Palette San Marino Hotel

For more than 300 AED, I expected a decent night, but the room smelled like pee as soon as I walked in and it was dirty. There wasn't even drinking water. When we asked for disposable slippers, they gave us one pair of used ones, like the pair in the photo. The cabinets were dusty too. Not the absolute worst, but still bad.

I booked through Agoda because I needed somewhere near two shoots, one late at night and another early the next morning. I never got into the room, and I still haven't received my refund from Agoda. I spent hours waiting and felt completely disrespected. This was one of the worst hotel experiences I've had, and I've never seen such unprofessional behavior at a hotel in Dubai. I arrived at palette San Mariano Hotel in Deira around 7:30-8:00 PM. My physical Emirates ID is broken and I had already applied for a replacement, which takes 2-3 days. I showed my digital ID through official UAE government apps, including UAE PASS, ICA, and MOHRE, but staff refused to check me in without the physical card. I stood at reception for 3-4 hours, until nearly 1:00 AM, with no proper explanation or solution. One female receptionist kept saying “no, no, no” without listening. My friend came all the way from Sharjah with his ID to help. Even after he had waited for more than an hour, they wouldn't accept it either. Then staff suddenly said there were no rooms, although they'd earlier told me rooms were available and I'd seen other guests checking in. I also saw staff hold onto other guests' IDs for a long time. One guest gave his ID for scanning and was told to come back in an hour. He returned after about 30 minutes from checking his room, but it still hadn't been scanned and he had to wait longer. When the receptionist said she was the only staff member there, it felt like guests were being blamed for a staffing problem that belongs to management.

Being told in front of other people that we could cancel if we didn't like the room was embarrassing and uncomfortable. The receptionist was rude when we tried to talk about the issue and said he didn't have time to argue. We had booked a standard room, but when we checked in around midnight on Day 6, reception gave us a triple room that wasn't part of our booking. This wasn't the service we expected, and I hope management takes it seriously and improves how guests are treated.

After staying here, I ended up with a lot of bed bug bites. There were cockroaches and bed bugs too. One of the worst hotels I've stayed in Dubai.