Hotel berhampiran First Baptist Church in America, Providence

This was a solo stay on April 20, 2023. I am a Hilton Honors Diamond member, and as such I enjoy trying different properties across the portfolio when I visit different cities. In Providence, I had not yet stayed at this Homewood Suites, so I decided to give it a try. It was a stopover on the way by train to Boston, so I found it extremely convenient, a few blocks away from the station. I was surprised that this hotel did not offer a Digital Key, because it would have allowed me to bypass the odd arrangement of the entrance on the street level and the front desk on the second level. So I had to stop at the desk to claim my plastic old school card key. The desk staff was professional and described the hotel and features, as well as mentioning breakfast down on the street level. My Diamond status was recognized. My room was the one I had chosen during the online advance check-in the day before arrival. As it was a suite, it was certainly spacious. But.... the HVAC was hard to control, if at all. The outdoor temperature went down to the low 40's, and so I would have liked to have my room warmer than it was. Turning the thermostat higher just displayed the higher temperature but did not make the temperature higher. Unfortunately this was realized when I was ready to go to bed, so I wasn't going to contact anyone to rectify it that late. I found the bathroom to also be spacious, with enough room to put my toiletries on the counter. Because of the room temperature I opted not to take a shower that morning, so I cannot vouch for whether there was any issue with hot water. Breakfast.... I did not expect much. It was buffet style but limited selection. I did have scrambled eggs. I was bothered in the morning before my planned departure from the room and well before check-out time by Housekeeping knocking on my door. I thought that they only come in between guests. I had to yell that I would be out within half an hour. All in all, a great location but the lesson learned is to check the temperature control earlier in your stay if possible.

Thermostat on cool setting was set to 68 degrees as room was 73. Woke up at 1am and the temperature rose to 77. Turned air cooler and auto-fan kicked in blowing air in excess of 85 degrees- quickly made the temp rise. Shut off the unit. Used the guidance to text to contact staff. No response. Did not call as that would have awoken my child. Text again to get guidance on finding the ceiling fan switch... no response. Finally found a panel of switches in the bedroom obscured by an oversized lampshade. I have never seen such an arrangement. Text again at 7:30 in the morning. No response. Finally after 8 someone sent a message that they would send up engineering to look at the situation. Great thanks. How timely of you. Two days later and still no response or apology from management. For a 4-star hotel I expect anything better than what was provided.

Food from the cafe (comes with Starbucks coffee) is both well-presented and delicious. The room is clean, comes with a nice black out curtain for well-rested nights. The room is very spacious.

酒店是有年頭的老酒店，交通位置很好，離旁邊的mall,葯店都很近。酒店裡面有通道去商場，很方便。還有離RISD學校走路15分鐘左右。總的來説是不錯的。服務人員也很nice，衹要你要求，他們都會幫你解決。

We stayed here for one night to attend my brother’s graduation ceremony at RISD. The hotel is conveniently located and very clean as its a new facility in the town. Staff were friendly and helpful. Would recommend people to stay.

總體：這家萬麗是當地四星標準，不像國內如北京王府井萬麗那樣是高檔型，所以各項水準相當或略高於中國四星級（如假日，温德姆） 環境：房間比較乾淨，大部分用品質量都不錯，衞生間很大 位置：毗鄰車站和商場，房間可以俯瞰整個downtown 餐廳：餐廳幾個小菜不錯，推薦炸魷魚calamari，服務熱情性價比高，也可以送餐到房間 注意，這家酒店不能用applepay付按金，別忘了帶實體信用卡

For the cost per night of this hotel ($450 per night for the 1 King Bed room) I was expecting something nicer and roomier. The room had no closet/dresser to store clothes nor did it have a full length mirror or a safe, which feel like standard things to expect in a room, especially one being marketed as “more boutique/upscale” for this area. The shower situation in the bathroom is quite annoying. It is a narrow, stall style shower, but instead of having a glass door, there is a thin bath curtain that sticks to your body the entire time. Also, since there is no tight seal, water gets absolutely everywhere. The front desk/check-in receptionist was not from the area and was not able to provide any bar/restaurant recommendations when asked. It would make more sense to place people familiar with the area in customer facing roles. Lastly, we checked into our room Saturday afternoon and when we left the next day (late morning) the trash was in the same spot, unattended to. Both discarded items in front of various rooms and large contractor style trash bags that clearly came from Housekeeping/Janitorial staff etc. The smell and visual left little to be desired. Next time I am in Providence I would choose to stay elsewhere.

Breakfast can be improved. Omelette and bread selection was awful Only exception was waffle and hash brown when they are given ( but is rare ). Also mattress on sofa bed was too thin and uncomfortable. Otherwise big room in a good location

I have been a Marriott Titanium member for 9 years. I believe that hospitality is the most important facet of hospitality for guests who stay at hotels away from their own homes: regardless of whether the guest is loyal or not. Unfortunately, I have found most hotel staff I have encountered to be inhospitable, and some of whom are tricky to work with. Thus, I recently decided to start writing short diaries/reviews for every hotel I visit (though it consumes my time) to hopefully provide some useful information for you and the hotel managers. My hope is that hotels continuously improve to try and become hospitable places with the purpose of serving their guests. In the end, my final evaluation (the number of stars) is heavily based on the quality of my interactions with staff as a loyal member. I stayed at the Providence Marriott Downtown for 3 nights (checked in on Sep 6 and checked out on Sep 9). I checked in around 7:00pm on September 6. Below are my views on good (+) and not-good (-) about this hotel. Good things: + The hotel is a few minutes walk to Brown University and downtown. + I communicated with my personal ambassador (Gabby) ahead of the stay and they managed to upgrade me to a hospitality suite, which is quite spacious. + Though the gym is quite small, it has essential equipment and is next to both the indoor and outdoor pools. The pools are quite nice. Not-good things: - The person who checked me in (I should have asked for the name: you can backtrack on who was at the front desk around 7:00 pm on 09/06) seemed to be nice but they lacked an important skill: telling me about the hotel. The person just gave me the key and that was it. A front desk should at least tell the guest where the gym is, where the club lounge is, where the elevator is, etc. I had to ask the person all these information! The person didn’t offer me any water either (I only saw this when I checked out when another front desk person provided another guest.): I am not sure what was going on as I am an ambassador and I do not think that they provide water to higher elite (there is NONE). It appeared to me that the person didn’t care, they just didn’t want to provide me anything! - The suite 559 that they gave me was very old: table, sofa, etc have a lot of stains. The windows, looking over a parking lot, are small and stained. The room really needs some renovation. When I checked in and opened a door of the cabinet under the TV, one of the hinges came off! I called the front desk about the door problem on Sep 6. I came back from work around 6pm on Sep 7, the door was still not fixed and I had to call them again. Only then somebody came up and fixed the door. Furthermore, the room was not cleaned when I was back at 6pm on Sep 7. - My personal ambassador (Gabby) told me that I could have breakfast at the restaurant as an ambassador, but the hotel did the opposite: they only allowed me to have breakfast in the M-Club lounge.

It met my expectations but I realized that I overpaid for the room because I booked too early:(