Fairfield by Marriott Inn & Suites Knoxville Clinton — Hotel in Clinton

If I could rate this place -12, I would, but not because of the situation I'm about to explain but because of the level of service and professionalism I received as a Titanium member from some staff including the property's General Manager. I stayed two nights at this property. Each of my nights were booked separately and paid for with points (so my stay was taken care of if you don't include incidentals). Fairfields require a $20 incidental hold per night, the first night, it was requested and paid when I checked in. According to front desk staff, the incidental for the second night was not taken (however irrelevant for the moment). My second night's stay I almost couldn't do, I didn't have quite enough points, but ended up getting the amount that I needed for my second reservation. I find myself having to stay in hotels a lot this year hence the titanium status. Anyway, I happened to look into my bank account last night to find a transaction from the hotel itself for the amount of $70. Mysterious. I called down to front desk to figure out what happened but the representative didn't seem to know why. The transaction occurred sometime in the evening of my second night, btw. I also spoke to Marriott Customer Service as well, they also didn't seem to know what was going on. CSR advised me to wait until this morning to call front desk to speak to the manager.

This morning I went down to check and spoke with the girl at the front desk about the charge. She said it was from the previous reservation and she just kept saying that it wasn't a charge but that it would fall off my account. My folio doesn't show where this came from. I've never seen this happen as a guest, but as a Marriott representative I've also never seen it happen that way either, but she kept saying "you know the system so you know how this works." NO?! Like I just said, I've never seen it. My reservation was paid for with points. Nothing else should have come out of my account. Period. It's one thing to say up front that extra holds are placed on a card because it's your hotel's policy to do so, but not every hotel operates that way, that's why I've never seen that happen. Anyway,I told her I would come back down to front desk. when the manager got in and speak to him. Later on, I went back down because I had laundry to do, he happened to be down there. I threw my laundry in first to kinda kill two birds with one stone. When I returned to the front desk, we started to talk and immediately I could feel the hostility coming from him. Again he said a lot of the same things the girl did, and brought up the fact that I use to work for Marriott so 'I should know.' every time I would say something like "your system" or "charge" he'd correct me to make me use technical terms such as "FOSSE" or "authorization" as if changing the verbiage would change the situation and it wasn't doing anything but making me angrier. I had a right to be angry. I don't care what you call it, money was deducted from my account that didn't need to be. My reservation was already paid for. no other funds should have been "authorized". Then he was like, "didn't you say yesterday that you didn't have enough points for this second stay at first?" I said "yeah but what does that have to do with anything? that was a completely different reservation for one, and two I obviously gained the points I needed for my reservation so what's your point?" everything after that was him saying stuff the contradicted the last thing he said. First it was an "authorization hold," then it was a mistake, then it was he didn't know where it came from and basically it was all confusing. He was just being completely rude and unprofessional. Yes I was upset, but I still did my absolute best to handle this as best as I could, meanwhile he talked over me and wasn't exactly hearing me. I tried to even calm down and try to have a civil conversation with him, but ultimately instead of figuring it out, he asked me to vacate at my checkout time. I said "I've never had a hotel ask...

The front desk folks were nice, even though one of them didn't know what an Uber was. 🙄

Why the 1-star?? The rates here during football weekends are exorbitant and ridiculous. We ended up staying here for 7 days because our RV sustained damage becoming uninhabitable. We were fine paying the regular rate of $122 then when we extended our stay from Friday to Saturday, I was charged $364++ for ONE (1) night, even though the night before I was quoted $294. The excuse was because it was a football weekend. This hotel is NOT a $364 a night hotel, no matter what event is going on in the area. I complained to the manager, who ended up calling me to tell me that they "gave me a break of $20 for Friday since I had double beds the rate would be higher..." No consideration that we stayed for a week....Really???

Because the RV was being repaired, we needed transportation as we did not bring our car. Thankfully, the folks I work with were kind enough to pick me up and drop me off every evening. Getting an Uber at this location is practically impossible. Uber eats is available (pricey), but Uber transportion is nowhere to be found in the vicinity. That's a huge negative.

Clinton is a beautiful area. However because this hotel price gouges on the rates during football season you can choose better. The manager made no goodwill attempt to come down on the price to normal rates, instead charged us with no hesitation. If I'm going to pay $360++ a day I'll stay in a REAL 5-star hotel, not at a Fairfield Marriott 🤮. The manager told me they had several cancellations that weekend, rightfully so. 😏

Also, the hotel is not pet friendly. In comparison, we stayed at a Tru Hilton hotel on Saturday night in Lake City, FL on our way back home. They also had a football weekend. Unlike Fairfield, I only paid $180 in total. The Tru Hilton Lake City hotel had hard floors, beautiful lobby, a superior breakfast to that of Fairfield, and pet friendly. When I shared with the hotel attendant at the TRU hotel what I paid in Fairfield, they were stunned.

Save your money and go elsewhere. The only positive in this hotel are couple young front desk attendants who were very nice, and the lady that took care of breakfast. Nothing else.

Management here leaves A LOT to be desired. I'm not going to even bother to post pictures of the hotel. They are not...

My 2 day stay here was terrible!! BUT I paid for 2 days in advance. The only thing I enjoyed was how much air freshener they pump through the building constantly. The location is remote to most of the tourist attractions. They have the entire lobby decorated like Christmas complete with an tree!!!! The breakfast was TERRIBLE!!!!! Also the hours to be served breakfast are very narrow. The beds are not comfortable at all. The parking lot is constantly busy with waffle house, taco bell, and other walmart traffic. Add a gas station, and dunking doughnut to the mix and the traffic makes a terrible nigbts sleep. There was a wedding crowd so I didn't sleep much at all. There's ZERO VIEWS so who cares what room you get. I was in the top floor and still no views and the wedding crowd was noise. Let's see parking was limited compared to their other properties too. Checking in and out was my nightmare. The front desk lady (young, long hair, and glasses) could never get things right. Everytime I went up or by she was getting complaints from the guest about their bills. I was NO ex exception. It took 2.5days to get my bill right! I had to get an extra $18 bucks per day removed from my billing. I booked at $129 tax & fee included. However they kept changing it to $129 + taxes & fees. The lady kept saying she would have her manager do it on Saturday but no show, then Saturday from home. Then Sunday from home, and the long list goes on from the lady at the desk. She always kept telling me she doesn't know how to work the systems etc. I WANTED MY money back so badly!! I checked out and went to downtown knoxville to the Marriot Bonvoy properties paid LESS and got the 9th floor with a almost 360 view of the city. I was was spoiled at the downtown location. NEVER EVER EVER will I stay at the Clinton property again! RUN !!! I still never received the call from the General Manager...