Iberostar Waves Berkeley Shore — Hotel in Miami Beach

Horribly disappointing experience. DO NOT stay unless you want to lose your time, money, and sanity. We booked the hotel for New Year's Eve. Before booking, we called to confirm that they had valet parking & EV chargers in their parking. They confirmed having both of these things on the phone, so based on this, we then proceeded to book the hotel (spoiler: LIES). When we arrived at the hotel, it was one disappointment after another. The valet parking is a joke: it's non-existent. In the time we were checking in (2.5 HOURS), only 2 cars were taken. Why? There is no valet parking. This hotel doesn't even understand what valet parking is. The parking attendant from the public parking garage around the corner comes if/when he can. This is WHILE working at the parking garage, so his availability to come moonlight as the hotel's "valet" is limited. Guests were literally climbing over each other to try and get their cars parked. Unacceptable. You might be thinking that’s not a big deal since you can self-park while checking-in… There is only ONE spot for guests to leave their cars when checking in. ONE spot, for all the guests, on the whole street. Everywhere else on the street parking is prohibited and you can be ticketed. The parking garage is inaccessible to guests directly. So, instead of checking in together as a family on New Year's Eve, one of us had to wait in the car down the street, keeping it running, while the other person checked in. Not a big deal if your check-in is a quick… Check-in was a NIGHTMARE. The staff are poorly trained: disorganized, uncommunicative, and deceitful. Check-in was OVER TWO HOURS. Maybe because it was New Year's Eve and there was a high influx of guests? Nope, it was 5 rooms. 5 rooms took 2.5 hours to check-in. We stood in line and waited, and waited, and waited. We lost time we could have spent settling in, going to the beach, or getting ready to celebrate New Year's Eve. Everyone was tired, hungry, and frustrated from the arduous wait. We planned to grab a bite when we got in but had to MISS A MEAL to stand in line at an incompetent check-in. No communication, no apology or acknowledgement of the wait. I wish I had left after the first hour and just booked one of the many, much nicer hotels nearby. When you FINALLY are seen by someone at the check-in desk (after hours of standing still), you are randomly sent either directly to one of the staff with a desktop computer, or to a man on the right with a laptop. If you are sent to him, he asks for ALL your information, and you're under the impression that you're being checked in. The process is slow and pain-staking (ANOTHER 30 MINUTES), but you're so close to the whole ordeal being over and being fully checked-in that you muster the last of your patience to just get through the finish line. But you're not being checked in. No, what's actually happening is that they're entering your information into some separate system (you receive no clear explanation) before being sent to WAIT AGAIN for one of the staff with a desktop computer to actually check you in. Were we informed of this before spending 30 minutes with him? No. Was this a NECESSARY step before checking-in? Also, no. See: guests who were sent directly to the desktop staff. They came and went while we stood there like idiots. This took an additional 30 MINUTES. Most of which, you're standing there while he looks confused at his laptop, aimlessly clicking. Clearly an attempt to just move people around to make it seem like things were progressing. What a JOKE. We then waited another 45 MINUTES to be actually checked-in by the desktop staff, which then took 35 MINUTES in this never-ending check-in nightmare. Total: What a disrespect of our time. For the guests who were made to go through the unnecessary extra step: what a direct disrespect to us. Be honest and upfront about what you're doing, don't lie and say it's a mandatory step. They DO NOT RESPECT you or your time. BONUS: They LIED about having EV parking! We called THAT SAME DAY and they LIED....

Disappointing Stay - Would Not Recommend (Overpriced Resort Fee & Service Issues) I recently stayed at [Hotel Name, if you want to include it] and unfortunately, I would not choose this property again. My biggest disappointment was the size of the rooms. They are incredibly small, feeling much more cramped than depicted in any online photos. In fact, the only elements that truly resembled the pictures were the bed and the artwork above it. Adding insult to injury was the inexplicable $39 per day resort fee. For what, I'm still not sure. The "private beach" it presumably covered was anything but private, completely open to the public. While we were told at the front desk that an umbrella would be $20 with the included chairs, it was actually $35. There was no mini-bar as expected; instead, a broken refrigerator was tucked away in a bottom closet, and it took them three attempts to finally get it working. The "rooftop pool" advertised was actually just on the 4th floor, not the 10th as suggested, and notably, had no bar. Beyond these deceptive claims, the general lack of basic hotel services and amenities was striking. There was no room service available, nor a concierge to assist with any needs. Trying to get ice after the pool closed at 10 PM was a hassle; I had to trek all the way to the front desk, and even then, there were no bags provided for the ice, which felt quite unsanitary. The bathroom amenities were also severely lacking. Beyond hand soap and lotion, and two cups on the counter, the shower offered only shower gel, conditioner, and another hand soap – notably, no shampoo. This oversight for a basic toiletry was quite inconvenient. To top it all off, I'm still waiting on my email receipt because the front desk staff at checkout couldn't figure out how to send it. This clearly demonstrates a lack of basic operational competence. Overall, the property fell short on several fronts, from misleading room representations and an unjustified resort fee to a significant absence of expected services and amenities, compounded by poor operational execution. I would strongly advise other travelers to consider alternative accommodations. Key additions and impact: "To top it all off...": This phrase helps introduce the final point effectively, signaling it as a concluding frustration. "still waiting on my email receipt because the front desk staff at checkout couldn't figure out how to send it.": This is direct and highlights a specific, ongoing operational problem. "This clearly demonstrates a lack of basic operational competence.": This adds a strong concluding statement about the...

Our Emails and voice messages never answered nearly 2 weeks after stay.

Email sent to manager:

We were given your email by the front desk to speak to you about some issues we encountered while staying at your establishment this week.

On Saturday, 5/25 we came back to our hotel room #214, after a day at pools and the beach. We attempted to take showers to get ready for our dinner reservations, but the shower was not operational. We immediately contacted the front desk and explained the situation and we were told they would send someone from engineering up. We waited a few minutes and called again when no one arrived to stress our dinner reservations were approaching and asked if there was another room we could shower in and the desk said that was not an option.

At this point I resorted to attempting to take a shower on the pool deck, without shampoo, because I was unable to remove them from wall in shower caddy. I got to pool shower and had to embarrassingly attempt to shower with the broken pool shower head and with a deck full of other guests. At this point my boyfriend came up and said the front desk would allow us to use another room to shower.

We were given room #207, which was unoccupied at the moment, but still not cleaned by room service. We entered room which was filthy. The shower was wet, had bunches of hair in shower drain, the sink area had a mixture of liquids all over the counter and room was overall dirty. Photos attached.

So with no other choice, both my boyfriend and I had to shower and then walk back to our room through the hallways carrying our stuff back and forth.

The embarrassment we encountered and unsanitary conditions we were unfortunately made to endure is not what we expected of our holiday weekend. On top of that, since we were held up during this entire ordeal we were late for our dinner show reservations and were seated late.

One of the employees who came to room to initially try to fix the shower told us to speak to front desk about compensation for our troubles. Upon checkout today, I attempted to speak to someone but was told management was not available and was given this email.

Both check in and checkout days were great but the Saturday troubles we encountered were not ideal at all. We understand issues can arise, but a clean room to shower in would have been the ideal solution. We saw other rooms being prepared for arriving guests and we should have been offered one of those cleaned rooms instead. We hope something can be done to compensate us for the...