Chicago Marriott Northwest — Hotel in Barrington Township

We used this hotel for our wedding room block in June. We chose this hotel over the Sonesta due to our previously great experiences with other Marriott hotels. Our wedding day was perfect, but this experience tainted it for us. The lack of communication between the sales team & the rest of the hotel employees was horrendous. I went back & forth with the sales team for over a year to confirm everything & ensure there would be no stress the wedding weekend. This included the room block & shuttle schedule. My (now) husband & I arrived to check in & they told us that his room was booked & then canceled. We showed them the room block booking list that I literally received a few days prior AND he showed them his Marriott app confirming the booking & they said, “well it’s not in our system so you have to book again.” That was stressful & frustrating because I was worried this would happen to other guests as well. I worked with the sales team to have 5 shuttle times to/from the hotel. One for the bride’s group, one for the groom’s group, one to get hotel guests to the wedding, one to get guests back, & a last one to get the bridal party back after cleanup. The team seemed to act like this was no problem at all & we had the schedule secured. However, the shuttle driver seemed shocked when we were in the first ride that they would have to go back to get the groom & groomsmen. He was under the impression there would be only TWO trips the whole day. I told them who I worked with & he huffed & puffed. He wasn’t surprised that this was happening again & was SO frustrated. Frustrated to the point that we could all see it, which made us feel guilty even though we shouldn’t have. I want to add that the driver was a good driver & even with the lack of communication, we got where we had to be. I would ask that sales management improve communication with the rest of the team. I’m happy to provide names of who I worked with in sales. My friend was walking towards the lobby doors around 8 PM the night before the wedding & there was a man making uncomfortable comments to her & other women. She brushed it off. Mind you, this man was definitely in earshot of the front desk employees. The same man tried following my mom to her hotel room that night, which was terrifying. So terrifying that I was too scared the night before the wedding to stay in my separate first-floor room without my now husband. We never heard anything from the hotel about what happened to the man nor did we feel secure. That same night, we were hanging out in the hotel restaurant/bar. Keep in mind that I confirmed with the sales team multiple times that it would be open. Its opening was delayed by at least an hour due to “no employees to work it.” Finally someone came by to open it nonchalantly & you could tell this woman was not a bartender. She didn’t understand the menu, didn’t know how to make simple drinks, & charged a few of our guests incorrectly at the end. We were very patient with her but definitely a frustrating experience. We would have spent a lot more money that night if it didn’t take 15 minutes to get one beverage. The restaurant was also running VERY behind (there was maybe one other person there ordering food…) so we opted to door dash fast food instead. Again, we would have spent a lot of money that night if we had the opportunity. A couple in our party had a hotel room that smelled SO strongly like smoke. They asked the front desk if they could get a new room & the desk employee said “oh yeah someone threw a huge party last night.” Okay? Then maybe be proactive & don’t give out those rooms?? My now husband got locked out of his room on the wedding day. Front desk suggested he get late check out for 2PM for ease, which was then confirmed by the employees. When he went back to his room to get ready on wedding day, it was locked at 12:30PM.

Will I continue to stay at other Marriott hotels? Yes. But I will never stay at this hotel again, & I highly recommend anyone looking for a wedding room block to...

TL;DR - Please do not use this hotel to host your weddings or other events, as it is the one part of my wedding that I truly regret. Every other 1-star review they have about issues with sales and shuttles WILL become your 1-star review as well!

Before I dive in, let me just give this preface: the review is long because a lot went wrong. I am, in fact, leaving out many details in favor of giving the gist of everything that led up to this 1-star review. I would be happy to provide more in-depth details to concerned potential customers, the hotel’s management, the Better Business Bureau, or even a lawyer.

Yes, the Chicago Marriott Northwest is objectively the nicest hotel in this part of Hoffman Estates, amenity-wise. That’s why we booked it for our wedding block (our venue was the Bridges of Poplar Creek just a few minutes down 72). However, we immediately ran into some severe communication issues with the sales staff coordinating our block. At best, they were slow to respond; at worst, they were rude and unhelpful. For example, when they asked for my credit card to complete the block reservation, they asked me to provide it in a scanned PDF form attached to an email. This is wildly dangerous and unprofessional, as well as a huge breach of Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards (or PCI); do not ever provide your credit card information to anyone via email, regardless of who they are. I won’t rant about the headache of getting this and other details confirmed, but I will simply emphasize that it definitely was a headache to accomplish seemingly simple transactions.

It is worth mentioning that during this preparation process, one of the details that was confirmed (in an overly-complicated process) was that we would have two shuttles bring our guests from the reception back to the hotel: one at 10pm for some guests who were elderly or physically disabled, and one at 11pm for anyone else. We’ll come back to this in a bit…

The night before the wedding, I (the groom) settled into our suite alone. The room was fantastic, except that when I opened the closet, there was a small pile of clothes, presumably from the previous guest, clearly worn to the gym. I found a plastic bag to dump them in (dirty boxers and all) and gave them to the front desk staff person, who was quite sympathetic to the situation and apologized profusely. Mistakes happen, and the cleaning staff were all very friendly whenever I encountered them, but cleaning up some other dude’s dirty gym outfit was not how I expected to spend the evening before my wedding.

Everything described so far would bring this review to 3-stars (maybe 2 if I was feeling grumpy). But the thing that would merit a 1-star review without any of the other troubles above is the resolution of the shuttles mentioned previously. During our wedding reception, as 10pm rolled around, we made our way to the front of the venue with our guests who were promised an early shuttle. To emphasize, this included guests who were elderly and physically disabled.

The shuttle did not arrive.

I (the groom) spent the next 30 minutes calling the hotel, asking about where it was. I was told several things, including: “It just left and will be there soon.” Not true. “It had to get gas on the way.” Not true. “It’s not our responsibility, because you booked through a 3rd party vendor.” Not true. Eventually, a shuttle did arrive at 10:30pm. When I talked to the driver, he informed me that he was, in-fact, the 11pm shuttle, and he was told to arrive early and wait until 11pm. He also told me that he did not stop for gas, and it indeed only took him a few minutes to arrive (the hotel and the venue are a short, straight shot from each other). In short, the various staff I spoke to over the phone repeatedly lied to me to cover up what I can only assume is a failure by the Director of Sales to actually book the 10pm shuttle that she promised us.

My attempts to address all this with the GM were...

Where do I even start. Location is very convenient right off the expressway. Check-in was very easy and the gentleman at the front desk was very friendly. There was a luggage cart that we were able to use but no one to help us. Probably par for the course these days. Short walk to the elevator. Exiting the elevator we noticed an unpleasant stench on our floor which was the sixth floor. As we walked away from the elevator it became less pungent but when we got in our room we discovered that it too had quite a funky scent. There were also plenty of little hairs that had been missed by housekeeping and there were small flying bugs. They seemed like gnats maybe. The air conditioner and fan did not work as it should, but rather seemed to turn off and on whenever it felt like it despite what I set it on. I went down to the front desk to get provisions from the guest pantry area and waited over 15 minutes and nearly 20 before the friendly gentleman who had checked us in at the front desk came to assist me. To be fair he was busy with people checking in and who had questions and issues, but I still had to wait a really long time. He at least gave me the items and I don't believe I got billed for them. That seemed appropriate enough. It was just a few drinks and snacks but still. The next night a request for extra pillows could not be honored because they could not find any and the only reason that I was able to get extra towels is that there were some lying out. I'd rather have them than not so I took them. Lady behind the front desk is friendly enough and seemed rather powerless because there was no one around to help her. Perhaps a sign of the times but it is frustrating to not be able to get extra pillows or extra towels, except by chance and good luck. Also by the second night of our stay the smell in the area outside the elevator had become almost intolerable and it was worse in our room as well. The room itself was nice in the bathroom and shower were nice. The workers were friendly but acted as if they were rather powerless to help with any of the problems and maybe they are. Frustrating. Reported the issues to the front desk before and at checkout and while they took note of them and somewhat apologized, it did not seem like they were interested or able to do anything about it. Not even some Marriott points which is the customary we're sorry response these days, or at least in my experience. I don't really know what to say beyond all this but in summary, it was a decent hotel with some major problems and I would look for other accommodations if I had to stay in the area again. One final note, the small alcove where we had parked was directly accessed by a sidewalk to a side door, but after we exited the building, we found that the walkway was flooded from the sprinkler system and the ground all around it was too soft to walk on especially in dress shoes. When we tried to get back into the hotel, the door knobs did not work and I nearly gave up before trying one more time and fiddling with the door handle to get it to open. They say it is the little things and I suppose that's true, but what it really is, is a bunch of little things! They make a...