Hard Rock Hotels
reviews and complaints

I was enticed to come stay at the Hard Rock Casino and Hotel in Tampa, Florida by a casino host who promised me the executive suite with all expenses, food, alcohol, accommodation and room service complimentary, paid by the hotel, at check out the next day the woman was rude and confrontational and challenged me that there was no notes or any documentation to support my story that my bill was covered by the promise of the casino host whose name I will omit for the record.

It took over 2 hours of confrontational inappropriate management communication at the check out desk to finally get the hotel to track down the casino host on his cell at home to support this and finally credit my card for $500 plus minus.

In the interim, I had given the valet parking attendant my parking voucher and all this time was making excuses (lies) why my car could not be found or located. Keep in mind there was nobody else waiting for there car, nobody, any residents waiting for the car, just 6 valet attendants laughing outside and smoking.

When I asked for a general manager or any manager, apparently, none were on duty, and another casino host, low on the management totem pole was in charge for the day, being Sunday Nov 22nd.

After another 2 hours of standing outside waiting for my car, finally the management of the valet parking area shows up to tell me she has bad news and "not to worry we going to take care of you" words that are far from the truth...when I was brought to my car still parked in the valet parking space, it was totaled, air bags released, both right side wheels and rims smashed and bent, both right doors and mirrors completely smashed in, the car looked like a giant Mack truck ran into my car at 50 mph.

The police report was done, no apology was made, the valet manager told me to get on my phone and make my own arrangements at my expense for a tow truck and car rental...he did not like my answer and was rude, arrogant, nasty, inappropriately dressed in dirty t-shirt, mumbling and chuckling to one of the valet employees.

It took another 2 to 3 hours to convince the manager appointed casino host to tow my car home to Sarasota and get me a ride home.

I was promised that their insurance company would be at my home taking care of this the very next day and they would pay for a car rental and have at my house...This is yet to be done...I have made phone calls and the answers are all political bull "we waiting for corporate to take care of this"...

DO NOT STAY AT THIS HOTEL EVER BECAUSE IF ANYTHING GOES WRONG, YOU ARE IN FOR THE AGGRAVATION YOU WOULD NOT BELIEVE FROM A LARGE CORP. THE WORST RUN MANAGEMENT EVER.

I know this as I was a VP in a Fortune 500 company and I have a good idea through many training seminars and basic logic the difference between good management and terrible management.

My husband and I stayed at the Hard Rock Casino in Biloxi, MS last month and had a wonderful time. During our stay, we found out that you could swim in the pool for $20.00, which seemed like a great deal as the pool area is spectacular. I called to confirm this information on Friday, August 20, 2010. At no time did the representative explain that on Sundays from noon the pool area is for adults only. On Sunday, August 22, my son, a friend, and I headed down to Biloxi from Laurel, MS, about a 2 hour drive. We experienced car trouble at the time-the brakes on my son's vehicle began to fail. Fortunately, we were able to get to the hotel. We then had lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe, where we were treated very well. I explained our predicament to the security guard in the restaurant, and he told me that it was fine to leave the car in the parking garage until my husband could attend to it on Tuesday. (He was at the time in Austin, TX helping our older son move.) We then proceeded to the pool area, where we were told that we could not come in due to the fact that the kids were not 21. I explained that we had nowhere else to go. The pool staff were condescending, and were not at all concerned about the problem that we had (they appeared to find it amusing). We asked to speak to the pool manager, and he happily told us that no one under 21 was allowed into the pool for Detox. I then went to the check-in counter and asked for a manager. A delightful young woman named Jessica heard the problems that we were having, took money for the kids, and lead us down to the pool area. She was told that we couldn't go into the pool. I then asked for the manager of the property. Melissa Seryl came down accompanied by a large security guard (I am 4'11" tall). She just reiterated policy. I asked if we could be comped a room so that we would at least have somewhere to wait until our ride from Laurel came to pick us up. She informed me that she was not authorized to comp people. I told her that this was fine, but that I was going to be sure to let anyone who would listen about our experience. She informed me that this was my right (I was so glad to have her permission on this issue), but that if I said anything negative about the Hard Rock on the grounds that we would have to leave. We were refunded the $40.00. The kids and I went to the McDonald's across the street, where we were sure to tell everyone that come in for the next 2 hours about our predicament. The manager at the McDonald's recommended that I write about our experience to this medium Our ride finally arrived, and when I made it home I called the Hard Rock again to see if I could speak with another manager and to ask the name of Ms. Seryl. The receptionist asked me to describe her, and I said that she was an older lady ( I consider myself an older lady at 47) and that she had long hair and was heavyset. The receptionist told me that I was rude, but connected me to a Mr. Aust. He asked how he could make me happy, and I told him that an apology from the pool staff would have been nice. He apologized for the fact that we couldn't use the pool, but there was nothing to be done about it. I asked the name of the overall manager of the property and was told that it was Duncan Mackenzie.

The next morning I called to speak with Mr. Mackenzie but was told that he was pretty much unavailable all the time. I was allowed to speak with a Mr. Carl Burl. His tone of voice was less than enthusiastic. When I repeated my experience he apologized, but repeated that what happened was just policy. He asked what he could do to make me happy, but I told him that I thought that going back in time was impossible. I told him that even if they had just comped us an ice cream cone I would have come away feeling like somebody cared. I informed him about the McDonald's incident and that I had reported his staff's behavior to the Better Business Bureau. He then got agitated and informed me that since I was making it my business to "bash" the Hard Rock that there was nothing he could do for me (which I had surmised from the onset of the conversation). He told me that "he was sorry that I had that whole problem with my vehicle but that it wasn't the Hard Rock's responsibility to entertain us or treat us to ice cream just because we had a problem". (I guess that whole hospitality business issue is unimportant.) He also questioned my parenting skills by stating that the Hard Rock was a casino, that Detox was an adult party, and that to expose my kids to either lewd (his word) environment was questionable. I had been under the impression that the Hard Rock welcomed families, but I was really glad that Mr. Burl cleared that up for me. I myself want to be protected from the the lewd, uncaring environment of the Hard Rock Biloxi, and believe me I'm going to make sure that everyone I know and a few that I don't understand that the Hard Rock Casino is just in the business of taking money.

I contacted the corporate offices at the Hard Rock and spoke with a representative named Davonne Raizor. She was attentive, listened to my complaint, and stated that she would contact Mr. Mackenzie. I thanked her. I was called back by Mr. Burl and he stated that he had spoken with Mr. Mackenzie and due to my vulgarity and the lies that I had made against himself and his staff that there was nothing more he could do for me. He also stated that he had never said that the hotel or casino were lewd. When I stated that he had a recording of the conversation, he once again became agitated and got off the telephone as quickly as possible.

If I had never stayed at a Hard Rock Hotel, had never bought merchandise in the gift shop, or eaten in their cafe I could understand how the management would feel that I was just being a moocher; however, their computer records would have shown them that this was not the case at all.

Out stay at the Hard Rock Hotel in Orlando was a huge disappointment. On our arrival on 7 October Saturday we were informed that the Hard Rock Hotel didn’t have any rooms available to honor our reservation. Our desk attendant was nice and wanted to be helpful but it was very difficult to understand him since he spoke very broken English. After the manager came out to help us with the problem, he saved the day by finding us a room with a garden view. Having paid in advance for a non-smoking with a pool view, I was rather upset to find my view was the back of a bush on the first floor and a room filled with cigarette odor. After returning to the hotel front desk, the manager gave us a $75 credit and moved us to a pool side non-smoking room the following day.

On 8 October we were moved into a nonsmoking room with a pool view on the 4th floor which matched our reservation and expectations. We were not particularly happy with the new paint odor but it was
certainly better than the smoke smell from the previous room. The next morning I asked the front
desk why they had a vacuum cleaner running throughout the night. The noise was as annoying as a person snoring. I was told that this was not a vacuum cleaner but a carpet drier and that the floor was
being renovated. Regardless, the hotel ran the machine throughout the night without regard for those
(if anyone else was on this floor other than us?) trying to sleep.

On the morning of the ninth, a crew of several Spanish speaking men arrived at 6:50 am probably to begin renovation work. We wouldn’t have known this except for their loud talk, shouts and laughs which carried on for several minutes.

I wouldn’t be going to the trouble to write this complaint had it not been for the grand finale at
checkout. After all, the manager had given us a credit and the other noises throughout the night were
an annoyance that we were able to ignore.

The desk attendant at checkout gave me a bill that defied common sense and was not even explainable by her. The bill listed many credits and charges. Only a few of the charges had a description such as The Kitchen (hotel restaurant). The other credits and charges were simply listed as Visa and the balance due was approximately $585.30 (on the first printout, more to follow). Having prepaid for the hotel this was very much more than what I expected and, as stated previously, had no description on the bill for what the charges were for. The desk attendant explained, with much confidence and enthusiasm, that this was probably just the rollup for the day of all of the charges I had and that the hotel accounting system just worked that way and, as much as she hated it too and many other customers had the same complaints, that’s the best she could do.

Still on the bill. When I asked her why there were so many credits on my account she explained that these were actually charges and the charges were actually credits. When I asked about the credit for $75 (reference para. 1 above) she explained that it was shown on the bill as a credit and that it really was a credit. At this point she printed out a second bill that separated the credits from the charges to try to clarify things. I won’t continue the play by play, but I kept my composure through 30 minutes of the hotel’s attempts to explain to me why credits are charges and charges are credits unless they are really credits and then they aren’t really charges. Throughout the conversation the desk attendant
provided six different printouts of my bill attempting to explain the charges. Each time, the balance due
was for a different amount: $585.39, $185.30, $0.00, $188.59, 47.03, and $556.42CR. Although I admire her persistence, after 30 minutes I gave up and asked the simple question, what amount will show up on my credit card bill? To this she replied, all of the charges and credits and after you balance them out it should come out to $185.30. The nightmare is sure to continue.

In summary, this is not at all what I expected from a Loews owned hotel. If it were not for having retained the copies of the six bill’s provided at checkout, I think it would be more believable to describe a UFO sighting. An American hotel should hire people to work the front desk who speak English well and use a billing system that doesn’t require an accounting degree in reverse gibberish to interpret. Our Hard Rock experience was very stressful and a big disappointment.

Sincerely,
Barry