Holiday Inn Panama Distrito Financiero by IHG — Hotel in Bella Vista

I arrived in Panama City late from a delayed flight, and was quite tired when I arrived at the hotel. I was greeted by a very warm and smiling welcome at the front desk, with all the check-in paperwork already prepared, and check-in took less than one minute. I asked during check-in how early I would be able to have breakfast (breakfast was included in the room-stay), as my departing flight the next morning was at 8am, I would have to leave the hotel by 5:30am, before breakfast service began. I was very surprised at check-out the next morning (check-out took less than a minute....really impressive efficiency at the front desk), when the front-desk clerk handed me a large paper shopping bag with packed sandwiches, yogurt, bananas and apples inside, for my breakfast while travelling to the airport. That was very, very thoughtful.....the level of attentive service that I expect from 5-star hotels (but don't usually receive).

The room was very clean and well-designed, quite spacious, with a very comfortable bed. Very good shower (no bathtub), and quite a spacious bathroom with good lighting.

The hotel is conveniently located, on a quiet street a few blocks away from the main thoroughfare (Balboa), close to banks and shopping areas.

I found this hotel to be of excellent value, and am looking forward to staying here again the next time I am in...

The Mildew smell was terrible in our room. We got to the room & the mildew hit us both, but we were really tired and hungry so my husband said let’s deal with it later. Hopefully the air conditioning will get rid of it. So we took a nap and went out to eat. When we came back, my husband‘s stomach was hurting, and he immediately went right to bed. I told him that smell is pretty bad. He said yeah I know, but I just gotta go to bed. I laid there with a pounding headache (i’ve had that occasionally before when I’ve stayed in basements guest rooms or Airbnb) & I finally fell asleep around 3 AM. I wanted so bad to go down there and see about a switch in rooms to see if another room would smell better. We were in 1103. I thought perhaps because were IHG rewards members maybe we got the funky room but I’m not sure. I’m not sure if they all smell like this, but I won’t risk it again. I feel like the air-conditioning was not working correctly because it felt climbing in the room all night long.

On I the positive the beds were amazing! Soft and so comfortable. The staff was nice. When we checked out at 5 AM, I told the staff attendant about it and he said he would notify...

I'm Diamond Elite member (which means I travel a lot) and whenever it's possible I choose IHG hotels. However, experience in this one is far from what I'm used to. I also stay in Holiday Inn (for eg in Europe) sometimes, so I have a comparison in this segment too.

There was a strange moldy smell in the room, the swimming pool was dirty and there were no towels available at all (nobody brought them for 24hrs of my stay).

The only pros of the hotel are the location and really good breakfast buffet.

I talked to the manager about possible options and what we can do in the situation. There were not many, so I decided that I wanted to change hotels after one night.

The manager agreed that I will get a full refund for the night I didn't use. It's been almost a month and I still didn't get my refund (which was supposed to be sent 2 days after the checkout). I had to send a few reminder emails to proceed.

Now I got information that they will make a refund but they will charge almost 50% of the amount as a fee for the refund. Sounds like a...