Andy Shivaram

Review of Waikiki Beach Marriott

I was quite disappointed by this place which has a...

I was quite disappointed by this place which has a room rate of over 500$/night. I had also stayed at the nearby Coconut Waikiki at 175$/night and found the latter better in service and hospitality. One could easily sense that the Marriott was more interested in extracting cash from its customers than providing decent customer service or treating its employees well. Employees appeared generally demotivated. Some specific examples of my issues here:
- Room was fairly standard and dated for a luxury hotel and bathroom was no better than an average Holiday Inn. Walls were thin so one could hear conversations clearly from the room next door.
-The hotel has two 30 story buildings for residents but a common infrastructure that is woefully inadequate. Queues for the 40$ breakfast were 30-45 minutes, swimming pool was tiny and overcrowded and there was 1 jacuzzi for the whole hotel.
- a can of diet coke would cost 11$ for room delivery and we were told it could take 1/2 hour
- our luggage was delivered in 1 hour.
- Reception kept me on hold for 10 minutes to answer a simple question, luckily their phones have a speaker.
- Lani at reception should be trained better as she appeared to be more of a pompous official than a friendly receptionist, I would have thought that was a minimum requirement in a 500$ plus hotel in Hawaii of all places. Compare that to the friendly receptionists at the Coconut Waikiki
- Cost 9.75$ for me to print my boarding pass at the Business centre, at the Coconut they did it for you for free.

The location was great but with so many irritations at an expensive hotel, I would look elsewhere. Marriott has recently taken over Starwood, where I normally stay happily and I hope they don't infect the Starwood hotels with such sloppiness and greed.