Courtyard by Marriott Santa Barbara Downtown — Hotel in Santa Barbara

We arrived for a wedding in town and simultaneous staycation. The parking in the lot next to the building is scarce as it has one level...there is an additional garage with multiple floors, though.

The woman at the front desk was very friendly and offered two drink tokens for their poolside bar/restaurant when we checked in. So far so good. The property is tiny but mighty and is in a great location, walking distance from the State street stores and restaurants. Our room was on the 2nd level and when we walked in the door, we could stretch and touch the bed from the doorway. Not a criticism...just a perspective. You don't come to this property for square feet.

Woke up ready for some breakfast and it went a bit off the rails. We pressed the button that goes straight to their Saint Remy Restaurant and Bar, and it was no...longer....in...service? Maybe it's our error. We scanned the qr code to order that was next to the menu when you come in the room...and the linked page said that the restaurant was closed. We called to the front desk and the man explained that the website is constantly being updated and thats why qr code wasn't working but he would transfer us to the restaurant. It rang. And rang. And rang. There may have been a 4th ring...no answer. We called the front desk back...AND NO ONE PICKED UP.

I came downstairs to an empty restaurant with a man behind the bar counter and said I'd liked to place a to go order since there was no room service. He had no response. Yup...passive aggressive..but of course I'm not going to fuss at someone whose fault it wasn't..unless perhaps it was his fault.

Onward.

Ordered the food and sat for approximately 20 minutes before the food was brought out. Not bad and the order was accurate. The food was not bad but its best quality was the convenience of eating on site despite the inconvenience of eating at this site.

The rest of the stay was relatively fine, save for a light not working in the room that we needed to creatively shut off since it wouldn't go off due to a faulty sensor or something. We're still in deliberation about whether we'd return because as a Marriott property, gotta weight price vs value, fantastic location notwithstanding. The vanilla latte I had one morning was tremendous, though. It is brimming with potential and should be a destination property in the area with some tweaks to property management and...just...caring about...

Edit - after additional emails, I did get more responses and appropriate remediation. This property is nice and reasonably close to State St.

Should you run into issues, don’t expect anyone in leadership to communicate to you. Marriott downgraded our room 2 levels and didn’t even bother to tell us. Then it took 3 days for the GM to even respond.

Mistakes happen but when they consistently do and you are just ignored, that’s a statement on this property.

Arrival at 3:40 and told neither room on our 2 reservations would be ready at 4 despite that being the check in time. And this was said without any apologies or consideration for the delay. Told we would be notified when the room was ready. I did not receive a text, email, or app notification whatsoever. Arrived at 6:15 finally and given our room keys. Upon entering the room, we find out the room we booked was not given to us. Again, no one told us this - we simply found this out on our own. We book consistently direct with Marriott to avoid these kinds of things yet we didn’t even get a notification that we were downgraded. Spoke with the front desk - Eric I believe - and asked. He said he’d talk to you and you’d follow up with a resolution. I had asked about having the room comp’d because we had booked a suite for a specific reason to have room to not have to go to sleep at the same time and was made to believe that it may be a possibility. I never heard from you. I inquired for further resolution around 8:30and was told you left for the day. The next morning spoke to Eric again and he said you may be in later. Also was told you’d call with an update. When we returned in the evening, I was told you were gone and again never heard anything. Spoke to Victor this morning - he like Eric seemed to genuinely care but clearly wasn’t able to resolve this and was dependent on you. Finally the afternoon of day 3, a full 2 days later, I hear that $100 was knocked off which is the difference between what we booked and what we were...

Should you run into issues, don’t expect anyone in leadership to communicate to you. Marriott downgraded our room 2 levels and didn’t even bother to tell us. Then it took 3 days for the GM to even respond. ||Mistakes happen but when they consistently do and you are just ignored, that’s a statement on this property. ||Arrival at 3:40 and told neither room on our 2 reservations would be ready at 4 despite that being the check in time. And this was said without any apologies or consideration for the delay. |2. Told we would be notified when the room was ready. I did not receive a text, email, or app notification whatsoever. |3. Arrived at 6:15 finally and given our room keys. |4. Upon entering the room, we find out the room we booked was not given to us. Again, no one told us this - we simply found this out on our own. We book consistently direct with Marriott to avoid these kinds of things yet we didn’t even get a notification that we were downgraded. |5. Spoke with the front desk - Eric I believe - and asked. He said he’d talk to you and you’d follow up with a resolution. I had asked about having the room comp’d because we had booked a suite for a specific reason to have room to not have to go to sleep at the same time and was made to believe that it may be a possibility. I never heard from you. I inquired for further resolution around 8:30and was told you left for the day. |6. The next morning spoke to Eric again and he said you may be in later. Also was told you’d call with an update. When we returned in the evening, I was told you were gone and again never heard anything. |7. Spoke to Victor this morning - he like Eric seemed to genuinely care but clearly wasn’t able to resolve this and was dependent on you. |8. Finally the afternoon of day 3, a full 2 days later, I hear that $100 was knocked off which is the difference between what we booked and what we were...