Holiday Inn Express & Suites Chicago West-O'Hare Arpt Area by IHG — Hotel in Proviso Township

This hotel is plagued with problems. I don't think it is worthy to be part of the IHG chain of hotels and needs serious management. Front desk was in disrepair and papers, cases of pop, boxes, etc were stacked everywhere. Desk clerk was friendly, but front area was unclean and not welcoming. There was a cart in front of the check-in desk with a sign claiming they were under construction, but the feeling I got was this was an ongoing problem, not a short-term problem. The only place that had evidence of any current construction was the hot tub. It literally had plywood surrounding it and the pool was smelly and extremely cloudy. I'm not sure when they pool area was last cleaned. Needless to say, we did not swim. The hallways were in various states of missing trim and unclean carpeting, but there was no evidence of actually repair work going on. The walls...were do I begin? Filthy, our room walls had lots of marks/smudges/food/dirt all over them. We were not even sure if the red smears on the walls were blood, food, or whatever. It was very concerning. We would not let our children touch them! On the way to our room there was a group of 4 rooms together that were all congregating with each other, their doors were open and people were moving from room to room. They were loud and we were concerned about it prolonging into the night. In our room, the bathroom vanity had several spots that were sticky and we used our own sanitary wipes to clean them. The room had only been vacuumed in the center walk areas, but the edges next to the beds, furniture, and walls were full of debris. The shower appeared clean, but it squealed the whole time we used it. The toilet handle kept getting stuck because it was so stiff and we had to flush the toilet for our kids because they couldn't get the handle to work. Our sleep was interrupted by a train track right next door (next time I travel to a big city I will make sure this doesn't get repeated). In the bathroom it was even worse. We weren't sure if it was coming from below us or the rooms down the hall that has been very busy the night before. It was quite concerning to us especially since we had children with us. Also considering that it is a smoke-free facility. We got the impression that management did not seem to care. They did NOT have a breakfast the morning we left (Easter Sunday). They said they would have to go bags, but there were none. Not, that we would have eaten it considering our fear of unsanitary conditions in other parts of the hotel. We considered asking for a different room, but were concerned from the looks of the entire building that it wouldn't have mattered. We also considered checking out and not staying, but with all the new rules of either pre-paying, not getting a refundable room, or losing our night's cost we felt locked in. The way hotels are forcing patrons to pay in advance and if things don't work out you lose your money is a scam. If we are IHG members there should be legitimate reasons to cancel a reservation. We would have gladly moved to a different IHG hotel in the area under different management, but was afraid the hassle would have been too much considering we didn't check in until late in the evening. This was definitely not a situation I could have predicted for this hotel chain....

The front desk staff was excellent and very accommodating. Which is part of the reason I did not complain about the quality of the room. My experience with the front desk clerk started before I arrived. I called to inquire about the shuttle service from the airport (which is the reason I picked this holiday inn) because it had started to snow and I was concerned I was not going to make it to the hotel. I was meeting my son during his 20hr layover from buffalo to Seattle. She was very helpful is scheduling a pick up time for him and made every effort to make me feel.comfortable and ensure I was at ease about the weather and his arrival. Upon check in she was just as welcoming as she was on the phone and assured me whatever I needed would be just fine. When we got in the elevator we could not get the button for our floor to work. As we were about to get out another guest came in and picked our floor and it worked so we were good. We put our bags down and then left to get something to eat. Upon arrival the fire department was there. We had to wait in the lobby for the all clear. She allowed us to eat out food in the dining area. When the all clear came again the elevator did not work. We walked back to the front desk to check and see if something had to be reset due to the fire alarm. She said it was all good and went back to the elevator. We could not get it to bring us to our floor, we had to use the stairs. When we got to the hotel room to relax before getting the shuttle to the airport I went to take a shower and noticed all the bottles were half empty. I didn't need them and the front desk lady was so nice I didn't want to bother her with that. After my shower I sat on the bed and there was a big dip in the middle of the bed. Very noticable to the eye when I stood back up to see why it was so uncomfortable. Luckily there were two beds so I got in the other one which was better. The shuttle service was fantastic. The next morning I decided to look and see what kind of coffee were in the kcup (I use them at home so I was curious) and there was one that was already used sitting on the tray. I am starting to think my room was not thoroughly cleaned. I asked for a late check out because my son's flight didn't leave till 5. Twice before 830 in the morning housekeeping had knocked on my door. I stay at holiday inn hotels multiiple times throughout the year and housekeeping usually never knocks on my door that early. I found that very odd, especially because I was beginning to think they didn't...

Where do I begin! Reception staff, with exception of Loquacia who was helpful, were not trained in hospitality protocol and were seemingly helpless to address the multiple issues we faced on this property. Even their many excuses for our various difficulties were not credible. This property doesn't resemble in any way what I've experienced previously with IHG. The lobby was incredibly uninviting and unimpressive, the reception desk was all junked up, the reception staff always seated with little eye contact, behind plexiglass with masks, and thus impossible to hear and understand. No one else was required to wear masks, which I'm thankful for.

There was staff for the breakfast room operation on weekdays, but then really poor sack bags of nothing but sugar given out for weekends, with the staff blaming "Covid" for no breakfast room access -- not even for hot water or coffee!!! It just made no sense!

Our room's toilet seat was loose, our faucet delivering either cold or scalding water (nothing in between), lightbulb burned out in our room's hallway so we couldn't see to easily dress or use the hall mirror. There were no working electric outlets in any of the lamps so we had to search for outlets behind the TV or bedside table. Our safe wouldn't open, and our air conditioner thermostat didn't work. I called for maintenance and the man was very nice but I actually felt sorry for him -- he couldn't open the safe so he had to force it open and it never worked after that. He didn't have any lightbulbs for the hall fixture which was unbelievable since this same fixture appears all throughout the exterior hallways. He did fix our thermostat and he did tighten our toilet seat.

The last insult was that each night when we returned to the hotel, our keys wouldn't open our room's door so each night we had to get a new one and even then, on our last night, the new key wouldn't work so the desk attendant had to let us into our room -- we dared not leave the room because we knew we wouldn't be able to re-enter! We were told each day of our stay that this key issue was apparently a focus of the manager, as many other residents had the same trouble, but for it to persist for four days was truly unacceptable and a huge inconvenience.

It is high time to return to providing cleaning service each day in the rooms!! We were never offered fresh towels and had to hunt down the maids. I would say "run away'...