DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel Denver - Thornton — Hotel in Thornton

Update: 8/3/2023: I talked with the new general manager on the phone today and was quite reassured by our conversation. A few things of note:

1. Though she's only been at the property a week, and my stay ended three weeks ago and my call to get a refund were prior to her start, she still took responsibility and apologized without qualification.
2. She had already recognized the issue with F&B credits and has a permanent fix ready to be applied in a few days, in the meantime, she has set up the front desk to double check each account upon checkout for accuracy. She has also manually checked prior accounts herself to ensure that guests were not overcharged.

Most of all, I appreciated her approach and tone in talking about the staff. It is quite asset-based, and recognized her role in fostering their success. With this, I have considerable confidence in future stays.

The original review is below for context of the change in my experience and hopefully to provide clarity as to the difference behind the more recent and older reviews.

This is long - short version: If you are a Gold or Diamond member, check your receipt to make sure you haven’t been defrauded. When you realize you have, email management. Then when they inevitably don’t respond, file a dispute with your credit card company.

I’m a Diamond Hilton Honors member (three years, earned through stays, so I’ve been to quite a few Hilton properties). Never have I had to ask for a general manager’s contact information during my stay at a Hilton property. Never have I had management fail to respond to an email (and certainly not after calling Hilton corporate and requesting that return email specifically). Never have I had to leave a negative review for a Hilton property. And yet, there’s a first for everything. And it seems that the Hilton Doubletree Denver - Thornton is that for me. Should they choose to respond, I will update my review accordingly.

During my stay, and as others have alluded to in their reviews, I got the sense that the hotel viewed guests as an inconvenience. As a simple example, the hotel only offers a breakfast buffet but left breakfast menus lying around - giving the impression that they would have a made-to-order breakfast option. I guess it was just too hard to discard the old menus.

So after a few staff interactions, I just had a feeling that something would go wrong with my bill. I certainly don’t fault the employees for this, it was clear that their attitude was a result of fear-driven management. An attitude that, as others alluded to, resulted strongly from a priority of policy over customer service. As I didn’t want to burden the hotel staff with something that was neither their fault nor that they were empowered to fix, I requested the general manager’s contact information in the middle of my stay - in the event that something went wrong.

Well, after checking out, I got my receipt and I was sad to be right. None of the Food & Beverage credits ($100) had applied, so I followed-up by email with the manager whose information I was provided. After 10 days, I hadn’t heard back, so I called Hilton corporate (after 30 minutes with their online chat proved inept), and they fixed this with the hotel. I requested that the manager return my email as I had additional feedback that I wanted to share prior to leaving a review - and that I planned to do that in 7 days. I’ve waited 10 days as a courtesy, and have yet to hear back.

So, Gold and Diamond members: should you choose to stay here, don’t waste an hour working through customer service to get your benefits. Spend 5 minutes on the phone with your credit card company and dispute the charge. Maybe after the hotel has to spend $35/customer on chargebacks enough times, they’ll stop their fraudulent practices. And you’ll do a service to the rest of us, because nothing but money (specifically, losing money), will cause this management team to change their ways.

On a positive note, the breakfast staff was great! I’d recommend tipping up to the F&B daily maximum on your room to...

I am mystified by the way my wife and her mother were treated by Joe at the front desk on the evening of August 28, 2023.

The two of them are traveling and had been to Red Rocks for a show. They were planning to go to Fort Collins the next morning. They asked me to help find a room. I am a long-standing diamond member and we have been loyal to Hilton brands since 1995. The reservation clearly indicated my wife's name and that she would be the one checking in.

Instead, they stayed at the Delta hotel across the street from the Doubletree. Joe, the night desk man at the Doubletree, actually asked my wife to leave the Doubletree because she would not physically hand over her ID. (She did hold it in her hand for him to see as the two of them stood across the check in desk). He became quite upset, and told her there was no reason for her to not let him take her ID. She said she does not allow people to copy it or upload it and that's what has happened to her in the past so she tries to protect her personal information. He got upset, and said he had to physically have it, and that he would not let her into the hotel if, "I cannot confirm who you are". (Keep in mind that she was in the hotel already and the two of them had already had a conversation about being from Tennessee.) He was holding her American Express card in his hand as the conversation took place. He ramped himself up, kept talking, making himself even more upset.

He then told my wife that she needed to leave.

She said ok.

He continued. He told my wife that she needed to find another hotel. He said he knew that I was a diamond member, but she needed to go. All the while, he continued to hold her American Express card in his hand, preventing her from leaving.

She finally said, calmly, "Sir, you have asked me to leave. If you will give me my credit card, I will do so." He did. She went to the door, but Joe kept talking as she walked away. She told him, "You are throwing me out at 12:14 a.m., and I don't know where to go. " He kept on. She told him that she would report him. He said that was her choice.

She went outside where her mother was waiting in the car. Joe came to the car window and asked her to come back. For the first time, he said he could not see her ID while she held it, even with his glasses. If he had mentioned that fact while they stood at the desk, this whole thing would have probably turned out differently. Then, he kept saying it was up to her, her choice, as if she caused the issue. She told him, "No, thank you." and left.

I'm really mystified by this encounter and how poorly my wife was treated by Joe, after midnight. I am sure it hurt her feelings as well as offended her greatly--to be told to leave in the middle of the night, without cause, with nowhere to go.

Update: I had a conversation with the GM (8/29/2023) who apologized on Joe's behalf. She told me that Joe is 80 years old and "set in his ways". I explained that whenever I check in to a hotel, I show my ID across the desk just like my wife does, but the staff never questions me. Often, I don't even take it out of my wallet--I just open my wallet so the clerk can see it through the clear window. I told her that frequently my wife faces additional questions that I do not. I asked if she thought women are somehow treated differently than men during check in. The GM did say she would speak to Joe about the issue and that some training was in order. The GM refunded my room charge.

Curiously, the GM told me that Joe's notes in the Doubletree's computer about the encounter showed, "Guest refused to produce ID" and not much else. That is clearly not what happened.

This exchange was unsatisfying. I would hope that Joe would apologize to my wife instead of trying to paint the whole thing as her fault after he directed her to leave the hotel and thereafter followed her outside into the parking lot.

Joe, next time say, "Ma'am, my eyesight isn't perfect. I promise that I won't do anything strange with your I.D. and it won't be out of...

I purchased a room through Priceline for me and my 83-year old elderly mother who likes to shower every day. I purchased a hotel room for 2 nights that was an accessible room with a roll-in shower. When I got to the hotel, we were put in a room on the second floor that was not a handicap accessible room and did not have a roll-in shower. I pushed my mom's wheelchair down a long corridor to get to the 2nd elevator since the elevator closest to us was broken. When we got off the elevator, our room was again all the way back down the hall on the 2nd floor. To get our luggage was another excursion back to the car a couple of times and back and forth down the halls. I let Christian at the Front Desk know that I had purchased an accessible room and had not received one, but unfortunately there were none available. Christian let me know that we could move into an accessible room the next day and he reserved a room for us. The next day around 10am, I spoke to Arlene at the Front Desk so we could get into the room. The previous guests hadn't checked out yet, so I had to wait until later until we could secure an accessible room that was available, but Arlene assured me that we would get an accessible room. We had to leave the hotel to attend a birthday party about 15 minutes away. At around 3pm, I had to leave the birthday party to get to the hotel to check into our new room and move our bags to the new room. When I arrived, Christian was happy to help me, but when he got into their computer system, he found that the new room he had reserved for us, had been booked to another guest by Arlene. Arlene was there at the front desk and looked very surprised to see me. She offered some strange excuses as to how this happened, yet when all was said and done, she gave our accessible room to another guest by overriding OUR reservation--after she looked at me in the face and promised me there would be no further problems and that we would have an accessible room. For the second night in a row, my mom and I would be staying in a room that did not have an accessible shower--the same room that I purchased in advance on Priceline. Christian offered to move us to a room that was on the ground floor...even though it did not have an accessible shower, it did help that the room was not on the second floor to get my mom to and from the car in her wheelchair and to get our luggage out. Despite the fact that the room we needed wasn't available, Christian went above and beyond for us and consistently tried to do what he could to offset the problems we experienced, including moving us to a new room, comping our breakfasts the next day and speaking to Priceline on our behalf to remedy the situation. Arlene, on the other hand, ignored us every time she saw us and wouldn't make eye contact with us after that. The hostess & waitress in the breakfast area were great--very polite and accommodating. As with anything in life, there are problems that arise...some people can either try to make things better, and some people can make things worse. Thank you, again, Christian for being consistent in helping us, making our problem your problem and doing everything you could to remedy...