Hampton Inn & Suites Miami/Brickell-Downtown — Hotel in Miami

I stayed 2 nights at this hotel before a cruise during Thanksgiving week. It’s a nice hotel (up to date décor wise, plenty of space, and in a convenient location). However, there were a few things about my room (1403) that made my stay unnecessarily uncomfortable. If these 3 things listed below hadn’t been an issue, I would have given this hotel 4 stars, but instead, I give it a 3.

Most memorably, I was unable to control the temperature in the room. I’ve never been so uncomfortably cold in a hotel room before. The thermostat on the wall can be switched between “cool” and “heat,” but no matter which option you choose, it blows cold air, even if you set the temperature to 80 degrees. The comforter on the bed isn’t nearly heavy enough to keep you warm in that room. As cold as the room was, the hallways were surprisingly even colder. I never expected to visit Miami and be freezing.

The other thing that affected my sleep quality was the light on the microwave. It was really bright, and you could see it through closed eyelids. I had to cover it with a washrag, or choose to sleep only facing the opposite direction all night. At other Hampton Inn’s I’ve stayed in, the microwaves are kept behind a closed cabinet door, but this was sitting out in the open, so the light was obnoxious.

Another pitfall of this hotel was that you’re unable to fully control the volume on the television. You can’t turn it lower than level 11. I can understand limiting the maximum volume, but making it so you can’t turn the volume all the way down seemed odd. I like sleeping with the tv on, but level 11 was too loud. It was also too loud when I received phone calls, so the tv would need to be muted or turned off every time I took a phone call.

Lighting in the room wasn’t very good (ok in the bathroom though). There’s plenty of counter space in the bathroom, and the water pressure and temperature of the shower is good. The blow-dryer was awful though. It took me 1hour and 17minutes to dry my curly hair, and the blow dryer was dirty and sticky from someone else’s hair product, and the buttons were sticky and hard to turn on and off.

The positives of this hotel are the location. Easy to walk to lots of restaurants that are on the same street. CVS is a 2 block walk away. The metro mover (a free elevated train that takes you to a lot of Miami’s main attraction areas like Bayside Marketplace and the museums) is just around the corner. Very quick (10-15minute, $20) Uber ride to the cruise terminal. They offer a good free breakfast with sufficient options (the usual fare of hot cereals, a waffle bar, eggs, breakfast meats, pastries, cold cereals and juices). They have a pretty good gym for a hotel. There were 4 treadmills, 2 elliptical machines, an older spin bike (I didn’t use it but it didn’t look like it uses the SPD clips, for those who bring their own shoes), some free weights, and a few other things. A plug-in fan or two would solve the issue of it being humid and muggy in there. You’ll get really sweaty, but you’ll be able to get a good workout in.

Hampton Inn’s are generally pretty predictable and consistent, so I would give this hotel another chance if I only needed it for a night or two. If I were coming to Miami for a longer stay, or wanted to visit the beach, I might try something else. I’d also ask for a room swap or maintenance on the HVAC system if I had the same issues with the heat in another room. I booked this hotel about 4 months in advance and got a good deal (Under $250/night after taxes for a Thursday and Friday night). Closer to my stay, the price went closer to $450/night (pre-tax). I don’t think this hotel is worth that much money for more than one night, and I would stay somewhere else if the price is that high. I didn’t go to the beach during this stay, so I’m not sure how easy it is to get there from this hotel. I think it’s a pretty quick Uber...

My stay was good at first and turned into the worst experience at a hotel ever. I will start from the top on my stay. I checked in on July 19th where the young lady behind the counter was very pleasant, she did not go above and beyond for anything but was plenty nice. Friday night my room was just fine and I had no issues at all. Then Saturday night to Sunday morning in the middle of the night multiple times my AC made a ton of noise waking me up multiple times throughout the entire night. So first thing Sunday morning I went to the front desk and mentioned it to Alex and Alex seemed nice and wanted to help. He told me we have two options, the first option is switching rooms but he informed me they no longer have any king rooms left so he would rather do option #2 and try to send maintenance up to the room to get it fixed. I said no problem at all, if it doesn't get fixed will you call me to change my room. He replied with yes. So I left to proceed on with my day and I receive a call from Alex at 8:48am and he said my room had "do not disturb" on the door. I told him maintenance is fine to go in the room, that was for the cleaners. He then said "great I will call maintenance and have him go up right now" I said "great, if they can't get it fixed will you call me?" He replied with "yes" So again I went on with my day and didn't think of it since I did not hear from him I figured it was all fixed. Fast forward to Sunday to Monday night once again the AC started "rattling" on and off making a ton of noise waking me up multiple times throughout the night. So I went straight to the front desk the Monday morning where the initial lady just said she can send maintenance up and I replied with "I don't need maintenance I am checking out today" Anyways she said I need to talk to a manager and I spoke to Deatre (not sure if that is the spelling of her name) and she informed me she can only comp me for one night. I asked why since I was inconvenienced for 2 nights. I replied with "I spoke with Alex yesterday and he said he was handling it." She then replied with "well how our process works is he is supposed to bring it up to a manager and the manager is supposed to handle it, that is our proper process" I then said "I don't know your process and it is not my fault he didn't follow the SOP's of the company. Anyways all she said is she can comp me one night and and that she will reach out to the front desk manager Ernest via email and he would Tuesday. Anyways Tuesday comes and goes and no call from Ernest (go figure). So Wednesday I called a total of 6 times because I kept getting the "he is busy right now call back later" Anyways I finally got ahold of him at 11:47am and he said he was off at 4 and would give me a call before he left at 4pm. Once again no call back and 4:08 I called him and I caught him right as he was walking out. Ernest told me he would talk to Eduardo who is his boss and he would give me a call back tomorrow which would be 7/25 (the day I am writing the review) well I just got off the phone with him and he told me that Eduardo and him both decided to stay at the one night because they did offer me another room. I replied to Ernest with "I was offered another room if you couldn't fix my issue and no one called me back to let me know so I assumed it was fixed since that is what your employees said" (shame on me for assuming). Anyways, I asked to speak with Eduardo and Ernest said "Eduardo told me to tell you we are not willing to do anything else for you and he will not talk to you." At this point I told him I would be writing a review and letting the company know how poorly I was treated. I have videos, phone calls and plenty of documentation proving the issues I had and no manager even cared to listen or look at my proof. The answer was just "No" What a terrible experience with Hampton...

HEADLINE: Poorly run, elevators woefully insufficient.

Food at breakfast was good, the room generally was good and clean, and there was no loud racket or crazy people in the next rooms. So that’s good. But I unfortunately have to take a few stars off for what some may consider whiny or first world problems, but nonetheless expectations are high in this day and age, so deviations and problems cost in the score.

First, the conditioner bottle was completely empty when we got there, and we had to ask someone to come and fill it. This isn't a HUGE deal, I’m sure you might say, stop whining you bonehead it’s just conditioner, but it shows a lack of attention to details. Every time the room turns over someone should be checking it…and that obviously didn’t happen here. That kills a star.

Second, the power went off on half the room in the middle of the night, which wasn’t discovered till the morning, and the phones were not charged. This may be a random thing, may have just randomly happened, but nonetheless you don’t expect to have no power in the room, so that kills another star.

Third, the day they came to clean, they didn't provide any washcloths. Again, tell me "Todd, stop whining" but nonetheless it indicates they aren't following checklists and details are missed. That kills another star.

On our last day, a saturday, admittedly a busy day, the elevator was useless. We waited for 20 minutes for an elevator to get down for breakfast...and finally just took the stairs (from the 15th floor, mind you). To check out an hour later, we waited another 20 minutes and finally were able to get an elevator. Walking down the stairs with our luggage was not an option. They simply don't have enough elevators, if you're planning on staying here on any type of a high utilization night be prepared to be stranded waiting for elevators. This is not fixable, as compared to the other issues. This killed another star.

Finally, the air conditioner made a terrible racket. Again, this isn’t a HUGE deal, and we sleep with a white noise machine so it didn’t keep us awake, but I can’t believe nobody noticed this (either a guest or someone servicing the room) or reported it and they didn’t fix it. Again, maybe it just happened to be our room that had a rattling air conditioner, but I have to call balls and strikes, and that kills another star.

In their favor, they were good about checking with me each day, via text, to see if there were any issues, and I did tell them about these problems. On the air conditioner issue, they offered to give us a different room, but I did say don’t bother again because we use white noise and it’s not a problem particularly for us, and a pain to move. I added back a star for their offering to do that. Again, scores are based upon our...