Holiday Inn Franklin - Cool Springs by IHG — Hotel in Brentwood

We drove 14hrs across the country for a festival near the Holiday Inn - Franklin - Cool Springs. We received an email from the property a day prior instructing us to fill out our stay requests on the website before we arrive, so we did. We requested an earlier check-in from the standard 3PM and a few other minor requests that I forget. Doesn't really matter because all of it was CLEARLY ignored.

We arrived to the hotel at just after 1pm on our check-in date and were greeted by a middle aged surly desk clerk. I politely greeted this man and started to explain that I had filled out the request online for early check in. He very rudely interrupted by saying "Oh, that's cute honey". I stopped talking and didn't really know what to say. I thought maybe he was not understanding me so I started to say what I wanted again and again he butted in rudely with a comment about me being impatient. I was completely confused. I had just finished a 14hr drive across the country, I believed that I had done all that I needed to do in order to check in early and the clerk clearly did not care at all about what I wanted. He continued to ignore me and type on his computer. When I tried to speak again he again cut me off telling me that I need to learn some patience. He went on to make a wide sweeping gesture beyond me and stating "all of these fools are here thinking that they are going to check in early, what makes you special?". I had no response. I calmly spelled my last name for him when he asked me again because he did not listen the first two times I gave it to him. While he was loading up my account he made it a point to make a comment about how I "clearly don't know what a hair cut is" and then another rude comment about my clothing and general appearance. I was shocked. I had been on the road for 14 hours. When in that time would I have had any time to get prettied up for this guest clerk?! In the middle of what was most likely going to be another rude comment he stopped himself and said "well, I'll be. You must be the luckiest man on earth because your room IS ready". He programmed our room keys and started to give us his scripted informational speech about the amenities on site. While he was giving this speech, he got to the part about the Fitness Center. He started to tell us about the fitness center, made a long dramatic pause while looking me up and down and said "The Fitness Center... which you CLEARLY will not be using." At this point I had received enough abuse so I took my keys and walked to the elevator.

Upon entering the room we noticed it was relatively clean, with a few items out of place and.... a large cicada or other 2 inch cockroach looking bug suspended from the ceiling by a cobweb was left to greet us.

We just wanted to shower, change, and get the heck out of this hotel. However upon entering the bathroom to take that long awaited shower we realized that the body soap, hand soap, AND conditioner were completely empty. We didn't have the energy or desire to deal with the curmudgeon behind the desk so we ate our left over road snacks and watched some tv until shift change.

Later on that night we walked downstairs and found a new desk clerk off in the restaurant area watching tv. He came over to the desk when we rang the bell. We asked him for the missing soaps and he said he only had travel sized shampoo and conditioner and was not able to give us body wash or hand soap.

To top everything off our room was located next to the stairwell which people felt the need to use all night so we got to hear the VERY loud SLAM of that door up until midnight when we finally fell asleep. Eventually we were able to sleep and the only good thing I can remember is the bed was pretty nice. After the beatings we took, I think the bar was set pretty low.

Save your money, stay in a park somewhere. It'll be cleaner, safer, and you'll likely get less rude treatment from the wildlife...

"What could improve"? That's a loaded question. I stay in 3-4 different hotels per week. I have Platinum Elite status with IHG and this was probably the worst location we've stayed at. The carpets are stained, the room has a bad smell (the smell of cat urine), and the lobby isn't warm and inviting like most Holiday Inn locations. I would say for Cool Springs, Brentwood, and Franklin, TN the standard is behind the curve. When we checked in, the gentleman behind the counter was too busy listening to his EarPods to be bothered with paying attention to us. I asked him 3x how he was doing, to which he never replied. He was so distracted. We walked by several times and each time he was so invested in his phone or TV show, he didn't even look up. One of those times even purposely avoiding us by ducking behind the counter and hiding into the staff room to avoid having to talk to us. Later in the evening we called down to ask for an extra pillow. He said, "If the laundry room is locked, I cannot get more pillows. Call me back in 10 minutes." Since when is it up to the consumer to call back to the front desk? Isn't good customer service offering to call the consumer back? Also, when we finally called back he said he had one pillow, then proceeded to tell us we'd need to come get it at the front desk. Lol. No thank you. You keep your pillow. Maybe we'll request it tomorrow. And maybe we can get soap while we're at it, since there is none in the room and only about 1/4 roll of toilet paper left. Based on the lack of attention to detail in the room and upon check in, my guess is that the room probably isn't cleaned up to standard. Do better y'all. I'll give 1 star for the location. But that's about it. The second day when we entered the lobby, the gentleman was working again. We overheard hollering because of another customer complaining about the lack of cleanliness in her room. They offered her an entire refund and she quickly left the hotel. When we went to ask for another set of pillows, we were once again told there was, "none in the whole hotel", except he then realized there was one laying on the floor in his office. He goes and retrieves the pillow off the ground and hands it to us... honestly? Fast forward, instead of dealing with the guy at the counter, who I actually find out is the manager, we call IHG corporate to let them know about our stay. We were on the phone for over 2 hours with IHG by the time it was said and done. After being on hold with IHG, they then transferred me back to our location of hotel and THE SAME GUY FROM THE FRONT DESK gets on the line with me! We spoke and he tells me that he is so sorry and that he was on a phone call with his manager and that's why he never acknowledged me upon our arrival last night. Yep, ok... I'm buying that. Not. This conversation goes on for a long while and he continues to apologize and says, "On your next stay we'll make it up to you." LOL. There will be no "next stay", sir. I didn't say that, but I thought it. To finish this, he tells me he will credit 5,000 points to my account for the issues. Guess what is still is NOT in our account? Points. IHG has started to lower their standard in regard to cleanliness, quality, and the product that they offer. This Holiday Inn...

Story time!! My experience with this hotel was extraordinary. I am a former flight attendant so you can imagine the number of hotels I've stayed in. We had two guests and two rooms. We were checked in fairly quickly and headed to our rooms. I am a female and the other guest is male. He had no issues at all. About 15 minutes after getting into my room, someone tried to enter my room. Luckily, I had the safety latch secured. By the time I checked things out a few minutes later, because I was a little freaked out, there was no one was there. Another few minutes later, I get a phone call from the front desk questioning why I was in the room and how I got there. I replied, "With the key you gave me 20 minutes ago!" He promptly hung up without giving me a chance to further the conversation. I quickly called back and questioned if it was another guest trying to enter my room and he confirmed yes and that he assigned my room since he showed it being unassigned. He gave the new guest a new room which is great, because I didn't wish to relocate due to his mixup.

About 15 minutes later, HE TRIED TO ENTER MY ROOM WITHOUT KNOCKING!!!! I happened to be coming out of the bathroom and the door flew open against the security lock freaking me out! I slammed it shut, undid the security latch, and threw it open wanting to know why he was entering my room without any announcement. He said he didn't know I was there. Wait, what?! I questioned what the heck he was talking about, HE CALLED ME ON THE PHONE IN THAT ROOM, he KNEW I was in there, why he would be entering WITHOUT KNOCKING!!!??? He had no excuse. He stammered a weird apology and left.

I told the front desk the next morning and they just basically stood there. Then I have reached out to that specific hotel and to corporate via email and I get petty answers like, "We'll look into it." or "We are sorry. Please stay here again so we can prove we are a good hotel." No thanks! I will never be staying at that hotel ever again. I am posting this as a last resort and warning to others. And looking through other reviews, I'm not the only one this has happened to.

Moral: doesn't matter where you are staying, PUT ON THE...