Tilden Hotel — Hotel in San Francisco

Aside from the bed being surprisingly comfortable, this place was an absolute joke:

It all started when I called the day before check in to see if they could have a bottle of wine sent to the room and add the cost on to our bill for me and my girlfriend's two year anniversary. I was told that my request wouldn't be a problem, but the following day, there was no wine. I asked the front desk what happened and they said there was a new law preventing hotels from sending wine up to rooms without a liquor license. I get that, but why not call and tell me before I arrive so I can make other plans? Although I realize this is rather petty to harp on, the LEAST the hotel staff could have done was to simply contact me regarding the issue and all would have been okay.

There were ongoing renovations which were not advertised that negated some of the out-of-room amenities that were advertised. None of these renovations were ever communicated to us before booking the room nor are they mentioned on the website.

The heat in each room comes courtesy of a radiator in the corner by the bed. Ours, unfortunately, didn't turn off when we tried to follow the instructions the front desk gave us. Instead of sending someone up (this is the middle of the summer mind you) to check it out or show us how to do it ourselves, they said they would manually turn it off. 45 minutes go by and nothing happened. We call again "Oh, sorry, we must have forgot." 30 minutes go by and we call back down "We'll get right on it. Sorry for the delay." with a really abrupt hang up before I could get a thank you out. Finally after another 10 minutes I goes out. This transaction happened every single night. 3 calls a night, for 3 nights. All over a radiator that won't turn off in our room so we can get a little shut eye without feeling like we're being baked to death.

Another issue was the failing key cards. We got to our room when we checked in and they didn't work. We asked a cleaning maid to help and she said "you have to open the door" before turning back to her cart. We got her attention again and she huffed and puffed and blew her way down the hall before saying "idk, some doors only work when you pull the handle up for some reason. Try that." Bingo. I'm pretty sure us asking for help was the reason our room was only cleaned 1 out of the 3 nights we stayed there though.

Valet parking is advertised, but you'd be hard pressed to find anyone willing to park your car from the hotel standing out front to greet you. I think when you do finally hunt someone down to park your car they only take it up to the parking garage up the street half a block, and then upcharge you a few bucks for the service when you want your car back. Just park the car there yourself and save some cash.

The walls between rooms were paper thin, and the piping made a very loud rattling noise if anyone next to you or on any floor above or below you flushed the toilet.

Breakfast amounted to a croissant, a cup of coffee, some melon slices, and a small cup of yogurt, all of which is served in a room slightly smaller than the room we stayed in.

Although this place is great in terms of accessing the touristy things to do around the city, the homelessness in SF creates a real safety hazard in the less cared for areas such as this one. We were told by the rental car place that we shouldn’t park our car on the street near our hotel because they had a lot of car thefts and break ins around this area.

All in all, Hotel Mark Twain was a terrible experience with a staff that seemed cold and indifferent to anyone’s problems with unimpressive rooms. Any time we needed something, the staff acted like we were bothering them. I know we probably contacted them more than usual, but it was totally unacceptable to have a radiator running all night in the middle of the summer. This place can be so much more, and I assume the owner knows as much considering they’re renovating the space. But with such a cold front desk, the stay becomes almost a burden on...

1. If you are looking for a hotel that is accessible and universally accommodating to - size of person, range in mobility, etc. this may not be the place for you. Circulation and access to the rooms are limited to a VERY small elevator and very steep stairs (questionably following code). This elevator fit my mother and I and our small carry on luggage comfortably. Having strangers in the compartment made it uncomfortably intimate. A wheelchair would NOT be able to get into the elevator. A person who is of a greater build might find it uncomfortable or even difficult to use this means of circulation. During our stay, the elevator broke and my elderly mother had to use the stairs...we happened to be on the 6th floor. If anyone has limited mobility - I would be hesitant in staying at this location.

2. MAKE SURE YOU READ THE FINE PRINT WHEN BOOKING ONLINE. I thought we may have been the only ones who overlooked the EXTRA SURCHARGE for access to "EXTRA AMENITIES" (which we did not use during our stay). There is NO option to cancel out of these extra amenities. This extra surcharge (29$ + TAX per day) adds quite the cost if you are on a budget. We had missed this cost when booking - and were met with a cheap piece of paper on a stand telling us that we had to pay up extra money just for amenities that we did not use what so ever. I must note that sometimes this "stand/paper" was not out at the front, which made it quite a bit more suspicious. On questioning of the stand they told me that they changed the rates according if the amenities sign is not out - which of course only lead me to wondering more questions... "Extra" amenities like WIFI should be free. Local calls seem to be an "amenity" that I expect 90% of guests not to utilize since most of us come with our own electronics for communication. 10$ credit at the restaurant seemed a bit ridiculous - we never used this. The restaurant was a lounge and ambiance was dark and moody like a cocktail bar (not exactly family friendly). The unlimited newspaper and magazine downloads via Press Reader were never used. I believe by having a phone/tablet/laptop it is fairly easy to find news reports without "free Press Reader articles". Board game rentals were also an amenity that we did not use. It would have been nice if they had the board games on display. It didn't really follow the idea of having a seamless experience with everything a guest could need at their fingertips. Furthermore, signage and way finding to the 24h fitness room was not to be seen. Is it really a separate amenity to have access to yoga mats? Seems redundant. Same day garment press and shoe shine? (not mentioning the cost that goes with that - and paying for that that should be a given that it is ready same day). I could go on further but I think you get the gist by now.

3. For guests who have not been to San Francisco. Note the proximity to the Tenderloin. The Tenderloin houses the homeless population and the smell of urine is quite prominent. That was a silly mistake we made. It all worked out in the end however. It's proximity to other things were quite okay for the stay we had. We felt safe for the majority of the time. We only ran into one incident where there was a lady who followed us into the lobby that clearly was not in her right of mind and was on drugs. She made quite the aggressive scene before lurching back out.

4. Reception service was poor. The lamp was broken and we called down - they said they would come up. They never came up to look or fix it. They are professional but not friendly or warm by any means.

5. Coffee shop attached is not something to count on. Seemingly they only have one barista. She happened to be sick one day so they were just closed. Kind of bizarre. Would expect that it wasn't just one person working it always.

6. Images on site are certainly photo shopped and manipulated - Quite...

The hotel itself is quite quaint with nice decor. Small rooms with a need for updated mattresses. They also need better lighting.

For the most part the rest of the employees were very helpful, but two of their employees were extremely unprofessional and their customer service skills were non existent. First they have construction, which they start at 9 in the morning, so if you came here to relax don't stay here. The Jack hammering from the roof can be heard all the way to the first level. Second, they shut the water with little to no warning. I received the warning 30 min before and they were going to shut it off for 1 hr only. The issue was that I called the front desk to complain about the water issue not being turned on in the allotted time. Jackie the receptionist was extremely unprofessional and rude.

I called to ask when the water was going to be turned on Jackie went ahead and told me it would take another hr. I exclaimed that our whole group left the hotel to waste time and came back because we needed to use the shower. She said there was nothing she could do about it. Then I proceeded to tell her that what the hotel was doing was not unprofessional. They should have warned us about the construction before booking. If they would have put something on their website or a sign in their lobby then i would have made a better decision of not staying there. Anyway, Jackie apparently didn't like my suggestion because her next words were "YOU SHOULD HAVE KNOWN WHEN YOU GOT HERE, now what do you want us to do about it?", with attitude. So of course my next words were "are you f#&k#? Kidding me".

Since when does a CS employee ever respond like that to a customer??? She then proceeded to tell me that I shouldn't speak to her in that way. Which at this point i disagreed whith her first response. I continued to explain to her that there should have been warning at least on their website especially with the prices that they charged. And she kept saying that all of us were suffering and that's something we had to deal with. I was appalled!!!! I explained to her that I didn't need to speak to a Manager I was just going to review them.

Withing a few minutes I got a phone call from the manager Alexander Wink. And proceeds to tell me, "I heard there was an issue with one of my employees...wait wait a minute let me call you back" and hangs up on me. Doesn't let me respond or ask me what happened.

Two minutes later a call back. The manager Alexander Wink then proceeds to tell me the following, which goes around this: There was an issue with You where you made my employee feel uncomfortable and were rude. He even asked me to apologize. Alexander Wink did not bother to ask me what happened nor what the issue was. Which shows he just cared about his employee Jackie and not the customers.

I had to stop him to even try to explain my side of the story. The conversation didn't go any better. He did apologize for the inconvenience but he was extremely unprofessional even to the point that he said that Jackie must be on something ("period") because she's been very emotional. I was just done.

My husband "the reasonable one" according to the manager Alexander Wink had the audacity to state. Terminated the contract. We ended going to a hotel down the street which...