The Notary Hotel, Philadelphia, Autograph Collection — Hotel in Philadelphia

I recently stayed at this hotel and I booked it primarily based on the decent reviews the hotel received lately. My experience was much different.

Let me begin with the positives. The hotel location is convenient, although, there are a lot of homeless folks around. The lobby smelled wonderful upon walking in. The staff was friendly. The on site restaurant was wonderful and highly recommend booking it for dinner and breakfast. The food was delicious. The on site coffee is OK but it was not my favorite.

Now, for the not so good items. Valet did not bother to greet us when we arrived so we were forced to park in the offsite parking at $60 per day. Outrageous. We supposedly received an upgraded room for the City View room and the window was hardly a window. It was the smallest window I have ever seen in a hotel and the "upgrade" almost felt insulting. We were not offered any of the "free" water that is supposedly available to the guests and I didn't even know free water was a perk until the 2nd day when I heard another guest ask for it. The room was poorly lit and at times, it felt cold and depressing because of the lack of lighting. The shower is the worst design I have ever seen. The only way to turn on the shower is to walk into the shower which means you get hit with a splash of cold water as soon as the water comes on. That doesn't feel so great in cold Philly at 7 am. The bathrooms are very small but they could have designed the shower differently. I called service on 2 different occasions - once to request additional towels then a 2nd time to request the vent in the bathroom to be checked. After 45 minutes of waiting, I had to walk to the front desk and ask about the towels. The towels finally showed up after an hour. The vent never got checked and for the entirety of our stay, we had foggy mirror in the bathroom anytime someone showered. When 4 people are trying to get ready in the morning, foggy mirrors are really inconvenient.

Overall, this hotel has the opportunity to be great if they prioritize customer experience and satisfaction. Being responsive to reasonable requests is a minimum expectation but the hotel was not able to deliver. Also, not being transparent about the fact water is free resulted in me spending a lot of money on water bottles. The manager made this right after I complained to her by crediting me for the waters I paid for, but again, I should not have to complain to...

I am extremely disappointed and deeply frustrated by my recent experience at The Notary Hotel, Autograph Collection in Philadelphia. I stayed at this hotel on July 1, 2025, checking out the morning of July 2, 2025, from Room 1404. Unfortunately, what should have been a standard, uneventful stay has turned into a situation of loss, disrespect, and negligence.||||I am 1000% sure I left my $500 electronic red light therapy face mask in the room. I have photographic proof of me wearing the mask in the room, timestamped from the night of my stay. This is not just a misplaced sock or toiletry—this is an expensive and essential wellness device that I travel with intentionally and protect carefully.||||I took all proper steps to report this immediately after checkout. I called the hotel and spoke with Nathaniel, the Director of Lost Provision. He was polite but unfortunately unable to locate the item. I then followed up with Shawn Monaghan, the Director of Housekeeping, and made it abundantly clear that I had photographic evidence of the mask being present in my room during my stay.||||Despite that, I was told that the housekeeper assigned to my room claimed they did not see the mask. And that’s where the investigation stopped. No follow-up. No real effort. No accountability. Just their word against mine.||||Frankly, I am shocked and appalled that a Marriott-branded hotel would take the word of an employee without digging deeper—especially when I provided clear, timestamped photo proof. My property didn’t vanish into thin air. If housekeeping didn’t turn it in, then someone kept it.||||This situation leaves a terrible impression of the lack of integrity and poor guest advocacy at this property. I travel often, and I’ve never experienced such a blatant disregard for a guest’s concern, especially when backed by evidence.||||It’s insulting to be told “nothing was found” when I know without a doubt that the item was in that room when I checked out. I am not only disappointed—I feel violated and disrespected. I expected better from a property with the Autograph Collection name on the door.||||If you stay at this hotel and misplace or leave anything behind, do not expect to get it back. Do not expect real follow-up. Do not expect empathy or action.||||I will never stay at this hotel again, and I strongly warn others, if you value your belongings and want to be treated with honesty and professionalism,...

Unfortunately, I did not think our stay was worth the money and would caution folks who are thinking about staying here to perhaps shop around some more. Pros: Great location, nice staff, inside hotel is very nice, clean & smells great Cons: The room we stayed in had that pesky layout where the bathroom sink area is not closed off/doesn't have a door and is detached from the actual bathroom/shower. If you wake up earlier than anyone else in the room, any face washing, tooth brushing, getting yourself ready (hair, makeup, etc) it all will be loud and clear and can wake others up as it's an open concept/no door. I really don't understand this layout and I'm seeing it more and more. Also, someone mentioned lighting sucks. AGREE. The room was so dim. Room service never cleaned our room. We left in the morning, came back afternoon, room wasn't cleaned. Got a room service knock at 3PM, told them we'll be out at 5PM, returning later at night and they agreed to come back at that time. They didn't. We ran out of toilet paper and had to call the front desk at 10PM for some TP but also had to wait ~3 min on hold to speak to someone at front desk. It's the little things. Valet - the guys running the valet are nice. We were given a card with a phone number and told to call that # 30 min prior to needing the car because it was very busy (comic con was in the area). Ok, fine. You call that number and IDK who runs it but the other end was rude as heck to say the least. Seemed like they work with the hotel rather than it being the hotel itself. Perhaps The Notary Hotel should know that their contracted vendor was rather unpleasant to deal with. Never had this experience with a hotel valet before. Additionally, they cold de sac was always blocked, so once you got your car (30-40 min later), you had to either back up out of the col de sac or wait for someone to move the cars blocking the exit. No directions were really given to us and it delayed things every time we had to leave the hotel in the car.

I wouldn't stay here again, it was not worth the price tag given the service...