Residence Inn by Marriott Dallas Las Colinas — Hotel in Irving

AVOID IF YOU'RE A DISTRESSED TRAVELER - This location engages in predatory business practices and exploits people during emergencies

I'm writing this as a warning to other travelers who might find themselves stranded due to airline issues. This Marriott location practices predatory billing that specifically targets people in crisis situations.

What happened: After American Airlines stranded me in Dallas for three days due weather delays on August 28th, I attempted to book a room here at midnight. Have you ever had to come to terms with not getting to tour a wedding venue with your finacee? Have you been dumped in a strange city without transport late at night? I was exhausted and under extreme stress. I never received a confirmation email, never got a follow-up call, and obviously never stayed at the property since I had no verified reservation. I stayed elsewhere.

The scam: A few days later, they hit me with a $150 "no-show" charge for a reservation that was never confirmed. Think about that business model. Charge people for rooms they never knew they had reserved and never occupied.

Management response: When I called to dispute this obvious billing error, management "conferred." "I'll talk to management and get back to you at around 1:00 p.m." No such call. Why would there be? And they decided to keep the money anyway. No confirmation email? Doesn't matter. No stay? Doesn't matter. No actual service provided? Still keeping it.

The contrast: Other businesses I dealt with during this same travel disaster showed basic human decency and flexibility. This Marriott location saw someone in distress and decided to extract an extra fee.

For Marriott corporate: This Las Colinas location (not the Courtyard just down the way) lost you a customer who was otherwise satisfied with other hotels of yours. I will tell everyone I know, and beyond, that they treated me worse than dirt. Apparently Marriott likes keeping veterans like me on the street. Hey, Marriott, out of the meanness of your heart, could you give me a cardboard sign too? I'm sure you have hidden fees for that.

Choose literally any other hotel chain. Hampton Inn, Holiday Inn Express, even independent motels show more integrity during travel emergencies than...

Myself and a colleague, who was in the room next to me, were kept up most of the night by a what we suspected to be a family of opposums living in the ceiling. We both complained the next morning and were assured they would look into it. We were told that we coudln't switch rooms as there were no rooms available. We saw the maintenance guys outside the building walking around and looking at the building, that was it. We were then told that they couldn't figure out how they were getting in. For three nights we complained and weren't able to sleep. The exhaustion was affecting our work performance. Finally, they agreed to switch rooms for both of us. It took two hours to get my room ready and four hours for my colleagues room. No compensation was offered, and when I asked for points they agreed to give us a measly 2,000 points each. The points were never added on to my account.

In my new much quieter room, the mattress seriously needed to be flipped and I woke up to a dead cockroach by the door inside my room. Later that night when I came home late, a rat laid dying outside my building.

You had to connect to the internet every time you wanted to use it on any device, regardless if you signed up for ten days.

Then when I returned from work, I learned from a coworker that painters had been inside my room. When she asked why they were there and if I knew about it. They responded that the touch up paint had to be done that day regardless if I wanted them in my room or not. No one ever informed me that painters would be in my room or were in my room. I couldn't even tell what they touched up. Then the day after Halloween we were informed that it would be a mandatory oven cleaning day. No housekeeping would take place and all ovens would be cleaned regardless if you had the no service today sign up. So don't expect any privacy here.

Another colleague had to switch rooms because of a reaction to suspected mold. The staff was very apologetic, but did nothing to make it right. They never even gave me the points that they said they would give me. I spent the entire trip exhausted and not knowing who would be in my room...

Went here on vacation from Milwaukee Wisconsin with my family members. I'll mention the good things first... 🤦🏽‍♂️ I love the size of the suite with the full kitchen and living room. I also love the continental breakfast with the beautiful stock of options that they offer from vegan choices to simple cereal or turkey sausage and bacon ect, they had something that I think would appease to anybody's particular taste or nutritional diet. 🤷🏽‍♂️

But more importantly the bad side

We got there and walked into our room and instantly smelled in the air a stench of mold. We asked can we search and look through the other rooms to see if we can see something that wasn't so in your face because we did not especially look forward to getting sick while on vacation and didn't want to take any chances. Upon inspecting two other rooms they were actually worse. Even our other party that was with us and had their own separate room actually went inside their bathroom looked up at the ceiling and had at least five visible spots of black mold in clusters. Upon notifying the staff they, did offer to move them to another room which was so far away from our other party that we had to either walk or drive to the other end of thee establishment to connect which was sort of a bother. I think management should work heavily on keeping up the cleanliness and keeping down the moisture content in these rooms. Other than that, the place is pretty nice compared to places I've been in the past all over the country. They just have to step up their game with that mold smell and actual black mold that we saw... 🤷🏽‍♂️ I'm actually surprised they didn't at least offer us some type of discount because of the situation that our party had to go through with removing all their belongings and moving them to the other room after they had already settled in and were comfortable and now had to go back out in the heat and endure the move to the further location...when all they wanted to do was lay down and relax after eating a hearty meal and walking all day with the tours we were...