AC Hotel Seattle Downtown — Hotel in Seattle

MODERN & NEW. PARKING COST RIDICULOUS, BREAKFAST NEEDS WORK!

Most of my stay at this hotel was fine. The reason I won't give them five stars was what's related to two things--the parking cost and problems with the breakfast.

There really are no other parking options around the hotel. There's a cruddy looking dirt lot right across the street, but the area looks a little sketchy, so I didn't feel comfortable with leaving the car out there. I think they know this, and it's been part of the Marriott playbook for a couple years now to gouge customers for parking as additional revenue. $65 a day is just absolutely ridiculous and the most I've ever paid at any hotel. I'm a Titanium member and I spend 3 weeks a month in a hotel for the last 7 years (mostly Marriotts) so I've been to a lot of hotels, I absolutely know, this is the most expensive I've ever seen, even including ridiculous Miami.

My bigger problem was with the breakfast. I came here for three days to spend some time with a friend and I had many hotel choices but I chose this one because of the breakfast specifically. I love what they call their European breakfast, which goes beyond your standard fare that you get at most hotels for free. The first morning it was closed because staff didn't show up. There was a manager at the front sign greeting everyone to tell them how and why they were closed and recommending different breakfast options. Maybe not practical, but why not roll up your sleeves and start doing some of the work? On the second day, staff showed up but service was poor, other than two entree orders that you can make, everything is buffet style.

We got to the restaurant 40 minutes before they closed on a Saturday. Most of the food was gone, keep in mind breakfast is $21 a person. We grabbed a couple of slices of bread and ordered an entree. 10 minutes later when we went back to get some additional bread, all the condiments were put away such as jelly and butter. My friend went to get some fruit but the dude had already put away all the utensils. Yogurt was put away. I went to complain and tell him this is a buffet style breakfast that we were paying for and all the food is being put away 20 minutes before the restaurant closed. Get this, this dude told me he was packing up because he needed to go to his other job. Needless to say that's just not acceptable. I went to the hotel manager and THB she was excellent. She intently listened to what I said. I explained to her that I had been to many AC hotels, a knew what was normal and the typical expectation of their breakfast. I explained in detail everything that was out of whack.

I wish I would have gotten her name. I'm just going to give a description in case her managers are reading this so she gets the accolades she deserved. She was a white woman, blonde hair, mid-thirties, blue eyes, attractive. She impressed me because the next morning, she was in the restaurant helping show the young man who who apparently seemed to be new, all the ins and outs of everything he should be doing. Including a bunch of little small details that matter. She recognized me when I came in and came up and spoke to me and I told her thanks for responding.

The hotel is modern and new, close to everything in downtown Seattle. With the way the manager responded I would expect the breakfast situation will get straightened out. If you can tolerate the $65 valet charge or not have a car at all, this may be the...

I couldn't decide between a 3 and a 4, but I ultimately went with 3 stars, which will hopefully improve when I visit in the future. ||I'll begin with the positive. ||The location is slightly out of the city centre in the South Lake Union area, a bit over an hour from the airport by public transport. The lake itself is a 10-minute walk, and it's about 30 minutes on foot to the Space Needle or Pike Place Market. ||The front desk, bar, and restaurant staff are excellent. They're personable, friendly, and can't do enough for you. Special shout-out to Keenan, the bartender, for his exceptional cocktails and witty banter. Also, to the front desk agent who sorted out the endless problems with housekeeping. Unfortunately, I can't remember his name, but he's on in the evenings and has a Southern accent. ||Which brings me to the negative: Housekeeping is a disaster. ||Our room was filthy. Dust and dirt on the floors, long black hairs (not mine, I'm bald), and bits of toilet paper on the bathroom floor, shorter hairs (yuck) in the sink, a dirty mirror, and a broken toilet seat. I'm not sure if the room had actually been cleaned before our arrival. ||It had been a very long, frustrating travel day, and we just wanted to sleep, so we went to bed. ||The hotel only cleans the rooms every other day, which is unacceptable. If I wanted to make my own bed, I'd just stay home. And I'm tired of hotels telling us it's what guests want. It isn't. ||I explained the situation to the front desk the following morning, and they put in a request for the room to be cleaned while we were out. It wasn't. Upon our return, I explained (again) to the front desk. The agent was extremely apologetic, offering us a drink at the bar while the room was cleaned immediately. ||It still wasn't particularly clean, but better than before. Unfortunately, the same thing happened 2 days later. We arrived back to an uncleaned room. More apologies, another drink on the house, and breakfast the following morning. Excellent service recovery - thank you. ||For some reason, the housekeeping staff don't use vacuum cleaners, but some sort of large lint roller on the floors, which is useless. That's why everything is so dirty. They also missed things like replacing coffee and cups, leaving a bath mat, etc. This is a training and oversight issue that needs to be urgently addressed by management. ||I understand that the property has only been open for a month, and teething problems happen at new hotels, but they need to sort things out in short order to improve the guest experience and avoid...

I couldn't decide between a 3 and a 4, but I ultimately went with 3 stars, which will hopefully improve when I visit in the future. ||I'll begin with the positive. ||The location is slightly out of the city centre in the South Lake Union area, a bit over an hour from the airport by public transport. The lake itself is a 10-minute walk, and it's about 30 minutes on foot to the Space Needle or Pike Place Market. ||The front desk, bar, and restaurant staff are excellent. They're personable, friendly, and can't do enough for you. Special shout-out to Keenan, the bartender, for his exceptional cocktails and witty banter. Also, to the front desk agent who sorted out the endless problems with housekeeping. Unfortunately, I can't remember his name, but he's on in the evenings and has a Southern accent. ||Which brings me to the negative: Housekeeping is a disaster. ||Our room was filthy. Dust and dirt on the floors, long black hairs (not mine, I'm bald), and bits of toilet paper on the bathroom floor, shorter hairs (yuck) in the sink, a dirty mirror, and a broken toilet seat. I'm not sure if the room had actually been cleaned before our arrival. ||It had been a very long, frustrating travel day, and we just wanted to sleep, so we went to bed. ||The hotel only cleans the rooms every other day, which is unacceptable. If I wanted to make my own bed, I'd just stay home. And I'm tired of hotels telling us it's what guests want. It isn't. ||I explained the situation to the front desk the following morning, and they put in a request for the room to be cleaned while we were out. It wasn't. Upon our return, I explained (again) to the front desk. The agent was extremely apologetic, offering us a drink at the bar while the room was cleaned immediately. ||It still wasn't particularly clean, but better than before. Unfortunately, the same thing happened 2 days later. We arrived back to an uncleaned room. More apologies, another drink on the house, and breakfast the following morning. Excellent service recovery - thank you. ||For some reason, the housekeeping staff don't use vacuum cleaners, but some sort of large lint roller on the floors, which is useless. That's why everything is so dirty. They also missed things like replacing coffee and cups, leaving a bath mat, etc. This is a training and oversight issue that needs to be urgently addressed by management. ||I understand that the property has only been open for a month, and teething problems happen at new hotels, but they need to sort things out in short order to improve the guest experience and avoid...