Canopy by Hilton Jersey City Arts District — Hotel in Jersey City

The receptionist asked me to pay for the night's stay, and when I inserted the cc, it suddenly showed a different amount. Upon asking her why, she explained that it included a $100 deposit. I cancelled the transaction because it felt like a really icky business practice to just ask for the card and charge a completely different amount before saying anything. While she explained that it is for use of the minibar (which turned out to be empty) or room service (which was later explained to me that doesn't exist), she said it was a policy. When I asked to speak to the one responsible for the policy, the classic answer came which was that the person was in the meeting. Another receptionist came and asked her what was happening. She said I didn't want to pay the deposit but completely left out the detail that she didn't communicate properly - which I then added on. He then asked me to come to the other side of the counter and explain (again!) what was happening. So, I now told the complaint for the third time which was ridiculous. It turned out that my cc was actually charged even though I cancelled the transaction. This is illegal! A company isn't allowed to charge a card when the transaction has been cancelled on my end - which was what I did immediately after entering the card into the machine. So, the receptionist didn’t even tell me that the card was charged! I could have a good ground for a lawsuit here.

Furthermore, a $100 hold per night is absolutely ridiculous for one person per night. Plus, they have access to my guest history with Hilton, so they know that there has never been a single charge left unpaid or late, or any issue with any room I ever stayed in!

Besides, every single hotel I’ve been to in this world proactively offers a copy of the receipt when a card was only used for (pre-)authorization. Having to ask for it, and then not even getting a written confirmation that the authorisation of the $100 has been removed is an intransparent and questionable business practice.

Upon checkout, I also had to proactively ask for the receipt, that wasn’t even offered to me. At checkout, they said I should have received it but I didn’t as I was checking my email. Turns out, suddenly, there was an additional ‘l’ in my first name in my email, which was not entered by me since I received the initial booking confirmation. When seeing the receipt, I had noticed that the $15 credit wasn't even applied towards my account.

Additionally, I'm a Hilton Diamond member where one usually gets free breakfast. At this hotel, to get a $15 voucher when breakfast is ~$32 is ridiculous. You're literally asked to spend even more! Besides, they charge a compulsory tip on the receipt for the restaurant which is unacceptable and I had to ask them to remove it.

I had to ask for a water cooker which wasn't even in the room. In the second day, as I extended my stay, my room wasn't cleaned and I again had to proactively ask for it. After 2h of wait (this was in the afternoon already), I had to call in order to remind them.

There are so many little hiccups that simply should not occur for a brand like Hilton. Considering the inconvenience and numerous issues encountered during my stay, I had asked for compensation and was offered a mere 5,000 points. Upon highlighting that that was very little in comparison to the total of 140k points for two nights, they only offered 5,000 points more and said that that was everything they could do...seems like customer service and transparency isn't part of the business plan for this hotel, and being the highest level member status doesn't really count for...

I wasn't going to write this review but the breakfast issue has upset me enough. I will try to keep it as balanced as possible. Most of what I've written isn't new. Other reviewers have pointed these things out as well. Heed the warnings!||The Good:|- Location: one block from Path station. Close proximity to good restaurants and cafes. Some days even have food trucks/stalls in the neighborhood. 10 minutes walk from Whole Foods.|- Modern interior and technology - no need for physical key card, can unlock elevators and rooms using Hilton app. Online check-in and check-out + room selection option. Messaging the front desk works well. In most cases, the staff responds within a few minutes.|- Convenience - Water filter available on each floor in addition to ice dispenser.|- Light controls were really cool - ability to control various lights from the bedside and bathroom.|- The mini-fridge, while unconventional, was roomier than expected.|- Fitness room - the machines worked well and a reasonable selection of free weights.||The Bad:|- Comfort - the mattresses are in bad shape. They do not provide enough support for a good night's sleep. This is probably dependent on the room.||- Housekeeping - they seem to do the basic minimum. Various parts of the room were dirty, especially things that you wouldn't typically see such as corners, above the luggage storage area, etc.||- Housekeeping - we weren't ready for housekeeping one of the days. We asked the frontdesk to have our room serviced. Even though the housekeeping staff were still around and working on other rooms, our room didn't get serviced. Make sure you ask the frontdesk a few times, including via the messaging feature in the Hilton app.||- Housekeeping - towards the end of our weeklong stay, we ran out of the body wash (refilled bottles). Housekeeping didn't check or address it. We brought it up to the frontdesk and they merely left mini soap bars in our room that were 3 years old/close to expiration (if that matters). My suspicion is that by the time we noticed/reported this issue, it was later in the evening and housekeeping staff might've left. Normally I would be understanding of this situation, except they actually sell the body wash bottles in the lobby and could've left one of those in our room.||- Breakfast - on our last day, we decided to try out the breakfast "buffet". It's pricy ($35 after taxes and mandatory tips) and has very limited selections. But what's worse - they have a made to order egg station but it's not included in the buffet price. We asked for omelettes and were charged separately (after taxes and tip that's $20+!). They do not advertise this information ahead of time. They take your order and it later shows up on the bill. I highly encourage skipping the breakfast (unless it's included in your reservation) and checkout the cafes in the...

We had a mostly pleasant stay here for a wedding. The rooms were very nice, new, spacious, and clean. The decor throughout the hotel is very modern and tasteful. I loved that you could dim the lights in the room amount various presets. It is also in a great location if you want to hangout in Jersey City, take the PATH into Manhattan or Hoboken, or take the ferry. The hotel restaurant featured a decent menu and interesting cocktails and everything we ordered looked and tasted very good. However, there always seemed to be something off every time we went. The first night, we went for dinner and the food took a little bit longer than we expected (~45 minutes) based on us being the only people at the restaurant. The next morning, we went for breakfast and the flatbread that my wife ordered came without two of the ingredients (chili oil and one other one that I can’t remember) which made it kind of plain. When we asked for chili oil, the waitress seemed confused and offered us Tabasco. That day they added a tip to the bill even though they didn’t do that for either of the other times we went. The last time we went, we ordered cocktails, which were very good and well-made, but the bartender serving us took the time to take care of random other tasks (bringing in the cushions from outside, wiping down the countertop, etc.) before making our cocktails. Later, she offered to bring us water, but never did. It was a weird experience, especially since she was very nice to us the entire time. On our last day, we tried to get breakfast at the restaurant but they weren’t serving a-la-carte breakfast because Labor Day was the day before and it sounded like they ran out of ingredients. This restaurant has all the prerequisites to be exceptional but instead kind of falls flat due to lack of consistency and organization. The only negative interaction we had at the hotel (or with any staff members, for that matter) was on our last night there. We tried to talk to the front desk attendant about helping us split our room charge up between different payment methods and she got very aggravated immediately. Didn’t even try to hide it. Another customer came up while I was talking to her about her key not working and she was rude to her as well. Based on how unprovoked of a reaction it was, I would guess that she had something going on in her personal life and management should check in on her to make things are ok. She was working the front desk at around 10:45PM on Tuesday, September 5th. We also wished that at check-in, the diamond status benefits had been explained to us and that there had been an evaluation for a room upgrade. Other than the weirdness from the restaurant and this one negative interaction, everything else was pleasant. Kenny, who helped us split payment methods at 4:30 in the morning, was...