We planned a vacation for Disneyland and Universal Studios. We made reservations at the Desert Inn & Suites. We have stayed there several times before without incident. This time, we noticed 2 roaches on the sink and called management about it. The general manager by the name of Padmini came to our room with maintenance.
They said they didn't see anything (besides the 2 smashed roaches that we left for them to see as proof), but the general manager said they would exterminate/spay while we were at Disneyland. She also informed us that she would give us a very nice discount that we were sure to be very happy about. She apologized and left.
When we returned, we noticed housekeeping had not removed a bag of garbage containing food and also an empty pizza box. Later, we saw another roach! I called the front desk and asked for housekeeping to come and remove the bag of garbage so that it would not attract more roaches.
After calling a second time, someone came with a can of Raid. I told him I did not call for that, I called for housekeeping to remove the garbage that housekeeping never removed from earlier. I said I did not want him to come in and spray the Raid because for one, it was after midnight and we were not dressed, the children were sleeping, and we did not want to smell that strong odor.
Around 1:00A.M., I turned over and saw another large roach on the nightstand! I turned the light on to get it and saw a few smaller ones scrambling away. We tried to inform the night manager; he was less than pleasant but said he could move us to another room. I did not want to move to another room only to encounter the same problem.
It was obvious the motel had a roach problem. We asked the night manager to please make a note of this and give to the general manager in the morning so that she would know the situation and refund us our money. We did not feel we should be paying under these conditions.
We packed up, woke up the children and left. After searching for a while we found another room. Everyone was sold out due to a convention in town.
After a few hours of sleep in a run down hotel (the only one we could find at almost two in the morning with a vacancy), we went to Desert Inn to check out. The manager refused to take off charges for the second night that we did not stay, only giving us a $25 discount per night.
She even insinuated that we brought the roaches with us! How very insulting! I couldn't believe it. We told her we saw roaches crawling into the clock on the nightstand were we kept seeing the roaches and so she sent maintenance to the room to take another look.
She said if we could "prove it", she would not charge us for the second night that we did not stay there. When we looked at the back of the nightstand by the clock plug, we saw a roach crawling! He showed it to the manager, Padmini, who refused to come out and speak with us.
Instead, she relayed the message to us that she did not say we didn't have to pay for the room. That in fact, we had to pay for both nights and she would take $25 per night.
If they didn't have a roach problem, and she insinuated that my family had the roach problem, why did she give us $25 off for both nights? I have never been so insulted before! We had to pay for both nights, we were very late getting our kids to breakfast and to Universal Studios because of it, we had to pay for another hotel on top of it all, and no one ever apologized or tried to work it out with us.
Upon returning home, we took all of our clothes out of our bags and shook them out in the backyard before bringing into the house and washing (but remember, Padmini thinks we brought the roaches!). Some vacation!
The general manager Padmini, the night manager Teo, the front desk clerk Lisa, and the front desk clerk Greg, all truly need some lessons in customer service. They were rude, unprofessional, and unaccommodating. They showed no class or tact whatsoever. Greg ended up changing his tone after we kept disputing the matter, but everyone else was just horrible.
I work with the public, and I would never treat anyone this way. This sort of customer service is unacceptable. I will NEVER stay there again and this sort of treatment will only lead to a loss in customers.
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