Best Western Saranac Lake — Hotel in Town of North Elba

When I showed up the hotel was dirty. The bathroom was filthy and shower had dirt all over it. Not one single person who worked there was the same person over my 4 day stay. Not one single employee had a name tag or wore a uniform. The room cleaners were only men. They didnt speak english and were hanging about the rooms listening to music but werent actually cleaning. I spoke to a lady who was checking out when I did and she said upon arrival her room was dirty, bedding not cleaned etc and a boy who was also checking out told me he had left his room a few times and locked the door and when he came back his room door was unlocked and open. When I arrived I asked the front desk how safe it was and he said it was safe, they have never had any issues. When I got to my room my window was unlocked and open. This window was bug enough for anyone to get in and out of. Housekeeping should be making sure windows and locked and shut before a guest comes into that room and the blinds should be open so people can see that its closed and the blind was shut most likely in hopes that we wouldnt check it but thankfully we knew enough to do so. I immediately did not feel safe. On my last night there I was sleeping and at 2am a man in his 50-60s and a younger boy 15-16 were trying to get into my hotel room. I woke up freaking out. It was just my mom and I and the man was able to get into our room. Luckly we had the latch on the door but the man used his hand to push the latch back to get into our room. We tried calling the front desk and there was no answer. I tried calling out to the police and operator and the main hotel line and the phone didnt work. I ended up calling the police from my cell phone and when they arrived they told me that my room was booked and that we shouldnt have been in there yet the hotel its self actually messed up and they shouldnt have had double booked the room. Had they actually double booked the room my key card wouldnt havent worked and it was still working. And the guy who tried to get into my room couldnt get in at first and tried a few times and had walked away and came back and tried again and then got in a second time. The girl who was at the front desk knew 2 females were in the room and she was about 20, she was in a baggy tshirt and track pants and slippers (running the midnight shift) and said claims she let the man in our room meanwhile she was never actually to be seen until the police came. The police couldnt do much and the man claimed he didn’t know someone was in the room. If there is a latch on the door Im not sure how you dont see that someone is in the room. Earlier that day the girl at the reception told me they didnt have any toilet paper and within a minute found me and myroom , not sure how she knew which room and handed me toilet paper. The girl knew I was a young female myself in the room and most likely assumed I was alone. She could have given this man any info and this could have been an inside job. I went to leave the next morning and of course no one was at the front desk for 15 mins. I went to the back room as I heard music playing and approached an employee folding towels who claimed she didnt speak english and refused to help me. I found out the manager was out shopping and wouldnt be back for a while so I sat waiting to check out and informed the ‘manager’ of what happened upon his arrival. He said he got a call at 2am from the girl at the front desk but was sleeping and chose not to answer! He said the girl was new on reception this was her first night shift and didn’t know what she was doing. He claims she had only been with the company for 2 weeks and wasnt trained properly. He said that it was a man and woman who thought they were checking into our room which made no sense as there was no woman it was a man and a teen who had no luggage on them. No one checks in at 2am and no one checks in before 3pm at any hotel so this wasnt a mistake. This was an inside job done on purpose. The manager claimed that the owner likes to run the hotel his way not by best practices which is not ethical. This was very insafe and not acceptable. This is not a place you want to stay. Its dangerous. A lot of men stay here for work out of town, alot of men who dont speak english, and a lot of men who are immigrants. Our room was also right beside the back door which was an easy exit and enterance for anyone trying...

We are Best Western Platinum members and have stayed at dozens of BW properties over many years. This was our WORST experience with a BW hotel (or ANY hotel for that matter). On a Wednesday afternoon, we booked on-line around 1 pm. We arrived around 4 pm. The front desk rep took an inordinate amount of time on his computer trying to find a room for us. We asked for a first floor room. He replied that none had been cleaned. We quickly surmised that there was a severe housekeeping understaffing. The rep then advised that he was going to personally check rooms for us. He left the desk and was gone for at least FIVE minutes. People on line behind us were asking why he left his post. When he finally returned he booked us into a room on the second floor. When we asked for the location of the elevator, we learned for the first time that there is NO ELEVATOR. We are seniors with mobility issues. He advised us that the only way we would have a first floor room was to wait in the lobby for a half hour while a room was cleaned. After being on the road all day, we wanted to simply check in. In spite of our mobility limitations we hauled our luggage up two flights of stairs to the second floor. On opening the room door, we saw that beds had not been made and housekeeping had not touched the room. The front desk rep had LIED TO US when he stated he had personally checked that room! We hauled our luggage across the building and down another two flights of stairs. There were no other rooms ready for occupancy and the rep agreed to process our refund. We took seats in the lobby and began a search for other accommodations, all of which were pricier. We also did not want to get back on the road. While we searched, the rep advised that he had suddenly found a clean room on the first floor. Not wanting to take chances on find another hotel, we agreed and we unpacked. A half hour later we had problems with two of the three lamps in the room. I returned to the front desk. The rep LIED TO US A SECOND TIME. He stated there were no spare light bulbs in stock, something that never happens in a large hotel. He offered to move us to another room. Having just unpacked, we were not inclined to repack and then start over in another room. I asked if he would take two working lamps from another room and swap them out in our room. He then stated that by that time the hotel was fully booked and could not switch lamps (which only meant that if he moved us to still another room, a new guest would be dealing with the lamp problem in our room). By now the entire hotel experience had turned into one serious and surreal experience after another. The rep did suggest that we speak with manager Rebecca in the morning who would most likely not charge us for the room. The following morning, Rebecca was not in. I spoke with another gentleman and stood at the front desk for nearly 20 MINUTES while he typed an email to ownership recounting all of our serious inconveniences, not including this additional twenty minute inconvenience. Several hours later I received an email offering a 25% discount on our hotel bill. This was unacceptable and certainly not commensurate with the extent of the inconveniences we suffered. I sent an email in reply. I then called the hotel and had a cordial conversation with Rebecca who had arrived after our check-out. Shortly later I received an email confirming we would NOT be charged for...

Bottom line--room was not clean at all, housekeeping staff could use some training/organization skills. Lack of cleanliness was pretty unnerving, especially during these times. On the bright side, the gentleman that checked us in at the front guest was very pleasant and helpful.

When we checked in, we walked into a bathroom with large amounts of the previous guest's long dark hair all over the middle of the bathroom floor and in the tub (so much that when you opened the bathroom door the hair clumped up under the door and got stuck). There were recent soap scum and toothpaste stains on the faucet. We found more of the previous guest's hair when we pulled back the bedsheets... Which definitely made us think that the sheets weren't changed between guests.

If the bed wasn't made, we would have assumed that housekeeping had forgotten the room altogether. The room had a smokey odor and there were what looked like weird 4-inch diameter dark marks all over the bathroom mirror.

Sleeping there felt pretty uncomfortable and we also felt bad having to bring up the housekeeping shortcomings in order to ask that the room be attended to the next morning (we had a long drive and arrived late, so just dealt with it the first night)... When we called the front desk about the cleaning, the lady seemed disbelieving and curtly said she would let housekeeping know and hung up. Not exactly rude, but made an already awkward situation more awkward...

When we returned, the hair was taken care of, but sadly they left the same towels/sheets and the faucet was still dirty. Luckily I had picked up some cleaning wipes that day and was able to wipe down the faucet, doorknobs, light switches, and remote. Judging by the grime residue on the wipes when I was done, the high touch areas were definitely overdue for it.

On another morning, housekeeping knocked on our door at 8:15am, we told the housekeeper we would be out of the room in 30 minutes so she could clean. We finished getting ready and left in 15 minutes and did not return until after 10pm that night. The room was untouched, beds not made/nothing cleaned. We thought it was weird that housekeeping would try to clean an occupied room so early and I guess if you're not up and out by 8am, your room isn't getting cleaned at all (or maybe they were upset we asked for the room to be cleaned the day before?). Just felt like the housekeeping staff were not following a standard protocol and letting things slip through the cracks.

We knew this was an older hotel in need of updates when we booked, but we just had higher expectations for basic cleanliness, especially at the ~$200/night...