Residence Inn by Marriott New York Manhattan/Central Park — Hotel in New York

MOLD! FILTHY! NO KITCHEN! BAD FOR PHYSICAL DISABILITY! HARD TO FIND!

UPDATE: After about a month of advocating Marriott did refund the cost of the room.

We booked this hotel based on the fact that it had a kitchen and because of its reviews for cleanliness. Due to severe mold allergies, it is hard for us to travel. When we do we research for days to find a safe location and we travel with a powerful HEPA air purifier. Usually, we are ok with mild symptoms but this time we got burned.

First, the worst issue, this hotel was filthy!!!!!! Room 4605 was filthy! I have stayed at cleaner Red Roof Inns which didn't cost me $352 dollars a night. The room had not been vacuumed. There was overflowing trash in the "kitchen" trash can! There was pubic hair in the shower. The carpet was stained all over. The shower had MOLD everywhere including on the showerhead! The room ventilation system was full of dust and visible MOLD and the stairwell ventilation also showed mold growth. Our air purifier shows when air quality was bad, for most of our stay the air quality was red in the room even with a tiny window open. The air quality in NY that day was in the green. The air purifier gave a warning every time to the AC would kick on. We stayed for one night. After about 30 minutes in the room we were incredibly stuffed up and could barely breathe. The next morning we were very sick. We were exhausted since we had traveled to NYC for specialty medical care and could not sleep. The hotel lobby on the day we checked out reeked of hot garbage and we could smell it through N95 masks, it was disgusting. See attached photos.

Secondly, I will address the kitchen. There is no kitchen!!!! It should not be advertised as a kitchen and if you are familiar with Residence Inns kitchens this one does not meet the criteria and is not well defined on the hotel's website. There is a drawer-pull dishwasher, fridge, freezer, a microwave. THAT IS ALL THERE IS! I am unsure why there are pots and pans considering you can not use them in a microwave. The fact that pots and pans are advertised on the hotel website leads you to believe this is like other Residence Inns that provide a cooktop. There is no hot plate or cooktop, there isn't even a toaster oven. The microwave was in a cabinet and the cabinet door wouldn't even stay open, so good luck using it without overheating it! The pots and pans were also dirty.

Now to the inaccessible aspects for those with disabilities. You have to use a hotel key card to push the handicap button on the handicapped entrance to the hotel lobby! Even with the hotel key card the button would not work, someone had to let my partner in on multiple occasions. This is not disability compliant!!! If you are disabled someone has to let you in. You can not gain entrance to the lobby independently. You also have to use your hotel keycard to make the elevator work, to get into your room (obviously), and...to work the lights in your room! You must insert your card into a slot in the room in order to get the lights to function. Once you do this it is still a crapshoot as to whether the light will work as they worked only randomly once the card was in. The card slot is high on the wall as well.

As if driving in NY isn't already frustrating, good luck finding the hotel!!! We used 3 GPS systems and both the mailing address for the hotel and the GPS address provided on their website that they say to use for travel. The GPS address sent me to another Marriot Residence in NY entirely and their website is confusing, it should be clear that the hotel is both a Residence and a Courtyard. It was incredibly hard to find, the GPS address was incorrect, and eventually, we had to use the mailing address, our eyes, and map reading, thankfully my partner was there to help me navigate so I could focus on the road. I have never experienced so many issues finding a hotel. Once we got there it was confusing that it was both a Courtyard and a Residence as this is not advertised on their website. I thought we had the wrong...

We checked in early due to our flight being early. Receptionist was able to check us in and offered to message us if there's an available room ready for us to check into but I declined the offer since we had other places to go to throughout the day anyway although the offer was nice. We were able to drop off our baggage at the bellhop counter by the door while we explored the city. When we returned, we checked in at the reception again to go to our room and grabbed our baggage from the bellhop. As we went to our room, it took me a bit to realize we were given the wrong room. We went back to the lobby and Cyril was the receptionist that attended us this time. I told him about the room given to us being the wrong room that I booked. He said that it was due to the type of room being two different types. Not sure if he meant that due to the views that the room gave but it was definitely not the room I asked for as it didn't appear the same on the pictures and it was definitely smaller. After reaching out to some of the other staff, he was able to find us a room and told us it's going to be a bit of a wait since the cleaning staff were still getting the room ready. My wife and I waited on the side and he told us he was going to step out a little bit but assured us that he will come back for us and let us know when the room is ready. Finally after a bit of a wait, he gave us the keys to our room and finally got the room I paid for. The room was spacious and the views it gave was definitely what I booked. Thank you Cyril for the attentiveness and for correcting the error! Now to the room, the kitchen area had some plates and glasses inside the dishwasher and counters. There were some stuff in the counter available for purchase and a pad you can list some groceries you would like the staff to purchase for you. Microwave was hidden inside the top cabinet but was a little inconvenient since you had to hold up the cabinet door while putting your food inside or out the microwave since it doesn't lock. Fridge was a small but good enough to hold the little food we had bought throughout the stay. Could have had more space though. I don't remember seeing utensils either unfortunately. The bathroom was clean. There's a little gauge showing the water temperature as you adjust it. Shampoo, conditioner, and soap containers were hanging on the shower wall. Unfortunately, they were out of conditioner. Not sure if they noticed this when they have us the room but they're able to replace it if you asked. I just threw away the bottle and they replaced it the next time they cleaned the room. There was a hair dryer, towels, and an extra roll of toilet paper on the bottom of the sink. There's a little soap bar and napkins provided as well. Slippers are also not provided so make sure to bring some to walk about the room when you want to get off your shoes after a long day. The room we booked was the Deluxe room with Times Square view. Although we didn't get enough view of Times Square due to the buildings being in the way from our level, the views given were breath taking especially at night and during the morning when the sun was just rising. There was a huge tear in one of the curtains in our room when we got in. The beds and pillows were decent and comfortable enough but not sure if new bedding was placed since there was a little stain on it. TV provided enough channels for you to watch on or you can connect your account to other streaming apps within the little TV. provided in the room. List for dry cleaning was inside the drawer along with the iron and the board. The cloth on the iron board needs to be changed since it didn't hold up. Breakfast continental buffet is on the 3rd floor. Could be better but they have bagels, bread, and spreads you could take to-go. The 3rd floor turns into a happy hour area during the afternoon into the night where you could chill and get some drinks/snacks. Private shuttle services to the airport available to be booked at the bellhop area for $75 (tax and tips...

I chose to stay here over the Christmas and New Year’s weeks (23 December 2022-3 January 2022) because I booked late and this was a mid-tier residence that offered slightly less expensive prices for this season, and they were conveniently located to the places that I wanted to see, but if I had booked earlier, I would have chosen another higher tier place than this.

While the front desk and the bellmen were friendly and had excellent customer service, I am not a fan of how the crowds were organised. For example, on New Year’s Eve, we were not notified that there were wristbands to be worn for the entire day as the NYPD was blocking access to those who were not staying in the area for reasons of crowd control. No letter in the room to remind us so that we can make a contingency plan. Last minute planning for both parties. As someone coming from highly organized Singapore, this was quite a shock.

Since it is an extremely busy season, I expected some form of queues for the lifts and the breakfast line. However, not only did I have to wait for at least 5 minutes for lifts and even once I had to wait for 15 minutes on New Year’s Eve for the lifts, I was always rudely cut by the other tourists. No one bothered to be firm on who should get in the lifts first, so it was all very chaotic. Plus the language barrier, I got into a spate with a woman who didn’t speak English and just stood there, holding up the queue, while she was waiting for her husband. When I asked her if she was going up, she condescendingly answered that she was waiting for the lifts while we were there with our whole party and she was not. She even cut the bellman who was there BEFORE her, waiting to deliver a whole trolley of luggages. Alas, this woman insisted to go up and we had to wait for another whole 10 minutes just to go back to our room. A similar incident happened in the breakfast room and for the lifts from that floor. It is a simple issue that should be not complicated to this degree, hence why it is incredibly frustrating.

Furthermore, our room had missing amenities I.e. utensils, sponge, towels when we first checked-in. I expected that the basic amenities be provided when we first enter the room as this is our first impression of the hotel. Alas, we were deeply disappointed that a residence of the Marriott brand would be so callous with the preparation of the room. Hobs of the electrical stove would malfunction towards the end of our stay. Dishwasher powder that was given doesn’t clean well enough and thus we had to wash by hand all the time. Room was also extremely cold at night and the heaters don’t seem to be working or whatever. It detects a certain temperature but in reality it is a lot colder than what it detects it to be, therefore making sleep uncomfortable:(

However, while they missed some critical things, the room was still cleanly kept. My sincere thanks to the housekeeping team on making up our room in a timely fashion.

Additionally, the breakfast was edible but don’t expect a Michelin-star level meal. I think my dorm has better food than this… On that note however, I would like to commend the guy in the black shirt (not the one in the suit!) who was mending the cash register, making coffee and checking guests for the breakfast. He had great hospitality despite his busyness. The one in the suit was just talking and not helping his colleagues:(

All in all, we had a great view of Manhattan and even Times Square, plus being able to cook was a great bonus, but if I had booked earlier, I would have chosen a higher tier hotel with no kitchenette and be in a better crowd than this one. Quite a nightmare this stay was, mostly due to the guests and not so much about the hospitality shown by the hotel staff. Coming from a place of highly efficient and organized city (Singapore), the confusion and stress was appalling.

Sincerely and no offense intended, Naomi

P.s. I forgot to mention that we had a fire alarm at 2am that didn’t go off until a couple minutes later with no...