someone to come all the way back up (for another tip), instead we used the plasticware out of the trash from the night before. At this point lesson learned, no more hotel food! The second night we ordered pizza to take off to our room. We decided to have a drink while we waited for the delivery. We did not sit directly in the bar, more off to the side between the lobby and the coffee shop. There are no designated signs that this was bar seating, and at this location you really can not determine what is what it is all one big room. There are no signs that state no outside food or drink. We simply put our boxes on the table in the lobby area so we could finish our drinks. My wife literally had 2 sips left and we were speaking to another couple and the manager Desiree came over interrupted told my wife she needed to put the pizza boxes on the floor under her chair, or leave the area. We told her as soon as we finish our drinks we will leave she was persistent that we would comply with her demand ASAP, and proceeded to tell my wife "you would not take McDonald in Whataburger would you?". Not only did this embarrass us in front of a couple we just met, but totally unprofessional. I am not going to put $40 of pizza on that nasty floor even if it is in a box. I ended up going all the way upstairs waiting on elevators as they have 3 but only 2 work, so my wife could finish her drink. When I got back down we spoke to Kat about it, she said she'd talk to her. We never got an apology. I just looked at my credit card bill, for a 3 day weekend we spent over $500 in food, drinks, and that is not including our room, and tips that we paid cash for. I haven't even looked at the card my wife used yet. We are filing a complaint with Citi AA card as they recommend you. You need to reevaluate your choice in managers...

I have been a Marriott Titanium member for 9 years. I believe that hospitality is the most important facet of hospitality for guests who stay at hotels away from their own homes: regardless of whether the guest is loyal or not. Unfortunately, I have found most hotel staff I have encountered to be inhospitable, and some of whom are tricky to work with. Thus, I recently decided to start writing short diaries/reviews for every hotel I visit (though it consumes my time) to hopefully provide some useful information for you and the hotel managers. My hope is that hotels continuously improve to try and become hospitable places with the purpose of serving their guests. In the end, my final evaluation (the number of stars) is heavily based on the quality of my interactions with staff as a loyal member.

I stayed at the Westin Houston Memorial for 2 nights (checked in on August 31 and checked out on Sep 2). I checked in around 4:00pm on September 2 by Caitlyn. Below are my views on good (+) and not-good (-) about this hotel.

Good things: Caitlyn was friendly to check me in and said happy birthday to my daughter. Caitlyn also talked to my daughter a bit, which was very nice. I booked one room for 2 nights, using points. Though the points were even higher then the JW Marriott in the Galleria, I chose this Westin as I had wonderful experience with them during my last stay. This Westin is better to me than the other two Westins in the Galleria. I communicated with the hotel by email and my personal ambassador Ricardo ahead of the stay that this stay was for my daughter’s 16 birthday and requested that they would make the stay personalized and wonderful for my daughter. They upgraded my room to a presidential suite 2006 and prepared the room with welcome birthday presentation including a hand writing card, balloons, a stuffed little bear, and a big chocolate cake. My daughter was pleased and super-happy about the special stay, and my family (wife, son, and myself, together with my daughter) really enjoyed the stay. This was one of the best stays that we have had as a family. The room is a higher category of presidential suite: clean, big living room, two big rooms with two king beds, and wonderful surrounding glass windows (big glass windows with nice views are always important for me) Though the gym is quite small, it has essential equipment and next to the infinity pool on the 18 floor, which is very nice. The pool area is very pleasant to be, especially during the night time. The hotel is in a quiet neighborhood and is close to a lot of restaurant and a big shopping center As an elite member, you can order breakfasts for 2 people from a small selected items, but they are wonderful. I prefer this over a continental breakfast. Renai at the restaurant was very nice and friendly. the front desk staffs were welcoming and warm every time I passed by. complementary cold water (important for me) for all guests in the lobby. complementary parking for titanium and ambassador (as I experienced with them).

Not-good things: Diego, at the front desk, who checked me out was slightly rude. I said that my parking was complementary when I checked in and Diego asked a provoking “who told you that” with a cold face. It would have been very appreciated if Diego chose a more professional way of asking question “Sir, could you please let me know who provided the complementary parking for you”. But Diego chose an unfriendly and rude approach. There is...

Well it’s a beautiful hotel but it’s not worth 600 bucks a night. This was the second time we’ve had trouble with them. The first time we went, valet lost our keys and finally found them after about an hour. This last time when we got there we got our room and nothing was said. We went to the Astros game. The next morning when we go to check out she told us we had 2 rooms and since I didn’t cancel one we were charged. I was like well hell no I only booked one room. Besides if I did book 2 rooms why wasn’t I told this when I checked in. Anyways Long story short we were charged over 1200 bucks for one night. And the bad thing was, was that I never received an email with the confirmation and never realized till that morning when I went to looking for it. They wouldn’t refund us. I had to go do a claim through Marriott and I’m now waiting to get a response. We can barely afford to pay 600 for one night much less 1200. The lady working the front desk didn’t give a shit! But I bet your ass she would throw a fit if she was charged that much! These Marriott people have way more money then us so they best refund our money back!…anyways we’ve stayed there several times when we go to Astros games but I will NEVER EVER stay there again! I will find another hotel that we could walk to after a game! I wouldn’t recommend this hotel unless you have an extra 600 dollars a night to throw away.

Edit…we went at the end of July sometimes and Marriott as of yesterday credited us back the 594 dollars that they charges us for the extra room that they said I booked…when I initially called and made a claim I thought it went well! She gave me a claim number and if I didn’t hear from them in 5 days to call back with that claim number. Anyways I do that and of course talk to someone else that I can barely understand but we get through it and come to find out the claim was closed so she had to do another claim and told me the same thing as first one did. Well 5-6 days later I call back and low and behold the claim has been closed again! So they redo the claim and give me another claim number. At the end of all this I was to my 5th claim number and extremely pissed but the last lady i talked to told me it’s cause the first four sent to the wrong people. Well she just told me that it will prob be more then 5 days and that they will have to listen back to our phone call and do some investigating. Finally after this long it gets credited. Even though we did receive our money back I still feel the exact same. These are the most ignorant people they have working for them! And we will never stay in a...