Hotel Contessa — Hotel in San Antonio

I had an awful experience at this hotel. We were told we could check in early and that there was another room available. We checked in, everything seemed normal in that process, we get up to the room and my husband makes a run to the CVS down the street. A couple minutes after he left I heard our door open. I peeked around the corner because I know my husband wouldn’t be back that fast and there was a stranger in my bedroom, with a clipboard and Kleenex.

She then proceeded to tell me I shouldn’t be in here, that this was a check out room. I gave her our name on our booking, I told her how they told us they had a room available early for us. She wouldn’t listen to me and kept going back and forth with me about how I should not be in here, it’s a checkout room. She asked me if the room was clean, I told her yes. She made a face like she didn’t believe me (even though it was clean/bed made when we entered), this whole conversation was about 6-7 minutes long us going back and forth about how I shouldn’t be in the room despite me giving her our name on the reservation and telling her we had another room, but this one became available faster.

It was really uncomfortable having this happen, and the fact that this stranger would not leave my room and had me have to convince her we were staying there was really unprofessional and ridiculous. I was braless and in pajamas, I thank god I wasn’t naked when she entered my room without permission. I understand mistakes happen. But what should have happened is as soon as she saw the room was occupied she should have apologized, left and spoke with the front desk to clear it up and check in with them, instead of going back and forth with me for 7 minutes having me try to convince her of our stay.

This is a good reminder to always use the hotel lock, normally we always do, but we had just gotten there and with the cvs being a few minutes walk away I thought it wouldn’t be a problem at all. My husband went to the front desk right after he finished at CVS to tell them what happened and they were surprised and said sorry and they would teams her. No offer of a discount or any comped room from the wholly bizarre and unprofessional experience. It really ruined my experience and after that I didn’t even want to be there. Thankfully we were there for only one night.

Another thing to note, the hotel is also incredibly hot. I know it’s hot outside but as soon as you enter you can feel a heat wave inside the hotel, the air felt broken. In the room it took a long time to get cold enough to feel comfortable (about 45+ mins). We tried to get some drinks at the bar and hang out in the couches but the area was so uncomfortably hot that we had to go back to the room where we had gotten it slightly cooler.

In the room we would get random wafts of what smelled like garbage and it was not as nice as it had appeared online. Unfortunately it was not a great experience for us. I could have overlooked the AC issue, random wafts of garbage, but having to argue with a stranger staff woman in my hotel room that I was paying good money for really couldn’t be looked past. I travel a good amount, have stayed at a lot of different hotels and have never had anything happen like this before. Anytime there’s been any kind of small inconvenience hotels in the past would go above and beyond to make it right. This being a much bigger issue and a so disruptive to our visit, I had hoped they would have made it right and comped our room for the night. Next time, I will look elsewhere for a...

UPDATE…although it wasn’t as easy as it should’ve been to get resolved…the director of guest relations did get back to me and we were able to satisfactorily resolve the issue. This hotel is a great place to stay, fun location, newly renovated, nice on-site restaurant. Id be happy to recommend them again. As a previous recommender of Hotel Contessa, it makes me sad to have to write this review. We had a less than ideal experience the last time we stayed (beginning of Nov ‘24). It was a very quick trip for us, we got in late Friday night and checked out early Saturday morning. Check in was great, room was fine…wake up Saturday morning to no hot water for a shower. While we were assured (in a subsequent phone call) that this issue only persisted until shortly after we checked out, we weren’t able to shower before we had to go. All in all, not a huge deal…but when you’re paying top $ for a room, it is expected that you’d be able to shower in the AM before you leave. They credited our valet charge (the only remedy the manager on duty was authorized to give). I was told to call in and I could talk to someone about a further refund. I called in and was told by another person they’d done everything they were authorized to do. After another phone call was told I needed to talk to the director, and they’d pass on my phone number…he’d call me back. I know you’ll be shocked to learn that he did NOT in fact, call me back. I called again one morning, was given his scheduled time in…and finally was able to call in and get him on the phone that day. After a brief discussion, he asked me what it would take to make me happy, I told him I thought a refund of $100 was fair based on what we paid for the room. This conversation took place about 2 weeks after the night we stayed…2 weeks to talk to someone in a position to be able to resolve the issue. It’s all a little excessive…but wait there’s MORE. The credit never showed up on my card (and still hasn’t). I’ve called in a number of additional times, I’ve left messages, I’ve recently sent email. None of them have been returned yet. What should’ve been an easy issue to address has been more difficult than it should’ve ever been…and the issue still isn’t resolved. It’s largely unacceptable. It’s one thing to care for guests when everything is good and everyone is happy. Hotel contessa has been good about that for years (we aren’t first time guests). But this experience has me questioning ever staying there or recommending them to anyone else. It was an easy issue to solve. Like I said at the start…this wasn’t a review that I wanted to write, and I’ve given them every chance to make it right…but apparently they aren’t interested in that. So before you book you should know…Hotel Contessa is a beautiful place to stay…their location is prime…their rooms are great. But if you have any issue during your stay they aren’t interested in making it right…they’re only interested in collecting your money, with no accountability for providing the promised level of service that is expected when paying to stay in a nice hotel. We just wanted a place to sleep and shower…we got half of it…and apparently that was good...

Thinking of staying here for your wedding night? I can help you with some pros/cons.Overall, I'm not planning on staying here again. We stayed here for our wedding and honeymoon night, a total of 3 nights, and while some things were nice, there were just way too many issues. One perk is it's right by Marriage Island. Our party had five rooms. Our room was very hot the first night and I had to call front desk several times to get help with it the next day. It was miserable, especially when trying to get ready in several layers of wedding dress. It def added overall to the stress of the wedding. The hotel itself was pretty but there was no communication about the cost of valet parking or that there were add on service fees of several hundred dollars, just in case any service was used, such as room service. I would recommend asking about this before booking as it was unpleasant for those that booked in our party. These fall off if unused but we did not appreciate the surprise. We also rented a backup weather room. We were told our room we liked was available, but then told later it wasn't since they had tables setup. No one ever even let us know where the room we paid for was even located in the hotel. We didn't end up even seeing where it was, and didn't use it, but it's also non refundable. That was expected though. The man that took our bags was very nice, I think his name was Roman. He was so friendly and made us feel very welcome. The room bottled water ranges from 2.50-6.00 a bottle, to keep in mind. The resteraunt food (the Ambler) was very good. We ate there twice. I wouldn't expect better treatment for booking a large amount of rooms and a wedding room. You get what you get, which was in this case less than okay. The bed was comfy though. The worse thing was all the surprise charges such as the several hundred dollar just in case you use it fee. Even though it fell off, these things should be communicated. Overall the hotel did not live up to luxury hotel standards and I've had better stays in comfort hotels and other actual luxury hotels. The room, while nice, had a dirty city view as the windows were filthy. My windows at home were cleaner. Professionalism is lacking in certain areas and these types of problems are usually only found in lower class hotels. Luxury hotels usually communicate better and have better customer service. Overall very surprising that this is a lower class hotel. Also, if you want to swim, you can access the pool I believe for $75. If you are okay with paying that price for this type of experience, then you should have a good stay. 👍 Mostly, I wish I had picked another hotel on the Riverwalk that my husband and I would stay at every year for our anniversary. Unfortunately, we will never...