Hawthorn Extended Stay by Wyndham Dayton

Customer service has been exceptional in my experience, but housekeeping is another story. My room had dog hair everywhere, dirty pots and pans, trash under the bed, and dirty sheets. I only found the large red stain on the mattress after spilling water on the sheets. This wasn’t a one-time problem. Every visit, I bring my own cleaning supplies to tidy up the room. When I first started staying here in March, I thought it was a really nice hotel. I must have gotten one of the newly renovated rooms and assumed the others would be the same. On later visits, I found rooms with broken drywall or missing light bulbs. Each time I came back, things seemed worse, and this latest stay may have been the worst yet. It feels like they focus on making the outside look nice while neglecting what matters inside. I hope housekeeping improves, or that someone checks the rooms after they clean.

I was so exhausted that I managed only about four and a half hours of sleep, fully dressed and with my shoes on top of the bed. I wouldn’t bring my luggage into the room, brush my teeth there, or put in my contacts. After driving through severe storms and tornadoes, I booked this pet-friendly place on Hotels.com late at night. I’m a senior who often travels cross-country on a budget, and I usually look for Wyndhams because I expect affordable, safe, clean lodging. This room was disgusting. There were holes in the walls, peeling paint, a backed-up sink, a gritty floor, chewed-up baseboards, and a rusty door. I also felt unsafe after seeing a man stagger through the parking lot, so I wedged a chair under the door. I cleaned up later at the first clean gas station. I left a review on Hotels.com, and management invited me back, saying they’d personally make sure I had a good stay. No thanks. They get one chance at a first impression, and this was my last impression. I don’t know why Wyndham includes this place, but the corporate office was great when I contacted them and clearly horrified by what happened.

The room we got was extremely old and run-down, and the heat wasn’t working even an hour after we arrived. We called, and the woman offered another room but told us to hurry to the office so they wouldn’t think we were staying in the first one, even though everything was unpacked. I asked if I could check that the other room had heat. She said she couldn’t promise it would, and if she let us look, we’d have to keep it and pay. Someone checked it for us, but that room had no heat either. She also said that even if a room had heat and it stopped an hour later, she couldn’t do anything and we’d have to keep it. She processed a $180 refund along with our $200 deposit, but said it could take 3 to 7 days. So $380 was out of my account, we had no room for a week, and I had to spend more money for myself and my kids. She wouldn’t give me anything with a refund receipt on it. I have video proof of all this. It was a huge inconvenience, with no room and no solution.

The check-in woman, Lisa, was amazing. But be aware of the door security: friends or workers used master keys to open doors, and the people who tried mine got it slammed in their faces before my pit bull could get them. If you do stay, lock up. The place is also terribly lit at night. In winter, they don’t clear the walkways or parking lot. Another customer had to buy salt and a shovel to dig both of us out, since we were in back buildings. A water line broke in the room next to mine, cutting water to our building for several hours. I understood that, but they shut the water off without warning five more times. They left a bin full of ruined things from the flooded room on the only sidewalk out of my room. I use a cane and have other health issues, so I couldn’t move it if there’d been an emergency. I complained. The front desk woman was the only one around, so she left a note to have it moved. It stayed overnight, then was moved first thing in the morning. We got another apology, as we did each time we complained about the water. They also said power would be off from 8 to 12 the next morning to fix the electric in the flooded room. If the bin hadn’t blocked the way, I might not have heard about the outage. When the power went out, I planned to use my tablet on wifi, but my phone had no wifi either. The first man I called barely spoke English, said he’d check, and didn’t call back after 20 minutes. A woman I could understand answered when I called again. She said buildings 4 to 8 were without power, and when I asked how that affected wifi, she offered to get the manager. He told me all buildings 1 to 8 were out. When I called him a liar, he said he could check me out. I needed to be treated like a valued customer, not checked out. I still don’t know why four buildings had to lose power for four hours to replace a handful of outlets. I’m still waiting for some offer of compensation, but so far there have only been empty apologies and a cold, dark room. At least I have water right now. Watch for hidden fees and costs, especially if you bring pets. If you try this place, call the location directly between 1 and 9 and ask for Lisa.