Hyatt House Tampa Downtown — Hotel in Tampa

This was my second time staying at this hotel, and while overall it was just as good as last time, there is one new glaring problem versus my previous stay. I don't know who decided to make the parking valet-only, but they need to reconsider.

The issue is that the driveway/entrance is not configured to handle the amount of valet traffic the hotel experiences at peak times of the day (check-in/check-out/dinner time/etc). The first time I stayed here, self-parking was the default and valet was an option, as it is at most hotels in this price bracket. I liked that arrangement. This time however, guests were blocked from parking their own vehicles, and were forced to use the valet. I wouldn't have a problem with that if it functioned well, but it doesn't.

To be clear, it is not the valet runners/drivers who are at fault - they were working very hard and doing their best to move things quickly. The problem is solely related to the physical space and arrangements of the entrance. There is no space to queue up vehicles that need to be parked. Additionally, guests who use the automated text service to retrieve their cars sometimes do not come down right away, leaving their car sitting in one of only two possible lanes for vehicles. This is inconsiderate behavior by some guests, but the real issue is that there is simply no space for cars to sit.

I was in Tampa with my family, including 2 small children, and we were coming and going frequently during our stay so I used the valet multiple times. There were 2 occasions where we had to wait 20-30mins for our vehicle, including 30+ minutes after check out. Additionally, we had to wait over 30 minutes just to park our car, because of the issues mentioned previously. I'm surprised the city lets the hotel function this way, because the valet line was routinely backed up well into the street and around the corner, blocking a lane on a busy road for a long time.

This really sucks, because I love this hotel otherwise. It's why we stayed here again. All of the staff are great, the facilities are clean and exactly as described, the included breakfast is great, etc. Everything is really good, except for the parking situation, which is entirely self-imposed!

This was enough of a problem that even though I loved everything else about the stay, we won't be returning unless self-parking is...

The sole reason for 1 star was due to an major issue on the 3rd night of our stay. We were woken up at 3:30am to someone attempting to "break in" to our room, the individual unlocked our door and repeatedly slammed into the security door stop. My husband took his firearm out of his case in preparation for what may have come, but put it away when he saw it was just some poor airline attendant trying to get in to "his room". We called the front desk to get some kind of explanation but instead of apologizing my husband was asked why we were in that specific room and was told we shouldn't even be allowed in that specific room, as if we picked out the room, because it was designated for an airline.

Extreme lack of empathy, someone literally could have died if we had forgotten to flip that manual stop, and our entire family was shaken up. The icing on the cake was that the next morning when my husband went down to talk in person they then disabled our keys so my husband couldn't get back into the room and the door required it's lock to be reset so any new keys wouldn't work and then very most they could offer for the "inconvenience" was a $100 credit. It is unacceptable and they need to do better from training to how they handle guest situations they caused.

Now, if this hadn't occurred the review would have read as follows: The location is fantastic, walking distance to everything (aquarium was our go-to), the room is nice and a somewhat functioning kitchen is very convenient. The counters are not very toddler friendly, as they are not rounded and quite sharp. Found that one out the first morning after our son caught his cheek on it. The walk-in shower feels incomplete as there is no door and the shower curtain they have in place leaves a 1 ft gap at the bottom...which allows water to go everywhere. Parking is pricey, $40 a night, so if you are staying for more than 3 nights look into getting a monthly parking pass at the Fort Brooke Garage ($150), it's city owned and right across the street. The pool and patio are very nice, we were out there every night. Breakfast was a standard "hotel breakfast" and wasn't anything special, although that was honestly expected.

Obviously our experience was poisoned so we won't be coming back, but I do...

Front staff during the day is rude and unhelpful. We get to the hotel pay for our stay and they double charged us a $300 hold which is for incidentals they say. The card was put twice in the terminal because, it failed on her end the first time but said approved on the terminal. Said it would just fall off after we checked out when showing them both of the charges on my account. Then half way through our stay they charged another hold of $141 and some cents. They gave us absolutely no explanation as to what this hold is for when I called the front desk. I called customer service line and the woman told us the front desk would not help with the resolving the issue, and advised me to contact the complaint line. The reasoning the front desk couldn’t assist is because they were unable to see the double charge. I am a Hyatt member and I have stayed at many Hyatt hotels and this is by far the worst customer service I’ve received at a hotel. I had a total of $741 of holds while I’m staying from out of state. No apology, nothing. I have already contacted the complaint line and I am canceling my Hyatt membership. However, I am concerned for what the people in other reviews are saying about a great breakfast eat at home. The food is ridiculously unseasoned and bland. A side of salt, pepper, and basic hot sauce that’s crusted over from the non use does not qualify as seasoning. Salt that I couldn’t even taste because it was probably from some back room storage where they keep the french toast as well. The french toast on a few days were the same ones you get on a school cafeteria tray. I would choose to pay for the breakfast if it was better than this “complimentary” breakfast. Pathetic for a hotel breakfast. Not many options for people with allergies. If I could have left early I would have. The physical condition of the hotel was in good...