The Amway Grand is notorious for being one of the ...
The Amway Grand is notorious for being one of the best, if not the best, hotel in Grand Rapids. I wish I could agree with the notoriety, but I cannot after my stay this past Saturday. My girlfriend and I were town for a wedding and we chose the Amway Grand because of its reputation. We arrived around 3:40PM, knowing that the check in was at 4:00PM. We checked to see if our room was available, which it was not. Jakob, the front desk worker, advised that he could provide a double queen room as those were available, but that there was still a wait for a king room. I asked if check in was at 4:00PM and he advised, "Yes, the guaranteed check in time is 4:00PM." Being that it was only 20 minutes until that time, we opted to wait for the room we had reserved. The bar near the front desk was closed, I'm assuming due to COVID protocols. We waited until 4:00PM and went to check in and were still advised that the room was not ready. I went back up at 4:15PM and the room was still not ready. At this point, I was getting upset because we were in town for a wedding that was set to begin shortly and we wanted to get into the room prior to that time we needed to leave. Eventually, around 4:25-4:30PM, we were advised that our room was ready. There was no apology for the wait whatsoever. We took our room key, went to the room, used the restroom and dropped our luggage off. Before we left the room, we noticed that the room was very warm inside, so we moved the thermostat down to the lowest it would go. We then went and attended the wedding reception as planned. Around 12:30-1:00AM, we got back to our room to find out that it was still just as hot as it was when we had originally left. I ended up needing to sleep completely naked with no covers on as it was that hot in the room. It was a miserable night of sleep in that room. In the morning, we woke up and checked out. An hour or so after the check out, I received a text from the hotel asking if our stay had been nice. I explained to them all of the issues outlined above. I was advised that there is no "guaranteed check in time" as I was told and they asked if I had notified the front desk of the warmth of the room. I advised that there employee told me of the "guaranteed check in time" and it is was not something I made up and that it was past midnight when we arrived back to our hotel, which is too late to have to worry about malfunctions in the room. Not once was I offered any sort of compensation for the poor services or even an heartfelt apology. All that I received were excuses, one after the other. It appears that the Amway Grand thinks that they are so high and mighty that they do not need to provide excellent customer service anymore. I will not be staying with the Amway Grand ever again.