Aloft Philadelphia Downtown — Hotel in Philadelphia

Our recent stay was a complete nightmare, that started with a bed bug crawling across my husband’s arm in our original room. That alone is horrifying enough, but it got worse from there.||Upon inspection, we found that the mattress was not only unprotected—no mattress pad or cover at all—but it was heavily stained and downright revolting. We were promptly moved to a different room, only to find that this one had a filthy, stained shower curtain and was a downgrade from the room we had originally booked and paid for.||Next, we were moved again, this time to a third room where the air conditioning would not cool the room below 73 degrees, in June. After more back and forth, they finally moved us back to the second room—but only after replacing the disgusting shower curtain. So, that’s three room changes in the span of a 4-night, $1100 stay. Unacceptable.||||As for the bed bug incident, we were told a report would be completed in five business days to "confirm what the bug was or was not." The incident occurred Wednesday, June 4th, today is now Thursday, June 12th—and I have still heard nothing from the hotel nor their customer service team. No call. No email. No follow-up.||I was assured the manager would call me the following morning of the 5th, at 8 AM, when she came in and that never happened. I ended up calling her at 12:45 PM and was met with zero apology nor concern—just a robotic explanation that they “have a procedure” and would complete a report “within 5 business days.” That has now changed to seven business days, according to a Marriott customer service supervisor I spoke with today. I have now been given conflicting timelines from 3 onsite hotel employees during our stay and 1 customer service manager.||After multiple calls to the 1-800 Marriott line today, which included asking for my case to be escalated to a supervisor; I was shocked to be told there were no notes on the case of the hotel offering any compensation. The supervisor stated she did see all of the pictures I emailed of the bedbug on the bed, then in the cup as we saved it for their "report," dirty mattress, stained shower curtain, and room moves; but they can't offer compensation only the hotel can. Interesting. When I asked how she would feel spending $1100 to sleep with bed bugs, see stained mattresses and shower curtains, and be bounced from room to room, she had no answer. Just silence.||||Apparently, Marriott has no accountability for the properties under its name. Aloft is Marriott-branded, but none of the customer service representatives seemed empowered—or even willing—to do anything about a health and hygiene violation of this magnitude.||||To recap:||Bed bug in the room, crawled on my husband's arm||Stained, unprotected mattress||Dirty shower curtain||Three room changes in a four night stay||Low functioning AC in one room||No follow-up on incident report||No accountability nor apology from management||No compensation offered||||Marriott and Aloft should be ashamed to let a hotel like this continue to operate under their brand. It’s not just an inconvenience—it’s a public health hazard. If you care at all about cleanliness, comfort, or customer service, do yourself a favor and do...

The check in process was terrible and the staff member who received us could have given me thorough instructions. You have to go up a flight of stairs in their main entrance to get to the lobby and check in. So when I got to the lobby I asked for help with my luggage and they said there is no Bell service in the hotel. So I saw a small elevator and asked to use it to get to the ground floor in order to get my luggage and they said it was not working. Full stop. So I had to haul my luggage one by one and break my back only to find out that the guest elevators takes you all the way to the ground floor and connects you to Starbucks and the convention center. When I asked why did they not tell me about it they said it was a security issue and I had to check in first but you can literally walk to the room elevators to get to the lobby from Starbucks. It was crazy.

We needed to check in and leave for a function 30 mins later and we couldn't stay on our room. We put our luggage in a really small room although we paid for a deluxe and more spacious room. They said that the room I was in on the 17 floor was already upgraded and spacious and I made a mental note to not extend our stay and check out in the morning. We left to our function 10 min after check in.... The room felt warm so we set the AC to 66 and left and came back at midnight.

When we were back the AC was at 70. We were exhausted and slept. At 4 am I woke up drenched in sweat 💦💦💦. The AC was not circulating at all as there was one vent located awkwardly. l went to the front desk and they were keen to find a resolution and asked if I wanted to move but we had to wait till the morning because they were booked. The first night was the worst.

Second day we had to leave to our function at 8 am. I came back to change rooms at 1 pm and everything was good from there. The room was more spacious and the AC actually dropped to 66 and circulated well. I felt really duped about the first night were there. It was not what we expected or paid for.

We stayed for five nights. Hotel staff were nice. The lobby was dead in the fourth of July weekend which we liked cause we prefer it less crowded. I can imagine this hotel being more suitable for corporate travel and convention events and less so for tourists.

No breakfast or room service. Not sure if they have a restaurant. I would have preferred to stay in a place that provided a bit more service. We discovered a microwave in their lobby area the last day we were here.

Valet parking is 54 a night and not 40 as written on their website. We chose to park in a public parking place nearby for 9 a night.

The only redeeming thing about this hotel is that they allow dogs and staff loved my dog and kept offering treats. Also the views from our upgraded room was incredible.

I would stay here again because the experience got better and the staff is friendly but in the future I will inspect the room...

Everything went pretty well until our last night and morning at this property. I didn't understand the reviews discussing poor customer service until then.

My husband and I stayed here for a total of five nights. On Monday 9/23, our last night, we decided we were interested in staying one extra night, from 9/24 until 9/25. We attempted to reserve that extra night at the front desk. The person working there was as helpful as she could be. She said there were rooms available but she didn't have the capability to extend our stay or reserve an extra night. She said we would need to reserve online as they apparently don't handle bookings at the front desk.

Even though the front desk person said that rooms were available, when I entered 9/24-9/25 online, the hotel was showing as sold out. However, when I entered a minimum of a three night stay (9/24-9/27), the system showed that rooms were available. The front desk person advised us to call Aloft reservations. It took 10 minutes just to get a live person. I called twice and spoke to two different people, both incredibly unhelpful. The front desk person then advised us to talk to the manager once she was there in the morning and suggested she might be able to help us.

My husband went downstairs the next morning around 9 AM to ask the manager for help, who was even more dismissive and unhelpful than the customer service agents that we'd spoken to on the phone the night before. My husband pointed out to her that we wanted to stay an extra night but the system would only let us book a minimum of three nights. She basically said that we could book the three nights if we wanted but otherwise refused to help us. A couple hours later, out of curiosity, my husband checked their online system about 30 minutes before check-out and suddenly, there were several available to book from 9/24-9/25. By then, we were so disgusted with our experience that we just went home.

So, not only did the manager and "customer service" leave a really bad impression on two people who had just spent money on five nights at this hotel, they also lost out on a potential sale of one extra night. As much as we liked the hotel and everyone else we encountered onsite aside from the rude manager, this experience was unacceptable, considering how much money we had spent to stay here for almost one week. We will not be staying here again. If you value good customer service and want to feel as if your money has been well spent, I wouldn't advise that...