The Westin Indianapolis — Hotel in Indianapolis

We were in town for the GenCon Convention, which we come to every year. This is the first time we were able to book into the Westin, which is the closest to the convention center and we were very excited. We arrived early around 2:30 to find a very long wait to check in and we waited 2 hours to check in. Apparently the hotel had computer issues. At 4:30pm after checking in I spoke with a representative in the lobby, Britney, and explained to her that due to the delay in check in we were going to miss our dinner reservations and since 60,000 people were coming into town for the convention, we were not going to be able to get another reservation for our party of 5. I asked if she could get us a reservation at the Hotel restaurant,Shulas, which she did and then offered us a free appetizer or dessert for our trouble. We were slightly insulted that after waiting in the lobby for 2 hours, our luggage sitting on the curb until someone could get to it and missing our reservations at a restaurant we were looking forward to attending, that they were "giving us" a free appetizer/dessert. Britney understood and spoke with the GM and she returned to offer us a $100 credit for dinner ($50.00 for each room/family) Shulas is an upscale steak restaurant and we happily accepted the offer and thanked her. Dinner at Shulas for the 5 of us ( we were traveling with another family and they had a room at the Hotel as well). Dinner at Shula's was excellent and we even tried the Apple Cobbler that Britney suggested and it was phenomenal. We split the check up and charged the bill to our room as we were instructed to do by Britney and they would then credit the account $100. We went to bed and was happy with the way the evening ended. At 11pm that evening we were awoken by a phone call from the front desk instructing my husband to bring a credit card down to the desk (immediately). My husband handed me the phone and I spoke with the front desk person. She said we were over out limit and we did not have a credit card on file. I explained to her that at check-in they did not take a credit card because they were having issues with the system, however we paid 1 night room and tax as a deposit through the convention block. I mentioned that we waited 2 hours to check in today because of computer issues. She said she knew because she was there working when it happened. That actually made me more upset because why would you call guests at 11pm and demand they down immediately when you were aware of the entire situation. I explained to her that it was 11pm and we were sleeping and we had events starting at 8am the next day. She said we needed to come down with a credit card or "Lock-out" procedures would start the next day. Well as you can imagine I was upset and did not sleep much that night. The next day I addressed the situation with the GM, who gave me a standard apology and said he would look into it. I was still frustrated at the experience. I did contact Britney as apparently she had tried to call me left a VM on the cell phone of one of the members in our party, despite me calling and changing the information so my phone number was correct. Apparently no one changed it, despite me asking. Britney was once again awesome and very sympathetic! She did leave a very nice gift bag in our room with chocolate and 2 Westin thermos. It was a VERY nice gesture and we very much appreciated it. At around 10pm when we got back to the room for the night (2nd night), we pulled back the sheets and discovered that they were not changed as requested. The Westin like many other hotels has a "green" program. I read the directions on the door hanger and it stated that if you wanted to have the sheets changed to place the card on the bed and put your dirty towels on the floor in the bathroom. We followed the instructions, however the sheets were not changed. I had left the card because the we had inadvertently spilled some coffee on the bed in the morning, and the stain was still there. I called down to the front desk and spoke with a manager on duty. I was further disappointed as the "Manager" had no idea that there was a card to place on the bed to notify the housekeeper to change the sheets.... A very nice House-person, Lesha came up to change our sheets. During her visit the manager called her on on the radio asking if there was a card that guests could place on the bed signifying that a guest wanted their sheets changed. Lesha simply said yes and that the housekeeper did not read it. Lesha was extremely friendly and I assisted her in changing the sheets as we were eager to get to bed and having to have someone change the sheets at 10pm at night when all we wanted to do was go to bed. I went down to the desk the next morning and by this time staff was aware of the room number and my name who having all the issues. I spoke with a male manager and explained to him what occurred and once again got what I felt was a non sincere apology as well as the statement that I had heard from every employee that apologized to me... "this never happens". He then commented about sometime bad experiences become a "snowball" effect. At this point I knew that no one cared about my poor experience. Westin is a Full Service Hotel and with the higher room rate, Brand, as well as it being a downtown full service property comes certain expectations that your will have a better experience that average. In speaking with the party we were traveling with they too had issues. They did not receive housekeeping 2 days in a row and had to "beg" each night for soap, shampoo and towels. The guests at this hotel seems to be an inconvenience. I found the staff was very nice but they did not know how to execute their jobs effectively nor could they deliver great customer service. On the 3rd night our TV remote did not work. The maintenance person that came to the room did not understand English well and told us that in order for us to rent movies we needed to put a credit card down.?? At this point if I could have checked out and found another hotel I would have. After 20 minutes of the confused maintenance person standing in our room, another maintenance person finally showed up, reset the TV and the remote began to work again. I have stayed in MANY hotels of all service levels and I have to say that I have stayed at ONE STAR Hotels with better execution. A clean room and good service is what you pay for and except for my brief encounters with Britney and Lesha I didn't received what we paid for. Upon check out no one asked how our stay was....and we were charged full price for the FRUSTRATING and terrible experience. I expected more from a Westin. I will NEVER stay at this...

We pulled up to the front and no valet showed up. It’s $60 per night!! For that much SOMEONE should’ve been there! The valets in the morning told me they have a computer system that doesn’t work but since there’s no competition the computer company can do whatever they want. Apparently they’re on hold for three hours when they call to get technical help. I’ve been to many Marriott’s that are very streamlined with a QR code and a separate QR code so you can tip. This is just the beginning of our stay. I reserved a king and another room with two queens. When we got to the room we realized it was two queens and had to go back to the front desk to get the room we reserved. I’ve been driving for 12 hours, there’s no valet, and then they give us the wrong room and the front desk clerk proceeds to tell me to not be upset. That upset me even more. I’m a titanium elite member and I’ve spent 80 nights so far this year and NO ONE has had to tell me to calm down. Oh I was pissed by the gall of this lady. Now I get to the room and proceed to order breakfast for the morning and of course the Mobile ordering didn’t work so I had to call in the morning. I couldn’t get connected to the WIFI either. In 80 nights this is only the second hotel I couldn’t connect to the internet. I could connect to the WI-FI but it never took me to the webpage to put in the code because this hotel doesn’t allow you to put in your room number and last name to connect like 99% of the other Marriott’s do. So needless to say I never used the WI-FI. The person taking my breakfast order in the morning said they had apple juice but it wasn’t listed on the mobile app. If I didn’t ask I would not have known. So I asked for apple juice and wheat toast. Why not list it if you have it? When the food came we got white toast and orange juice. They said they were out of wheat but instead of calling and asking us for an alternative they just decided for themselves what to bring. We then got our breakfast in plastic containers! What happened to plates and silverware?! This is a Westin! They could at least not serve breakfast in a bag! How can a hotel of this caliber be out of wheat toast and not even bother to call to see if we would like another selection? The TV said welcome Thomas, Ambassador elite instead of Jason, Titanium Elite. In the morning when I was to text the number they gave me to have the valet get our car can you guess what happened?? Yep, when we got down to the valet there was no car. My phone said the valet had already got my valet order. I showed it to them and that’s when they proceeded to tell me their valet computer is junk. I paid $60 for this service!! These things might sound trivial but when you add them all up the experience would definitely cause me to seek another hotel in Indianapolis on my next trip through this city. So many things were wrong about this stay it really looks like management is sloppy and has no attention to detail. I would expect more from this quality of hotel. The only redeeming factor was the hotel itself. The beds at the Westin are like sleeping on a cloud. The bathroom sinks are massive which is great when you have two people getting ready at once. The room, hallways, and lobby are all warm and inviting. The only redeeming factors. Not worth the horrible customer service. This place needs...

My husband and I booked 2 rooms for our 8 friends, one in each of our names for a large annual convention near The Westin (Indy - Downtown). My husband arrived at 1 PM and had no trouble getting his hotel room. He sent me his room # so that I could unload my baggage & get my friends checked into their room upon arrival. I checked in our 2nd room & noticed it was the SAME room # my husband had checked in. The front desk had shut off his keys and gave me the room. I managed to get my husband down to the front desk & we straightened out the inactive keys situation. Unfortunately, they didn't have a 2nd room clean yet to give to me. They took down my phone number and indicated they would call me to let me know that our room was ready. No one ever called. After a normal dinner time at a nearby pub, I went back to the front desk and asked about a room. They only had a King + pull out by that time, which is less than suitable for the 4 large people who would be sleeping in that room. Feeling as though we had no other choices, we accepted the room. The clerk offered us free internet for the weekend for the hassle. Now back to my husband's room, I will merely list out the difficulties which are typical for lesser hotels than the Westin and will probably be familiar: (1) not enough towels. (2) Repeated contact to Housekeeping to obtain more towels each day (3) No housekeeping service for one morning where occupants weren't out until 10 AM despite a request to housekeeping (4) Very small bathroom; difficult to turn around. (5) No bathroom fan/vent. (6) A hotel trash can on the premises was overflowing & unchanged for the duration of our stay. (It was very distinct in appearance and smell as you exited the building on a side door. There was a turkey leg sticking out from one side with flies all over it and an old-fashioned Coke bottle next to it. We first noticed it Friday night and it remained in the same state through our departure at 2 PM on Sunday.) In an effort to be fair to this Westin, here were the high points of service (a) the concierge & valet services staffed very kind people who assisted us quickly. (b) Lines at the front desk went quickly. (c) Any staff seen in the hallways were courteous and appeared happy (smiling). Here are some additional points which met my very basic hotel expectations but I would not allow this to change my overall experience: (i) Bedding & pillows were of good quality; soft & supportive. (ii) Housekeeping encourages the reuse of towels & bedding where occupants are willing to participate. (iii) The provided shampoo, conditioner, hand soap and lotion were a fantastic scent. Of the 3 downtown hotels our group of friends has stayed over the last 8 years, this stay was by far the worst, but as you can see above, there are some good things about the service. This hotel likely will not make our list next year as we might be better suited to try something completely new...