Holiday Inn Express San Francisco-Airport South by IHG — Hotel in Burlingame

Beware the smoking scam! Stay at your own risk!

Manger

Mar 2, 2024, 3:28PM (1 day ago)

Mr. B,

Please be advised that after checking your room, we have determined that you or your guests smoked in our room. Our rooms are non smoking and therefor we assessed a charge of $250 on your card.

Thank you,

General Manager

Holiday Inn Express ® SFO Airport South

1250 Old Bayshore Hwy.

Burlingame, CA 94010

Mr B

Mar 2, 2024, 8:24PM (21 hours ago)

to Manger

Hello, You are very mistaken. I do not smoke nor does my wife. I request an immediate refund, If there was any smoking in the room it would for sure have been your employees. I found them on the staircase smoking when we checked in. One was fixing a vacuum cleaner and the other was standing next to them smoking till they saw us. If there is no refund I will go directly to cooperate. I've been an IHG member for over 2 decades and will not tolerate such underhanded tactics.

Manger

Mar 2, 2024, 8:30PM (21 hours ago)

to me

Mr. B

The room was checked by multiple team members, and I appreciate your feedback. However, the charge will stand.

You have the right to challenge the charge and I sincerely understand but 3 team members could not be mistaken. One team member could not even enter the room, that is how heavy the smell was.

Thank you,

General Manager

Holiday Inn Express ® SFO Airport South

1250 Old Bayshore Hwy.

Burlingame, CA 94010

From: B

Sent: Saturday, March 2, 2024 5:24 PM

To: Manger

Subject: Re: Additional Charges

No problem, we will let the corporation make the decision. Thank you for your time. Question: At what time did you and your team enter the room? I checked out at 4:50 Am, and was given a refund on my deposit because your employ stated everything was fine with the room so what is going on?

Manger

Mar 2, 2024, 8:42PM (21 hours ago)

to

Mr. B,

We refunded your deposit at check out as we work on an honor system when the guest initially checks out. When our team arrives after 8:30am, like today, they check all the rooms that were checked out and that is when we discover any issues with our rooms.

We appreciate all of our guests and what they bring to us and how they keep us employed and we go above and beyond to make every visit for every guest as memorable as possible. And that is not a lip service. We sincerely strive for that.

But we also are responsible to protect our place of work and we have some rules that help us achieve that goal and we will reinforce it when we need to which is thankfully not often.

Thank you,

General Manager

Holiday Inn Express ® SFO Airport South

1250 Old Bayshore Hwy.

Burlingame, CA 94010

From: B

Sent: Saturday, March 2, 2024 5:33 PM

To: Manger

Subject: Re: Additional Charges

Thank you for your reply. So I am supposed to take on the risk of allowing the room to be unchecked for over 4 hours and then be responsible for whatever happened in it? Housekeeping has keys, maintenance has keys, the front desk has keys, and security has keys. Anyone of those teams could use the room in a 4-hour time span and the guest has to pay? I have to tell you in over twenty years of using IHG properties all over the world, this is the first and only time this type of unusual practice has come up. I will let Corporate look at our emails and decide if the charge will...

We arrived at the hotel just after 8:30 after a long flight and pulling into the hotel parking lot, the overall look of the hotel at night made us question our decision to stay there. If the Max Cafe wasn't adjacent to the hotel, we would have probably turned around and looked for another place. The lobby was brightly lit and recently remodeled but in a severe commercial building style that looked out of character. The check-in was easy and the woman behind the desk was super pleasant. Because of the late arrival, she did waive the parking fee, which I wasn't even aware of and would have been upset had I been required to pay it. It was obvious that the hotel had very few quests so as a platinum IHG member, I was surprised that I was given a standard queen room rather than be upgraded to any of the king rooms (Leisure, executive, suite, etc, or even a room facing the bay which runs along the rear of the property) Going back out to find dinner wasn't easy... most places in the area seemed to close at 9. The parking lot is woefully under lit and felt a bit sketchy, especially given the general location of the hotel. Our room 350 was down a very long hallway that had not been redone and felt really eerie... kind of horror movie eerie but once inside the room we were surprised to find that it was much nicer than expected. It was clean, very plush towels, amazing water pressure with tons of hot water, the toiletries didn't include lotion or anything else other than a single small bar of soap by the sink and pump bottles of body wash, shampoo and conditioner, they are J.R.Watkins and they were VERY good quality but the bathroom was on the very small side as bathrooms go. The sheets and pillows were fine, the bed was extremely firm (which I happen to prefer) but might not be for everyone.

The breakfast set-up was unusual in that you walked up to the open door to a room where you gave the attendant tickets given to us the night before. There was a sign explained that the food would be boxed to go and listed the choices in the form of this or that (eggs or pancakes, yogurt or cereal, banana or orange and several juices. Around the corner was a small coffee station that offered either regular or decaf coffee in cups with no lids and no tea or hot chocolate. Trying to manage the long walk to the room with two boxed meals and two coffees without lids was a bit of a challenge.

Checkout was as simple as dropping the card keys off in a basket on the desk but there was no one at the station to answer any questions for departing guests. There was a man sitting just beyond the check-in who briefly looked up from his chair seeing that I was leaving but made no attempt to get up and ask about my stay or thank me for choosing the hotel.

One nice thing we did notice as we left was the large pool sitting about 5 feet above the ground in the front of the hotel and also some interesting landscape elements that were totally invisible to see when arriving by night. Some garden lighting would have solved that problem. One last comment, the parking lot in the front of the hotel holds very few cars and upon return from picking up a take-out pizza, there were no spots available, so I parked in one of the 4 handicapped spots and explained it to the super nice woman behind the desk and she assured me that...

This is a great hotel! We visited the area from North Carolina for a wedding and split the trip between two different hotels, this one, and a resort and spa about an hour away that was near the venue. Let me start off by saying, the experience at this hotel far exceeded our stay at the resort. When we first arrived after our flight, we were a few hours before their normal check-in time, so we had already made plans to go to Max’s for lunch, which is in their parking lot. We got to the hotel to drop our bags off, ate lunch, and were back at the hotel within an hour. Kathy was helping us and when we got back, we waited a few minutes before she called us up to the desk and told us she could go ahead and check us in. She gave us complimentary bottles of water and told us how to get to our room. The room was clean and spacious and the bed was comfortable. We were only there for one night before checking out to head to the resort for a few nights for the wedding. Like I said before, the resort didn’t even compare to this hotel. Everyone we encountered at the resort was rude and made us feel like we didn’t belong there even though we were paying guests just like everyone else. So believe me when I say that by the time it was time for us to check out and head back to the Holiday Inn Express, we were ready to leave. Joash checked us in the second time and he was fantastic as well! This time, we got to the hotel incredibly early, I think around 10:30am, again just hoping to drop our bags off before going out for the day. We dropped our bags off, and then sat down at a table to figure out where we wanted to go. We weren’t there maybe 5 minutes before Joash came up to us and said he could go ahead and check us in. We were shocked and very pleased. He also gave us complimentary bottles of water and told us how to get to our room. Again, that room was clean, spacious, and the bed was comfortable. Deybin helped us check out the first time and helped us with the shuttle the night before our flight back home. He answered all of our questions and was so friendly. He made sure that we didn’t have any concerns both times. Overall, this was a great experience. Everyone we encountered here was so friendly and made the stay even better, especially Kathy, Joash, and Deybin. If we’re ever in that area again, we will definitely be staying at this...