The Red Roof Disaster

The following is a letter I wrote to the general manager of Red Roof Inn of St. Louis/St. Charles, MO.  Do not read while eating.

To Whom It May Concern:

I would like to tell you about my recent stay at the Red Roof Inn #143 St. Louis/St. Charles.  I had booked my room via priceline.com after extensively researching reviews and your website.  Seeing that it was three stars and recently remodeled (in August 2012), I booked the room.  My reservation was for 10/19/12 thru 10/21/12.

I checked in Friday afternoon and went upstairs to my room #246 passing by grocery carts, cigarette butts, and a pillowcase discarded on the ground.  As soon as I entered the room I was overcome by the smell of smoke.  I immediately called down and requested a new room.  Candice made the change, but no apology was given.  I checked into room #209.

I went up another set of stairs, again passing by many cigarette butts.  Once I got into my room I smelled smoke, but it was not as strong.  Since I had already changed rooms once, the staff was not very accommodating, and I had a terrible migraine, I decided to leave the door open for a bit and start the fan.  As I went into the room, two flies came out of the bathroom.  I literally could not do anything other than lay down.

After a short nap I took a shower to get ready for a rehearsal dinner.  When I got out of the shower, feeling a little more human and in less pain, I saw the complete lack of cleanliness in the room.  The carpet was filthy and had not been vacuumed.  I put down a towel so I could walk to my luggage.  The toilet was covered with urine and hair clippings.  There was some other type of bug crawling across the counter.  There were small black bits of something INSIDE the sheets of one of the beds.  I left as quickly as possible.

Click on the photos for close-ups.  The weak-stomached may want to skip them and keep reading.
 

I called from the rehearsal dinner to complain and request to cancel my reservation.  Candice informed me that I could not be reimbursed for that night 10/19/12 as I had already checked in.  However she did say that I would not be charged for the second night if I checked out early.  I called priceline.com and talked with their customer service department.  They called and talked with Candice and was told the same thing.

There was no apology given nor was there any offer of another room or even an offer for housekeeping to come in and clean the room.  I did NOT want to stay there, but finances restricted me from paying for an additional room at a different hotel.  With the migraine and lack of funds, I stayed there.  However, I stopped to buy a blanket so I could sleep in it, because I did not want to sleep on the sheets.  When I checked out early, the front desk clerk (I can't remember her name, but she was the gal who is expecting), was very apologetic.  I did not receive a final invoice for my stay even though I specifically requested one.  I told her that I saw another guest (in room 109?) smoking in his room.  For a hotel that claimed to be 100% smoke free, I saw and smelled a lot of smoke.  When I opened my luggage that night, all of my clothes and things reeked of smoke.

I have never in my life seen anything so filthy in my life.  I was not expecting a five star hotel, just a clean room with a lock on the door.  I have attached some pictures of the room.  I am requesting compensation for this horrid night.  I would also like to know that there is attention to these deficiencies in your hotel.

Thank you for your attention to this matter,
Malia Hite

The manager called me this morning and told me that I would be refunded for the entire stay and that he would attend to the cleanliness issues.  It was a pretty thorough and genuine message.  I will likely follow-up with an email.  Although it was handled nicely in the end, I will probably not stay at a Red Roof Inn again.