Hilton Garden Inn San Antonio At The Rim — Hotel in San Antonio

CHECK-IN EXPERIENCE Considering the name of this hotel is a Hilton, you might be better off staying somewhere else as this location does not live up to the standards of a Hilton. The front desk people were helpful and friendly. I booked a room with prepaid breakfast to be included for a seminar held at this location. Checked in, got my breakfast vouchers (4 - 2/day) and received my room and this is supposed to be a non smoking hotel. Not only did the elevator smell like marijuana, but my room reeked of smoke and marijuana. I didn’t want to charged incidental or for the smoke smell, so I called Front Desk and was provided another room. The room had issues too, such as direct tv and tv at times would not work. Bathroom light, bulbs were out, and lip stick on the comforter. Not sure what house keeping does, but there was no shampoo or body soap in the bathroom.

BREAKFAST CREW NOT GOOD Well, the next day I went to get breakfast after paying upfront for the breakfast that included eggs to order and such and I was told that the hot breakfast would be extra and that the coupon only covered continental breakfast, which was cereal, toast and fruit. I asked the FDR and was told my breakfast was already paid for and the I should have been able to order eggs to order. After this I ordered 2 eggs with veggies and my wife ordered a waffle. I was given a receipt to sign and was told that the price will be removed when I checked out. The total for this was $62.95. I received my order of eggs but the waffle took over 30minutes to get. This was a waffle maker that is standard at most hotels with continental breakfast, pour batter in-close lid-flip and timer starts for 2 minutes. I had to ask 3 times about the waffle and they told me that it will be out in a minute, next time it is almost done and the third time it was because they didn’t have the waffle maker warming up. It finally arrived about 5 minutes later after speaking with them the third time. Waffle was nothing special and DEFINITELY NOT WORTH what was on the receipt of $62.95! Next day, I just order an omelet with veggies, but this time I wasn’t asked to sign a receipt.

VEHICLE BROKEN INTO- I checked out and received my bill that showed the breakfast was added then removed with a balance of $0.00. When I went to my truck, I noticed that my truck had been broken into. The front was scattered with paper and things from my glove compartment and storage compartment! I went to the FDR and I was told by the gentleman that works there that it happens a lot. Since “it’s the ritzier part of town, people tend to leave their electronics and guns in their vehicle and thieves know it”. What the heck!!! Why didn’t Hilton have security checking the parking lots every so often or their FDR just step out if this is a known thing!!! At the minimum, let your customers know that break-ins happen around here so we can be more aware. Now it’ll cost me to get my vehicle repaired.

BILLING I checked my credit card bill and saw a charge for Hilton Garden Inn for the amount of $62.95. Called the FDR and was told by the lady that she will get it taken care of and get it removed since I paid for the Hilton Breakfast. A couple of days went by and my credit card did not see the reversal of the charge. Called again and this time I spoke with Chris, and he said he would remove the charge and get it refunded along with sending me an electronic copy of my invoice to show the charge was refunded. I waited for a few hours and after not receiving the invoice of the refund, I eventually had to text Andrea who was finally able to get the charge refunded and sent me the invoice showing the refund. I confirmed the refund by checking my credit card statement and it did not take but a short time after texting Andrea to show up on my credit card statement. Not sure why it took so long from the first person I spoke with up until Andrea got it resolved!

CONCLUSION I will not stay here again as this is sub par for Hilton standards. STAY SOMEWHERE ELSE! Wish I could...

I'm torn between 4 and 5 stars. My husband and I, as Hilton Honors members, arrived at the hotel and could not use our digital key until we checked in to the front desk. No biggie, we were staying for 6 nights and they had to scan our card. The front desk staff greeted us with a friendly smile and quickly took care of us. We haven't used digital key before, it was nice, however it is only available on one device. This was a huge issue, not because of the digital key, because we noticed after a few days of using the digital key and the key cards that the system would deactivate the key cards, if we used the digital key. When your hands are full it's harder to maneuver a card than the digital key on your phone that is already in your hand. So.. we had to keep going to the front desk for new key cards. That was a bit aggravating for not only us, but to the staff. The desk clerks kept telling us to keep it in the sleeve and not have it near any devices. We didn't have it near devices and kept it in the sleeve and it would still deactivate. Our room was super clean except for a stain on the duvet cover. It appeared that it had been washed really well, just stained. If I would change anything I would offer nice plates, bowls, cups and silverware, at least, in the rooms. We ate leftovers many times in our room during our stay. I wound up going to Target for something to heat our food in and getting plasticware from the front desk. This was not a great place to do an extended stay with leftovers. The fridge kept our items cold and the microwave worked to heat items. The bed was not as comfortable as I would have liked, but I did rest okay. It was not comfortable at all for my husband. He awoke several days with aches. They offer cleaning service every 3 days. My recommendation would be at least every other day. Garbage was piling up quick and overflowing at times. I never really understand why they put those tiny garbage cans in rooms. That would be feasible if we had service everyday. We had service twice during our stay and everything was refreshed nicely and the bed was made. We had plenty of towels to last for 2 days, if we used a fresh towel each time. We didn't use the pool, as it was not heated and it was too cold and windy. We attempted to use the hot tub, however the first time we wanted to get in, at 8pm, it was not running. There was no button to turn it on, so we went to the front desk. The desk clerk was waiting on people checking in, so we waited about 5-10 minutes to approach. The desk clerk had to turn it on. She had to come outside too open up the vents and reset the emergency shut off, then go back inside to turn it on. She stayed with it until it was working. Unfortunately, it did not heat up quickly. By the time it actually started to heat up it was 9:40. I was so over it by now and the pool/hot tub area closed at 10. We did get to enjoy the hot tub the next evening, even though it was windy and chilly outside. It would have been nice if there was some sort of break from the wind around the hot tub area. They offer food, restaurant style, in the lobby for breakfast and dinner, at additional cost. Considering what you get, the prices were not so over the top, but could have been cheaper. We chose to eat out.. same price point, better selection of food. They also have a bartender at night serving drinks. Be sure to stay and chat awhile. 😉😁 I like to push my limits sometimes with bartenders. He graciously served well. I do want to mention that they DID NOT offer 24/7 coffee. They do have a Keurig in the room and offer 4 pods of coffee. Not enough extras in the room to satisfy my coffee needs though. The coffee in the lobby offers more coffee extras. Overall, our stay was nice...

My family and I fell in love with this hotel a couple of years ago after a friend of mine had gotten us a room here. Anyways, this was our second year spending New Years here and it was great, aside from some minor issues. Overall, we still love this hotel, but may look into another Hilton location for our next New Year's staycation.

Pros: Staff is super friendly and helpful, aside from the things we weren't suppose to hear I guess. Lots of texts to check up on how the stay is going. At one point my son knocked over my glass foundation bottle in the bathroom and we had to call for a broom and dustpan to get it cleaned up. Housekeeping staff was so nice. If you get the breakfast included, you won't have to pay $15+ each. There is coffee available in the lobby at all hours.

Cons: All minor things of course. The hot tub wasn't heated and apparently hasn't been working for a few months. There is no shuttle as stated on the website. We booked two rooms and had to pay for them separately instead of one total bill, which seemed really odd to me. The bathtubs are really slippery, so we bring a tub mat with us just in case. Keurig machine was dirty. Like a build up of something that seemed like solidified coffee gel where the coffee comes out of. So we just cleaned that off ourselves. The potatoes for breakfast were cold. The coffee in the lobby that available at all hours is pretty much room temp, and the cream and sugar area seemed pretty neglected.

Aside from this, there's the conversation that I guess wasn't meant to be overheard. We had arrived earlier than check in time and since the rooms weren't ready yet we asked if we could just hang out in the lobby and wait. So there we were just waiting and chatting, no big deal. After all, it was our own fault for being early. I guess staff felt rushed though, so at like 2:45pm they told us our rooms were ready and checked us in. The rooms were not ready. Housekeeping hadn't gone in to replenish the towels or clean, etc. One of our rooms was worse than the other, so we all hung out in one while housekeeping cleaned the other. This is what lead to the discussion we weren't supposed to hear. Housekeeping was telling the front desk that they need to communicate better because they had sent us up before the rooms were even ready and the front desk guy was telling them that he sent us up because we had been waiting for a while. It really made it feel like this was our fault, even though we weren't trying to rush anyone. We were literally just hanging out in the lobby. Anyways, overall, we do like the hotel, but I think we'll be opting for another location...