Aloft Charlotte City Center — Hotel in Charlotte

tl dr : if you stay here be aware that you have to pay $100 extra per night that you stay incase you break anything or steal the beds, ontop of your room charges that you pay upon arrival. you get the $100 charge(s) back in a week provided you didnt steal or break anything. you have to pay your own parking in the gerage at $20/day as well. there is no food included in the room cost but this is noted on their hotel page thay all food offered is at extra charge. on the positive side the coffee is free! ------for my stay------- -financially: i was overcharged $60 for my room and no one seems to know what it was for. it DID NOT show up on my reciept or my hotel profile, but did show up on my bank statement. management had to look on the banking end of their system to even see the overcharge. ontop of the TWO $100 damage deposits for my 2 night stay in Charlotte. the deposits were not disclosed to me when i was booking the room online, infact it was told to me when i checked in at the desk. i was told i need to pay an upfront damage deposit of $100 "incase i break or steal anything and if i dont itll be returned to my account" probly meant as a joke but it isnt a great first impression. before checkingout and leaving town i decided to log in and check my bank account. i found a second $100 pending charge on my card. Went to the desk and was told they actually charge damage deposite by night. that means that if you stay for 5 nights in this hotel they intend to hold $500 of your money ontop of the room cost you already paid for at checkin and it SHOULD be returned to you within 7 buisness days. obviously this was also not stated when i booked the room for my weekend. i was told that the $60 would be returned to me as well within a week instead of getting a refund or even an appology for the oversight. so for my $527.58 weekend (not including food and parking) i ended up spending $787.00. with a promise of getting $259.15 back in about a week "as its on my bank to quickly return the hold, not aloft's responsibility"

-rooms: clean and great view. -location: awesome! the reason we booked here! walking distance to spectrum center! -service: -front desk staff: very calm and patient. we witnessed many customer complaints, while we waited inline to purchase snacks from the pantry area, from wifi outages to parking issues (theres valet or self pay $20/day) and they were always nice and never agressive. we recognize the stress and complaints these members of staff have to deal with daily and they deserve alot of praise -management: never appologised one time for my overcharged stay. not once. simply telling me that she found no reason for my overcharge but that there wasnt anything they could do about it and i should wait a week to see if my bank releases it back to me. i also told her that i was only made aware of a $100 damage deposite upon arrival. and at checkout when i checked my bank, i found a second $100 damage deposite held in my bank account. she then said it was $100/ night rather than per stay. and then goes "oh so they did tell you at check in???" no maam. they told me it was "a $100 deposit". not $200 or per night. then she just decided to "okay" me at every point i made, until she walked away from me and got across the room turned around and goes "i mean unless you have more questions?" very rude way for a MANAGER to deal with an overcharged customer reguardless of the obnoxious damage deposite policy

how does no one on site have the power to return overcharged bills?? unacceptable and unprofessional.

on my way home i called another aloft and they said that their damage deposite is upfront and a one time deposite per stay. if its aloft as a company this lack of policy and reflects poorly on you as a chain. there is just something weird with this whole situation.

so i took photos of my room upon departure as well, that are time and i think location stamped incase it becomes a further issue since i didnt break or steal anything and fully expext to not be charged for...

DO NOT STAY HERE!!!!

I stayed at this hotel from January 7- January 8 2025.

On January 7 2025 after a long day of travel I checked in and was assigned a room. I put my things down and I was very excited to shower. When I opened the shower is saw phlegm on the shower floor. I then called downstairs and asked the woman who checked me in if someone could clean the shower (which should have been done before my arrival) or if I could switch rooms. She told me to come downstairs and get a new key.

After switching rooms I looked in the new shower and it was gross. The grout was stained with mold but it was a shower without human liquids in it. However, I showered with the sink all weekend because I was so disgusted with both rooms. I did not ask to switch again because at this point I figured it could only get worse.

On January 8, 2025 after being out all day I ordered some food and picked it up from the lobby around 8:10pm. When I came back upstairs I saw 2 ants crawling on my bright white Alo sweatshirt. I don’t know how many there actually were in rnis room but that’s what I saw.

On January 9 I called Marriott. The first person I spoke to told me to write the complaint myself after I had already waited to be spoken to. He then wrote the complaint and when I followed up I was told he left out the ants. This makes sense because he didn’t want to take the complaint anyway. The second person said she would fix it. The third person said she was escalating it even though the second person should have. It took 3 people for the general manager to reach out to me.

Marriot gave me 10000 points after I clearly started I wanted a refund because I would never be staying in a Marriott again. I mean would you?

The general manager’s name is Eduard Sofronovici. He was extremely dismissive and gaslit me regarding the ants. He stated that I complained about them 2 weeks later and they could not find any evidence of ants. However I complained about the next day on January 9th but due to the sloppy nature of their customer service that was not documented.

Eduard Sofronovici continued to gaslight me and ignore the substance of my emails by giving short responses such as asking if I had photos instead of responding to the meet of my emails. To be clear, I don’t. I told him I was in the first room for less than 5 minutes and the reason for my switch should have been documented. It’ s alarming that it was not because that room should have been cleaned immediately and an incident like that should be taken seriously. As for the ants, I didn’t say let me take my phone out and take pictures of the ants on my sweatshirt - I started getting the ants off my sweatshirt.

This is disappointing and an embarrassment for Marriott. I emailed Eduard this morning after he ignored my last email and stated that even if he is not going to do the right thing he can acknowledge this was wrong.

Do not...

I arrived in Charlotte for my cousins wedding weekend on February 21st. A newly hired employee (which i learned later during this issue) proceeded to check me in , early I might add though I requested. She did well by greeting me , asked my last name and for proper I.D. This is all usual pertaining to the check in process, however I did happen to noticed she never asked for proper proof of an employee rate, though the check in process went along. As i reached to a nice and seemingly cleaned room (nice view to add) I noticed my account was charged my room rate but also I had $481 hold charge. Knowing this came from Aloft I immediately went back downstairs to get information of what happened . The woman that checked me in proceeded to tell me that everything was right on her end and maybe I was at the wrong location ( Insult #1 and which it didn’t matter because I had this charge on my account). She then asks if my first name was ( “……”- Insult #2) replied no and gave her my full name to which she realized she checked me in under someone else’s 3 day reservation to my 1 day reservation. This suddenly let me know that she never reviewed my I.D accurately and saw the same last name and assumed that was my reservation. While she was apologetic and let me know she would refund it immediately, I knew I wouldn’t receive the money bacm until the next week. So that money was no longer available to me while being out of town. The same woman proceeds to find my actual reservation and proceeds to still check me in under my card on file which led to another $100 hold on my account (Last straw of any patience that was left in me) , which at that moment made me even more livid and asked her to just stop. I had just landed from the airport, took an uber to hotel and was short over $500 in a quick amount of time due to assumption, not clearly reading, and poor communication. I felt very upset , tired and disappointed with the feeling of “just because of a name I must fit that description” Not only do I also work in hospitality and understand certain situations however I was the guest this time and did not have the best experience which I know I could have received. While I was on the phone with my bank, another young woman came over to assist me, being apologetic and ensuring me of a refund. She claimed she was not a manger but her way handling the matter showed me, she should be. I knew things wouldn’t work out in my favor (in due time) and decided to cancel my reservation all together with full refund and I’m looking to see additional Bonvoy points to reflect my account in the upcoming days. This would’ve have been a great outcome and better review if certain and important steps weren’t missed at check in and definitely a failed moment if this was an...