Embassy Suites by Hilton Des Moines Downtown — Hotel in Des Moines

If this qualifies as a 3 star hotel then I'm the Sausage King of Chicago (disclaimer - I am not the Sausage King of Chicago).

To say this hotel was a tremendous disappointment wouldn't be accurate, because tremendous isn't a big enough word. A week before our stay we received an e-mail offer to upgrade to our room for an additional fee. We agreed to the upgrade and were then told we would be informed if we were upgraded... why offer the upgrade and ask for payment if it wasn't available? Needless to say on the day of arrival we were told we didn't get the upgrade. The front desk had no idea it had even been offered.

There was parking under the hotel for $20/day - but there were only around 35 spots when the hotel has 100+ rooms. Even with limited spaces the parking layout was abysmal. There's a steep drop at the entrance. Scraping happened for a number of people.

The room itself was decent sized and the furniture nice enough - but housekeeping was clearly not keeping up with the rooms. There were no linens for the pull out couch. When we called first thing in the morning to request housekeeping, additional towels, and sheets for the pull-out sofa we were informed that they'd put us on a list, but they couldn't guarantee any housekeeping during our stay. The drawers in the bedroom had a wide variety of hair in them. Some short black hair, some long blonde hair, a few gray hairs. Maybe the last person kept their prized hair collection in the dresser, or perhaps wolfman used it for a place to sleep - but it certainly didn't get cleaned.

When we returned to the hotel after a day out we found that the sheets and towels we asked for had been dropped off. No actual housekeeping was done, however.

The A/C was cold, but it was also dripping water from the ceiling intake at an alarming rate. I called the front desk for maintenance and they said they would send someone right up. Almost 2 hours later they arrived and vacuumed out the A/C intake, closed it back up, and left. The dripping stopped. Unfortunately by around 4:00 it had become a pretty consistent stream. A call again in the morning resulted in another maintenance visit which seems to have stopped it leaking for now.

There is a single clear glass panel for the shower, closest to the showerhead. No door, the panel doesn't slide, no shower curtain, nothing. If anyone showers vast amounts of water just careen out the open side of the shower and into the rest of the bathroom. Not even the panel helps much, since it floats an inch or so off the tile lip of the shower, so water just spills out there as well. The massive amounts of water making their way around this bathroom (that has no vent fan) likely explains the mildewy grossness all around the shower and walls, and the warpy wallpaper. Prepare to mop up with your towels.

Oh, and the microwave... My wife asked for some popcorn. The microwave hummed for 2 minutes and not a single kernel popped. I took the bag out, examined everything and put it back in for another minute. It didn't make it 30 seconds when some popping happened, but then some other noises started. I opened the door and pulled out the bag. It was on fire. The scorched bag was barely containing a black mass of charred popcorn kernels. I quickly took it outside because, well, burnt popcorn smells terrible. Open the window to air it out? No can do - they're screwed shut. Lesson learned, don't use the microwave.

That central atrium lobby/dining area is neat, but don't expect the pictures with fountains and a floor to floor waterfall. As of this moment they are all drained and empty. Instead of being attractive and interesting the barren lobby resembles a dystopian Mexican shopping mall - all hard concrete edges and gray tones.

The staff was unhelpful and unsympathetic, the room itself was average at best if you ignore the bathroom and the leaking A/C, the parking garage is sad, and there are 3 extra light switches in the room that don't really appear to do anything at all.

Do...

It started off bad before we ever left home. I checked in on the Hilton App on my phone chose a room, that afternoon before we left our hometown to drive to The Embassy Suites in Des Moines, from Friday January 31st to Sunday February 2nd. I received a notice on the Hilton App the Hotel staff had moved our room, from what I reserved on the Hilton App. I called the hotel and ask the Front Desk Clerk why they moved our room, we wouldn't be there for at least another 2 hours, which I had stated when I used the online check in. The desk clerk said I moved you, because you called and asked to be moved. I had not done this! We get to the hotel, I am not acknowledged as a Hilton Honors member. I explain to the desk clerk I want the original room I had chosen and he acquiesced and put me back in the original room I had selected on the Hilton App. I asked him to make a key card for my husband as he doesn't have the Hilton App and prefers the key cards. I get up to the room and I have two digital keys one for the room the clerk had moved us to earlier in the day and one for the room I had chosen, room 727. The one for the room I had chosen worked my husband tried his key card and it didn't work. We stopped at the desk before going to the evening reception to get the key card fixed. I then told the clerk I have two digital keys one for the room we are in and one for the room he had moved me to without my permission. He said just don't use the other one, but it seemed to me it was a safety issue to me, to have access to another room. The staff running the evening reception were friendly and even made me a NA mixed drink, extra kudos to that staff! We were going to a restaurant nearby where the wedding reception we were going to the next day would be held, so I stopped at the front desk and ask about the shuttle, I was told it's only a block away and we don't normally use the shuttle for that short of a walk except when it's really cold. It was 2 1/2 blocks away and I've had both my knees replaced, but my husband and I walked it, we wouldn't want to put the shuttle driver out for that short drive. When we get back from dinner it's 72 degrees in our room, I turn our thermostat down as low as it can go and that is 65 degrees, way too hot to sleep in. It was so hot in our room we got no sleep. The rooms are disappointing the wood furniture is chipped, there were holes in some of the upholstery and the wet bar sink backed up when it was used. The room was clean and the towels were very nice. The next morning, I went to the fitness center to use the elliptical, my digital key worked great to get in there, but when I got up to our room 727, it wouldn't work and said to return to the front desk. I just knocked and woke my husband up as I didn't want to go back down to the front desk. We had given up hope the front desk could actually help us. We used the hangers with the clips to hang our towels up to dry in the bathroom and put the Do Not Disturb sign on the door, because housekeeping didn't need to come into our room we weren't going to need additional towels. While we were out at breakfast, housekeeping came into our room even though there was a Do Not Disturb card on the door. Why have the cards to hang on the door if they are going to ignore them? Our room never got down to 65 degrees, so it was just way too hot in our room. I stopped at the front desk to get my digital key fixed and she said we can't fix it we need to make you a key card, we've stayed at many Hilton Hotels and they have always been able to fix a digital key. I will say for how large the hotel is, where our room was it was very quiet at night. . We ate at the hotel breakfast the next morning and kudos to that staff they were friendly and did a great job. They should be your front desk staff; they have great customer service skills. This hotel is in great need of a renovation. We've stayed at many Hilton Hotels in the Des Moines area...

Beware! This has to be the filthiest hotel I’ve ever seen.

The location is great, but there are options within the area that are much better.

We entered our room on the 8th floor and instantly got that sketchy feeling. I decided to check around the room for cleanliness. In the bathroom behind the front leg of the vanity I noticed there was something barely visible lying in a pile of built up dirt. I snapped a photo with the flash on, and it was a piece of plastic, but lying just beyond it was a dead cockroach.

We decided not to unpack and to discuss our options at a restaurant down the street. When we returned, talked to the manager to let her know what we found. She claimed that “all sorts of people stay here” and someone must have brought it in with their luggage, and assured me that they don’t “have that kind of problem here.”

They offered us a different room, so we accepted.

We entered our new room on the 5th floor, and were greeted by a tumbleweed of hair lying smack in the middle of the floor. Again, the room felt sketchy and I was uneasy from the roach. We thoroughly looked through the room without unpacking.

In the bedroom, I saw some dark bug-looking speck above the entryway, about 20” from the vent. My husband took a close up photo, which clearly showed the body of a dead cockroach. Like someone had smacked the thing on the wall and no one bothered to wipe it away.

We quickly decided there was no way we were staying here. We went to the front and the manager was in a meeting, and she never spoke to us again. The front desk guy was nice about the situation. He tried to offer us a stay in a “pure fresh” room, which we looked at. Admittedly this room looked cleaner, but there was soap scum on the shower floor of this “deep cleaned” room and it (obviously) shared ventilation with the rest of the hotel so we decided we weren’t comfortable staying.

We got checked out of the hotel and refunded, but then we were left with the issue of being stranded in Des Moines and having to find a last minute hotel for our anniversary trip. We ended up at the Hotel Fort Des Moines Curio Collection down the road, which was a MUCH nicer hotel with incredibly kind staff. We were happy to end up there, but unfortunately wasted our whole Friday of our trip dealing with Embassy Suites.

As a side note, if roaches don’t bother you much but you’re afraid of heights, this also may not be the hotel for you due to the elevators. The elevators have a glass wall which gives you a view of the hotel, but as a height-averse person I did not enjoy the elevator rides and honestly they ramped up my anxiety before we even got to the room. But that’s whatever.

I have been in hotels before with that sketchy vibe but never have I come across dead roaches in my room (or two rooms in this case).

Avoid this place...