I've always felt that my wife and I tend to look at the bright side of things rather than dwell on the negative but what we experienced at this resort was totally ridiculous. Previous to our trip, I had read negative reviews of this resort but chose to believe that those negative comments were the result of people who expect too much or simply have a need to gripe. After all, most reviews are subjective in nature, plus over our seven years of ownership in Fairfield/Wyndham, we have stayed at several resorts with absolutely no problems. All were great experiences. Maybe our expectations were too high based on our previous experiences with Fairfield/Wyndham.
Background: I made reservations in January (7 months ago). Initially, I was informed that they did not have an "Ocean Front 2 Bedroom Deluxe" Sunday to Sunday or Saturday to Saturday available, however, they could reserve me a Wednesday to Wednesday stay. Understanding that this isn't the normal procedure for Fairfield/Wyndham because reservations normally go from Friday to Friday, Sat. to Sat. or Sun to Sun, I questioned the guy. He said it was no problem because he would give me two partial week reservations; one for Wed. through Sunday and the other for Sunday through the following Wed. I specifically stated that this was acceptable as long as it was "Ocean Front, not Ocean View and that our vacation would NOT be disrupted on Sunday by forcing us to pack up and move to another condo. As a family, we had decided that we weren’t concerned with where the beach was located as much as we wanted a beach front balcony so we could enjoy the ocean front view on a daily basis. I was assured that we would have ocean front. I even called back a week or so after making the reservation to get assurance that we wouldn't be moved. Again, I was told everything was fine and that he had added a "Do Not Move" note to my reservation.
1) Day 1: Wednesday: Upon arrival, during check-in, the clerk informs me that my confirmation is for four nights (Wed. through Sun. only). I immediately explained the situation to him and after a short computer search, he found my other reservation. This worried me so I questioned him about being moved and whether or not we had an Ocean FRONT balcony. He told me that the rooms had not been assigned for the next week so he couldn't tell me whether or not I was staying in the same room. I later found out this statement was inaccurate. I am told to check back in a day or two. We were pleased to find out that we did have an ocean front balcony and a beautiful view.
2) Elevators are incredibly busy. There just aren't enough elevators for the amount of people in the north tower. One day, my son and I were greeted by two overloaded elevators in a five minute time span and decided to take the stairs. Fortunately, we were only on the sixth floor. It wasn't uncommon to return from the beach to find a line (minimum 10-15 deep) of guests waiting to get on the elevator.
3) Day 2: (Thursday) At 1 PM, all beach towels appear to be gone. We had just spent three nights at Bonnet Creek Resort in Orlando. At Bonnet Creek, guests could freely grab towels from one side of the cabana and return them to a slot on the other side of the cabana. At this time, I wasn’t aware that this resort required that I go into the Sunroom and complete a form to check out towel(s) agreeing to pay $15.00 per towel that isn’t returned. The cabana contained some nicely folded towels but they appeared to be damp. I wasn't sure if they were pulled from the dryer early so guests would have towels or not. A resort employee came out of the Sun Room and I politely ask her if the towels were clean. Rather than greet me with a smile and explain the check in/out procedure to me, this employee continues to walk away and says something that I can't understand because she if facing away from me as she walks off. I say, "Excuse me but I didn't hear you". She then turns half way around and states (with the tone of a 15 year old teen-age girl), "I said there dirty" At first, I just ignore her and head for the beach but I couldn't get past the resort gate before I became so angry that I turned around and paid a visit to management. Management seemed embarrassed and said they would take care of it. Even more amazing is that one of the managers excused this employee’s behavior by telling me that she simply wasn’t feeling well that day. I've been a middle school educator for twenty years and I can take attitude with the best of them. Middle school students can really test your patience and I have plenty of it, but I'm not about to take an attitude like that from a resort employee while on vacation. There is no excuse!
4) Remember the comment about taking the stairs due to overcrowded elevators. I forgot to mention the smell of urine at the bottom level of the stair well beside the elevators. The stairs were filthy.
5) Kitchen was not equipped with measuring cups or baking dish. We request both items at approximately 5:30PM. They were delivered at 7:15ish. By this time, my wife had already improvised and we were finished eating. Last week, while at Bonnet Creek, we were missing oven mitts and kitchen towels. We called the front desk and had them within 5 minutes. Every aspect of Orlando’s Wyndham Bonnet Creek was outstanding.
6) Shower door missing handle on inside so it was a challenge to shut the door. Tile floor has a sticky film on it. There was beach sand still in the showers. (Maybe all minor issues, but with everything else that has occurred, we are getting very frustrating)
7) Day 3 (Friday), I go to the front desk to check on the status of our room. The same young man that checked me in tells me that the rooms still haven't been assigned but he took my name and room number and told me that he would have management call me. We never heard a thing.
8) Day 4: (Saturday), 7PM, my key isn't working. I go to the front desk to fix the problem and while there, I AGAIN ask about our room status. I'm told that we have been assigned a room in the south tower and must pack up everything by tomorrow morning and move. Not only that, the front desk graciously offered to allow us to stay in our room until 11AM (one hour past normal check out time), store our personal belongings and food until 2PM at which time they would allow us to check into our new condo two hours earlier than the actual check in time of 4pm. Essentially, Ocean Walk is telling us that right smack in the middle of our family vacation, they expect us to pack everything up (food and all); we won't have access to our personal belongings or a room for three hours; and they sincerely believe that they are doing us a big favor by storing our personal belongings. UNBELIEVEABLE! At any rate, my wife and I visit with the desk supervisor and we are told that the woman who has our current condo reserved has a "Do Not Move" request on her reservation. She also has reserved three 2 bedrooms, side by side and she owns 500,000 points, (which is more than us). Suffice to say, we are told that there is nothing that can be done and they must honor her reservation. We are also told that Ocean Walk has no other 2 bedroom “ocean front” condo available so we are being moved to an ocean view rather than ocean front condo. The staff attempts to assure us that we are NOT being downgraded due to the fact that both condos are 2 bedroom deluxe condos. Yeah right…I’m sure they have people chomping at the bit to reserve ocean view condos rather than ocean front condos. After I inform them that I too had a "Do Not Move" attached to my reservation, they inform me that the "Do Not Move" was on my second reservation for the final three nights. :o).... Yup...that's correct…. I did NOT want to be moved from my ocean view condo but was okay with being moved from my ocean front condo or was it that I didn’t wish to be moved to a different room on the day that I check out. Either way, it doesn’t make sense and I tried to explain this to them. It is obvious that they made a mistake and put the "Do Not Move" request on the wrong confirmation. We ask the night manager what would happen if we refuse to move or if we would have taken a day trip on Sunday without being notified that we had to move condos. She tells us that she can’t speak for day management but they could take possession of our personal belongings and lock us out. So, on our ONLY Saturday night of vacation, we spend an incredible five hours on this situation…(two hours in conversation and three hours (8PM - 11PM) packing up and moving to a room in a different tower). Our new view is now the Ocean Walk shopping district roof top. It is absolutely breathtaking! I wish I would have thought to take a picture so you could see it.
9) Day 5/6: Sunday and Monday: We are in our new condo. Ceiling fans (in both bedrooms and living room) make loud grinding noise at any speed higher than slow. Shower door will not shut but DOES have a handle. I repeatedly grab handle to shut door while taking shower. Living room TV is missing the power button. There is simply a hole where the button should be. As long as we don’t lose the remote, we can turn the TV on and off. No remote and we will be unplugging the TV to turn it off. Balcony is smaller with only two chairs for a two bedroom. Also, we can smell cigarette smoke in both bathrooms. I guess I shouldn’t complain as I’d rather have it in the bathrooms than the kitchen, living room, or bedrooms. I assume that the ventilation system in the bathroom is connected with nearby rooms. There are some positives: Elevators in south tower aren’t busy at all. I found the elevator waiting with the door open on numerous occasions. Condo is actually cleaner than room that we had in north tower.
10) Day 7 Tuesday – This is a huge resort with tons of people. From my understanding, it only has two computers that have printer access. Both in the adult lounge (north tower). Internet is very slow. While attempting to print boarding passes for our return trip home, only one of the two computers will pull up the airline website. I visit with two more families (one in the process and the other had already) been denied a two bedroom condo. One couple was attempting to print their reservations for a two-bedroom because Ocean Walk was attempting to put them in a one-bedroom or charge them points for a two bedroom that they had already reserved. They were able to print off their reservations and did receive a 2 bedroom condo. Can a resort be this unorganized?
11) Wednesday – We check out with no problem. My wife and I are truly not negative people and I hate the negative aspect of this post. I just feel that I need to be honest and warn others about this place. I want to note that we were moved to the south tower and we walked past a vacant two bedroom ocean front condo every day from Sunday to Wednesday. There were a few positives. For instance, while printing our boarding passes, the printer ran out of ink. The young lady that was working the recreation desk was most helpful and very pleasant as she conducted business. We did run into some pleasant bellmen and a couple of security guards.
Let me just say that the view at this resort is absolutely beautiful and the potential of this facility is unbelievable. I can only assume that the resort has severe management and organizational issues. I would recommend that if you stay here and when, NOT IF you have problems, don't stop at the front desk supervisor, don’t stop at the resort management, but if your Fairfield/Wyndham owners, go to Wyndham’s national customer service line. Before contacting the national reservation line, all we heard were excuses and lies. After speaking with Wyndham’s national line, we felt much better and felt that our negative experience at Ocean Walk was important to them.
If you must stay here, you’ll simply need to ignore the many problems of this resort as well as their total disregard for the comfort and satisfaction of their guests. Hopefully, Wyndham will get this taken care of promptly.
