Holiday Inn Express & Suites Farmington Hills - Detroit by IHG — Hotel in Farmington Hills

The Holiday Inn Express is dying a slow death. No longer the Holiday Inn of the bygone era, it seems that all locations are now independently owned and operated under the brand name. ||The parking lot has an odd layout, no wonder the property is quick to disclaim itself from any liability because it is so dimly lit and much of it not visible to anyone. There is one parking area completely behind another building, so be ware of this point if you are a late arrival and the front fills up.||This location seems to have undergone a recent refresh, I did not say renovation. My first floor room had new furniture, not sure about the carpeting, but the fixture plates were reused and some of the outlets did not work. The refresh did not include the bathroom. The shower water was lukewarm at best, and this is springtime into summer, not the dead of winter. I am not much of a tv watcher but don't bother turning it on and find something else to do- the provider must pay the motel to run this channel package because there is no way anyone would pay for the channel selection by a satellite or cable provider. ||Others commented about soiled or stained linens, I did not read reviews in advance and I honestly did not look closely so tie goes to the runner on that one.||The breakfast is the standard Express fare and the area was clean. I do not have a complaint there. ||So the week following checking out my credit card is still holding onto a "pending" charge even though nothing was charged to the room. The phone number listed on the motel website does not work, and I tried calling it for quite some time. The email is a gmail account so who knows when this address is checked and by whom, if anyone... I called IHG Corporate who gives you a nice runaround and refers you back to the property for issues. So meanwhile they are still tying up my money and I never got a bill- physical, email, or otherwise. ||What hotel cannot or will not provide you with a bill? So there can only be two things afoot here- one is you are too cheap for the cost of a piece of paper or perhaps if you don't send a bill you try to keep the "hold" money when someone forgets or just claim other charges since the customer never got a bill when they checked out, right? After all, they claim "damages" and when you figure it all out, well what are you doing to do? Since corporate does not want to get involved, if you have a dispute with the motel you are relying on the same people who put you in the dispute to resolve it, and that generally does not go well. On those grounds alone, you would do well to find a better backed property somewhere else.||I am frequently in the Detroit area but I can tell you this one, like other Holiday Inn Express, is scratched off the list of candidates since I see many of them heading in a certain direction- downward. I should not have to chase around phantom charges nor a place where it is obvious you are cutting corners here and there to save...

We checked in for 1 night for a volleyball tournament and the guy at the front desk was not very friendly, never again. Checked in and went to our room. I always check for bed bugs at every hotel so that was the first thing I did when I got in my room. I was happy no bugs but while checking I notices a dark reddish/brownish stain on one of the pillows upon closer inspection it was dried blood on the pillow. So, I started looking at the comforters and found food stuck to the comforter on one bed and huge black marks on the other comforter. We went to the front desk and told them about the room. They gave us a different room on a different floor. Again, checked for bugs and all was good with that. We looked at the comforter and all looked good. We were sitting in the room getting ready to watch TV and decided to use the bathroom before and once we flushed the toilet it started running. It would start running about every 30 seconds after that. Sat back down to watch TV and my daughter decided to take the comforter totally off her bed and that is when we noticed that the underside of the comforter had what looked like it was a child’s handprint that looked like it had had food on it on the comforter. I decided to flip my comforter over and look at it and it had dried food stuck to it also. Called front desk and told them the issues and they sent a maintenance man to the room with two new comforters, and he fixed the toilet, so we thought. After about 30 minutes my daughter decided to use the restroom and once she flushed the toilet it started running again doing the same as before. Called the front desk and the lady was not very friendly and told me she tried to get ahold of the maintenance guy, but he didn't answer but she would keep trying and have him come back to our room. Well at 10:30 pm he still hadn't come back so we closed the door to help quiet the noise from the running toilet as it was very loud. Even with the door closed you could still hear the toilet running about every 30 seconds. When we checked out the next morning the lady at the front desk was rude even before I told her about the issues. She told me that she could give me a $25 credit or 5000 points. Well needless to say I have not received either of...

We arrived at 3:30pm on a Wednesday and while checking in, a member of house keeping was speaking to the lady checking us in. Check in was quick and cordial and were issued keys to a room. When we got to our room the same house keeping lady was exiting our room. She passed us in the hall and said "just making sure it's good". When we got in the room it was filthy. The chaise (where our 5yo was going sleep) was disgusting, with several fresh surface stains, some of which where white. The part of the furniture with the metal tracks for putting your suit case on where also disgusting with mold surrounding all of the metal tracks. Finally when we used the toilet it would not flush. When I went to call the front desk I discovered the insert card for the phone was missing so I had to guess how to use it. When I called the front desk and asked for a new room the lady was again very nice and offered to bring keys to a new room up to us. Before she arrived the house keeping lady knocked at the door and asked to see what was wrong. We pointed out the few issues and she said "I knew about the chaise but the toilet isn't me" and left. The front desk lady knocked on the door a few seconds later and gave us keys to the room next door. This room was better but still dirty. The chaise was stained but not as bad and the metal rails were moldy/dirty but again not as bad as the first room. The carpet however was filthy and heavily stained. When we went to sleep later that night my wife had several hairs in her bed and the next morning after showering I discovered a loogie (spit) on the shower wall. The front desk staff was very nice but the cleaning standards of house keeping where abysmal and disgusting. We were in a rush to get ready for our event so I unfortunately didn't take pictures.

Side note: A friend of mine was staying here with his family as well and he found an unspent round of 5.56 ammunition on top of the closet.

It's a shame that the rooms are poorly maintained because it was a nice room. Unfortunately it doesn't matter how nice the room is if it's that dirty. Especially in...