Hilton Garden Inn Merrillville — Hotel in Ross Township

I recently booked two rooms here a couple of weeks ago, and it was a HORRIBLE EXPERIENCE! To be honest with you I should have looked elsewhere as soon as I saw that the cost was going to be $642 for one night (not including $75 pet fee)! So, I was at my wedding reception and didn't have my phone on me until around 10pm. Well, when I looked at my phone, I saw I had EIGHT missed calls with two voicemails from the hotel and a missed call from an unknown number. Apparently, my dogs were barking and the front desk along with whoever called from the Sheriff's Office, thought it would be a good idea to leave voice-mails threatening to call Animal Control if I don't call them back. I was finally able to get through to someone after a few times of trying, and spoke to the front desk only for the lady to tell me that "my dogs are calm now" No apology or anything! A family member who saw I was upset because of the voice-mails and who was also staying at the hotel decided to stay with my dogs until I got back to the hotel! So thank you Hilton Inn for ruining the rest of my night! Also, I do understand there are other guests staying there, and I gave my dogs calming medicine which worked the three other times I gave it to them! Oh wait! It doesn't end there...I woke up to blasting Church music at exactly 7am! As far as the billing is concerned, I kept getting charged different amounts, and when I spoke to the lady at the front desk about it she said that I should have only been charged $396, I asked for both rooms?Her response was yes. I was like okay well maybe the rates are lower from the time I booked the room and they decided to honor the lower rate, or maybe, just maybe they felt bad about the voice-mails last night! Well a few days later I was charged over $700. I called the hotel to find out why I keep getting charged different amounts, I was told that that's the way hotel's work. I asked if she can give my info to a manager and here we are over a week later still haven't heard anything! Will look into seeing if there is a Corporate office or maybe a GM. NO ONE SHOULD GO THROUGH WITH WHAT I WENT THROUGH! ESPECIALLY NOT THE FIRST TIME I STAY AT YOUR HOTEL! NEVER AGAIN WILL I STAY HERE! By the way the beds were like sleeping on the floor! Do better! Forgot to mention that is was a family member of mine that called the front desk! I found out when we went out to breakfast the next day! It was mentioned that they did bark a little, but it wasn't to the extreme to where "Animal Control" or Sheriff's dept. Needed to be called! They were just doing what dogs do...bark when they here someone near the room! So please don't try to justify the actions of the workers who threatened to call Animal Control. My dogs were not neglected or agressive in anyway! A matter of fact people that come in with dogs should be offered a room away from other guests and all guests should be asked if there is an alternate number just in case they can't be reached! Once again I not speak for myself, but also for my family members who stayed there as well....WE WILL NEVER STAY AT THAT HOTEL AGAIN! HOW YOU GUYS EVEN MANAGED TO GET 4 STARS BLOWS MY MIND! I CAN ALSO GIVE YOU MY FAMILY MEMBERS ROOM NUMBER TO VERIFY IT WAS THEM THAT CALLED THE FRONT DESK! ALSO HAVE THEY HAD KNOWN NOT ONLY IT WAS MY DOGS AND THAT YOU GUYS WERE GOING TO TAKE IT TO THE EXTREME, THEY WOULD'VE NEVER CALLED THE FRONT DESK! OH YEAH AND LET'S NOT EVEN TALK ABOUT THE BILLING ISSUE I HAD AS WELL! ONE LAST THING...WE'RE GOING BACK TO INDIANA NEXT WEEKEND AND STAYING AT THIS HOTEL ISN'T AN OPTION....

Hope they don’t delete my review again. This just tells you how shady they are. I’m going to make this known anywhere and everywhere I can. I encourage to not stay at this Hilton. We stayed here for vacation to the dunes. Our stay was decent, until we checked out and had two incidental charges charged to our card. We turn around and go back and my spouse goes in to resolve the matter. Now, before we checked out and DURING our stay, we kept our room clean and trash picked up. This is with our kids who also cleaned up after themselves. Our kids have went down and asked for trash bags, and even a broom and dust pan to alleviate housekeeping of OUR mess. We didn’t ask for housing keeping ONE TIME during our stay. If it’s our mess, we clean it..and we did. There was an accident where a stain was left and we took an accountability for that stain. I even said we probably wouldn’t get our incidental charge back. My spouse goes in to inquire about to charge and it was for the trash and stain. (The trash was bagged up in one big trash bag, and a couple other little bags of trash left by the door.) They even tried to say other stains across the room on baseboards were from us. Incorrect. Just one stain we knew about and took accountability for. Our biggest problem, the housekeeper on that floor. They wouldn’t give us her name, but they know who she is and apparently she’s a reoccurring problem according the the maintenance person. I can’t speak for the other housekeepers in that hotel, but this one, disgusting, rude, and a liar. She lied and said SHE cleaned up all of the trash sitting by the door. WE DID. We even cleaned up trash from previous people who stayed in that room, but we never complain. Obviously housekeeping aren’t doing their job correctly. I had to buy disinfectant wipes from poor housekeeping in the first place. Again, never complained. Let’s not talk about the mold growing in the shower curtain too. That room was spotless of trash when we cleaned it up. Nothing else was wrong with that room. Not knowing my spouse was still in the room when him and the housekeeping manager walked up to examine it, the housekeeper said to the manager our room needed our “a** beat.” My spouse heard it, then her and my spouse exchanged words. She said we had 12 people in our room. Lol, ok. Definitely not. It was us two and our children. How exaggerating to make yourself look like WE were the problem. Appalling behavior from this staff. How are you going to LIE and say you bagged the trash up WE bagged? Because you thought we wouldn’t be back to resolve the issue? Threats? Corporate was contacted, and I will never ever come back to this hotel for vacation. I know they won’t care, but I hope whoever reads this avoids this location. It really is disappointing this is how our vacation ends because of rude people with nasty attitudes who hate their job. To the management or whoever feels the need to speak to me, feel free to give me a call. Y’all know we weren’t problematic people and we were of understanding and respectful our whole stay. So I hope no one else tries to lie. Y’all got cameras too for when our kids came down and asked for trash bags and a BROOM and dust pan. I guess we will be recording the end of our stays in every hotel room...

Needing a place for one night after being in Chicago, we settled on Merrilville because it's far enough away from Chicago to be outside of the incredulous traffic that is Chicago. We're also Hilton loyalists, so that made the choice easy and Hilton Garden Inn is our favorite of the Hilton brands.

Located not far from I-65, this location is relatively easy to get to. It's nestled toward the back of a large retail area and backs up to a large, empty field and some woods.

We arrived late afternoon and checked in the day before (room selection) and chose a room on the back side of the hotel, towards the large, empty field and the woods, figuring it'd be quieter than the retail/street facing side (it was). We stopped to check in and get physical room keys (Hilton's digital key is great...when it works). The young lady behind the counter was awesome. She was friendly and didn't mind chatting for a few minutes. She made us feel pretty welcomed.

The bar and restaurant were closed (on a Sunday evening), so dinner had to come from somewhere not on the property. Not to worry, there are plenty of chain eateries in the area, but it as far as we could tell lacked local food establishments. Outback did the trick, but we were hoping to stay in after doing an obscene amount of walking throughout the day.

Our room was clean and tidy when we got to it. We had to adjust the temperature because it was about 66° when we arrived. The bathroom was a bit dated in its appearance and for some strange, annoying reason the bathroom door automatically closed all the way. Every time. Aggressively. As it it was running a race.

The lobby was bright and spacious, as most Hilton Garden Inn lobbies are. We never made it to the pool, but without a hot tub we didn't really have a reason to.

Checkout at this location is noon o'clock, which is nice because we like to sleep in. All in all a good stay. If we're in the area again we'd gladly consider...