DoubleTree by Hilton Hot Springs — Hotel in Hot Springs

Nice hotel, would be a 4 or 5 star except for one massive issue. They apparently don't want you to have any coffee. They give you a small daily ration of two half cups per room, and there is no coffee in the lobby. When we checked in, I asked where the coffee in the lobby was. They said there was none... he said maybe the bartender could make me some, but it was getting late, so maybe not. So we went up to the room figuring they'd have a keurig or something, but no... there was no keurig. They have the absolute cheapest and worst hotel coffee maker you can get. It uses the little teabag pouches that you can't buy anywhere, and they only give you two per day. The coffeemaker, completely full of water, will only make two half cups. Which, as a reminder, is not a big deal if you have coffee in the lobby... but they don't. Whoever runs this place might have some religious belief about drinking coffee or maybe they prefer tea, idk... but if you drink coffee, you might need to stay somewhere else or bring your own coffeemaker. There is a waffle house nearby. that's the only way to get coffee at the moment.

*I left this review while we were staying. Unfortunately it did not get better.

I made reservations through Trivago weeks before our trip and immediately called the hotel to make sure the reservation went through. The hotel staff assured me the details were correct and confirmed a room with a view on the 4th or 5th floor. At check-in the staff member was very confused by our reservation, asking if we were from Paris, France and called my wife by the wrong name which I guess was in my reservation information. He had to manually change all my information and continually blamed the "third party" reservation and their "new system." It took 15-20 minutes to finally get checked into a room on the 2nd floor with an obstructed lake view and a tub instead of a walk-in shower with glass.

They charged 500 dollars extra to my card. When I saw this, I asked the front desk why I was getting double charged (my assumption). They replied with "sorry, new system, that's weird, don't know what that is, it will be reversed and come off in a couple of days". This is very misleading. I noticed that they advertise that they put a 500 dollar hold on anyone's card who lives within 50 miles of the hotel for damages in case you are holding a party, which is not allowed. The only reason I can think of that i was charged is because my home address is a very small arkansas town (120 miles away) and the guy checking us in, hadn't heard of it, so he charged the card, just in case. Telling me that would have caused me to confront them about it, so they deflected, and failed to tell me why I got charged, half truth... basically they lied.

I called twice for dinner room service. The front desk answered both times after it rang for a while and apologized, and tried again. I gave up when the front desk said, "sorry, he's really busy right now, I guess we don't have room service right now". They could have written down my order, brought it to the kitchen, and charged my room, but apparently we can't expect the front desk to use common sense, or maybe this is against policy... I'm not sure which it is, but it's odd.

The hot water went out on check out morning, so cold showers are a possibility. My wife did in fact take a cold shower at 10am. We've never in our lives been in a hotel without hot water. We figured we better let someone know, things happen.... when we let the front desk know, they said "hmm weird, maybe the boiler isn't keeping up, that can happen when everyone is showering at once." This didn't seem concerning, or like an emergency to him. I guess 10am is rush time for showering, so maybe just plan your day around when you will or wont have hot water.

Great building, very...

I am attaching the letter that I was directed to write to the Operations Manager, as the hotel General Manager said there was nothing more that he could do. I also spoke with Hilton's customer care, who shared that we would have a response in 3-5 business days. 14 days later, we are still waiting. Our stay June 24-26 was an absolute nightmare! I would be cautious about staying at this hotel.

Good Afternoon Ravi,

I recently spoke with Sal Patel, General Manager at your Doubletree Hilton in Hot Springs about our stay during the weekend of Jun 24-26. He told me that you would be the best person to speak with as the Operations Manager. I'm sure you are aware of the situations that happened during the weekend. Here is our experience during our stay:

Arrive at the hotel on Friday evening around 6:30 pm. Our friend, the father of the bride, had arranged for a running tab for this group at the lobby bar starting at 7 pm. There was only 1 bartender at 7, who, originally, seemed unaware that this was expected. This got resolved, but not a good start to the weekend. Saturday morning, 6 am-10 am, the fire alarm was going off and we were unable to be in our room. The enunciator was not turned off during this time, even though this was a false alarm. Saturday afternoon at the wedding. The food service was a cluster - tables were not fully served while other tables were starting to be served. When we did receive the food, the steak was uncooked. Not rare, just seared on both sides and purple in the middle. All of our table and others ate around the meat, didn't eat it, or sent it back. It was disgusting. Saturday evening from about 5 pm until 11 pm the power to the hotel was out. This was in the middle of the reception on the 7th floor, and it was 100 degrees outside. This made it extremely hot inside. It was very uncomfortable to be anywhere in the hotel, including in our rooms. Sunday as we checked out around 9:30 am we went to grab an elevator. Waited about 10 minutes while one elevator with housekeepers and supplies went up, and was finally informed that the other elevator was not working by another guest coming out of the stairs. We ended up carrying our luggage down the stairs in order to get out.

We were at the hotel for less than 40 hours and were unable to comfortably be in our actual room for at least 10 of those hours. We would have left Saturday night if we could safely drive, but decided that staying was the safest choice.

Ravi, I spoke with Sal today after reaching out to the hotel and him for the past 2 days. He told me that he could give me 20-30 dollars off the bill. After multiple calls, a conversation with Hilton customer care, and a conversation with Sal, this is ridiculously offensive to me as a customer. I am blown away that the guests can be valued this way.

I expect to have our total bill of $524.44 for both nights refunded. I look forward to your response and reconciliation...

SCAM! SCAM! SCAM! Be AWARE ! If you are a smoker DO NOT stay here! We smoked outside in the car and in the casino for hours and I’m sure our clothes smelt like smoke so they accused us of smoking in the room charged my credit card $250 claiming they had to use a expensive spray ABSOLUTELY ZERO DAMAGE TO THE ROOM.. If you are going to go off an odor on a CUSTOMERS clothes, the place should just have a sign that says “ DONT STAY HERE IF YOU SMOKE” From the minute I checked in the manager was going over all of these rules with other “GUEST” for literally 20 mins - on & on & on like they was giving out free rooms and we should feel lucky to be there.. They do not treat you like a customer more like a child, no drinking in most areas(although I don’t drink I thought that was stupid) rules upon rules I had a bad vibe from the beginning but had already paid on Hotwire so I stayed.. When I spoke with the manager about the UNAUTHORIZED charges he says the housekeepers said it smelled of weed smoke and we don’t even smoke weed but we do smoke cigarettes.. Seems this place needs to be investigated because after this happened to me I read other reviews and I’m not the only one who was falsely accused of smoking in the room and SCAMMED!!! Next time we visit Hot Springs I will choose a AIRBNB I have NEVER had a issue with any other place there except for this one and I visit often.. They must get a cut or money added to their budget or something for these charges because it was absolutely FALSE and FABRICATED or perhaps their housekeepers are smoking up their and blaming guest, I’m not sure but this was a BIG never AGAIN ! Shame on you DoubleTree Hot Springs ! One day your going to scam the wrong person and I hope you are all caught taking advantage of tourists like you are doing!!! I lost almost $400 bucks and was literally in the room for 6 hours to sleep and shower and since I’ve been home I’ve been on the phone dealing with these false accusations !! What a nightmare I’m surprised I was able to pump gas to get home they attacked my card with all kinds of deposits and charges.. I can only hope people listen so it doesn’t happen to you and two days after Christmas at that, these people are definitely a...