Here is the thing, is the hotel beautiful, yes. Is there ample room in the hotel rooms, also yes. Is the bathroom exactly what you would want in a Disney hotel with plenty of space, most definitely! However, the customer service and front desk needs a complete and total overhaul. The only individuals that work there that have any care to guests or hospitality whatsoever are the valet (MAJOR kudos to Cameron and Greg who are the real MVP’s) and housekeeping. The only reason why we do not stay on what would be considered the ‘real’ Disney property is because of how many times we are there and it just makes more financial sense. However you still pay for parking and for resort fees at the B (which are an absolute joke), so I am not even sure how much we are saving in the long run.
We have been staying at the B Resort in Disney Springs for years and are there every 2-4 months if not more. I was devastated when the Best Western Disney Springs (it is being remodeled from the groundup and is now the Drury Plaza) closed as that was our hotel and Kim at the front desk was sensational. Now, that was a hotel that understood large rooms, family atmosphere and customer service.
I understand that during the pandemic that challenges needed to be overcome to keep the lights on, such as; shortening of staff, etc., but if that is going to be the case and you are going to cut corners, then you should also be cutting the corners on the price of parking as well as the resort fee as well. Since any and all accomodations are null and void the minute you step onto this property.
I completely understand that this is #firstworldproblems, but I figure if I can save any traveler the grievance especially when traveling with young ones, I am going too.
With everything that happened this weekend, it was the nail in the coffin and I have canceled all future reservations and will be trying out the Holliday Inn right next store just to see (the reviews were excellent and it looks like it went through a refurbishing) and we are doing the All-Stars Pop for the Holidays. So here it is 5 reasons which will probably end up being more.
If the B-Resort in Disney Springs is going to market themselves as a Disney Springs Walt Disney World property with the same benefits of any other DIsney Property, they should probably align themselves with the values. IJS.
The Manager could careless about repeat business. Look I don’t need to be treated to any sort of red carpet service whatsoever, but I also do not need to be admonished on the phone, talked to as though I am a small child ( I never drop my Dr. title ever) and/or be chastised because I use Priceline to book and now have questions that you refuse to talk to me about because I made a reservation through a third party. Especially with things that have been resolved in the past without issue that you are telling me unequivocally cannot be done now. Also, when I asked for a corporate contact she refused to provide it to me, gave me her “supervisor” with an non-working email address and when I looked up said individual on LinkedIn (mama ain’t a fool) he had not been working at the B for quite some time. In addition to the fact that he oversaw housekeeping, not guest relations so I am really confused on why I was given their contact at all. In addition, with as many times as I have stayed there, you could at least pretend like you cared about my repeat business (even through all of your hotel challenges) which you blantantly told me on the phone that you didn’t.
Without fail there is some issue with the elevator. Two years in and you cannot fix the elevator? Keep in mind, there are only two and you can wait upwards of twenty or so minutes for one to arrive. If it is even working at all (I have already stayed twice where both elevators were down both times and they still can’t get it together). Depending on when you are checking in, this can be extremely frustrating especially if you have plans or dining reservations and may already be working against the clock. Tell me again why I am paying for a resort fee when it is taking me twenty minutes to get to my room with two toddlers? More often than not we are scuttled to the service elevator (we have taken it so much that my kids call it the secret elevator). I am sorry, but if I am paying a resort fee I should not have to always take a service elevator so I am not waiting an exorbitant amount of time to either leave the hotel or get to my room.
Sidenote: If you are planning to use their transportation it does not come on the regular as other disney properties, it needs to be scheduled. We always use our car so this is not really something I think of.
I understand that there is still a pandemic and you are short-staffed, but almost every other Disney property has returned to a normal cleaning of the room schedule. Even if you call and request your room to be cleaned, it does not get done and my husband several times over has had to physically go down to the lobby and get sheets and towels since after numerous requests they were never delivered to the room. You don’t want to clean the room, fine, but there should at the very least be fresh towels every day.
Oh, and this time the phone was not working, which is kind of a big deal when you need to either get something or have valet come and get your luggage. This also required my husband to physically go downstairs, wait for the longest elevator ever (he ended up taking the service one back up) and request what we needed.
The hotel for the first time in forever (cue Frozen music) was quite busy, because well…it’s flipping Summer, which you would think the hotel would be prepared for. Especially on a Sunday with everyone leaving and that they would at the very least get extra staff for the Season, but alas, I forget who I am dealing with. We waited thirty minutes for a valet to show and get our luggage. If we didn’t have so much, I would have done it myself.
I CANNOT WRITE THIS BIGGER, BUT THE VALET ARE AWESOME AND ARE THE B’S ONLY REAL REDEEMING QUALITY.
Cameron and Greg are amazing, work their tails off, and I am sure are getting yelled at three ways from Sunday, but continue to do their jobs with a smile and a humour that was needed for how irritated I was with what a late start to the park we were getting by waiting thirty minutes. If you have Capture Your Moment reservations (or any reservations for that matter), I highly suggest leaving this resort every bit of an hour and a half early and I wish I was joking since this exact situation this weekend happened for our CYM too.
If your room is dirty or there is an issue, do not expect anyone at the front to take any sort of initiative and make sure it is handled. The last time we stayed (seriously you would think that I wouldn’t be such a glutton for punishment) there was sticky residue all over the floor. We called over five times, kept getting told that someone would come up and do you want to guess what was not done? If you guessed the floor or caring that my two young children are stepping all over it then winner, winner. We put towels all over the floor which was hard since the kids were playing, didn’t understand to keep the towels on the floor or anything else.
It. Was. All. Over. The. Floor. Like not in a spot, but alllll over. Fun fact this was also the weekend that there was no hot water…but I am paying a resort fee, figure that one out.
One of the most critical issues is that their ‘special’ My Disney Experience number that is supposed to link your hotel reservations to your park reservations does not work and when you call Disney Customer Service which can be a super fun several hour wait (cue sarcasm) they will tell you that their ‘special’ number does not work because letters are not part of the Disney reservations and then you call the B back who will tell you that that is the only number they have and that a manager will call you back in 24-72 hours with the ‘real’ information and this song and dance will happen over and over until you give up and say “I am never staying in this hotel ever again”. I have annual passes, so being able to make multiple park reservations is something that I need to be able to do unless otherwise why would I be staying on Disney property.
Just to drill the situation home, we arrived at the hotel (this last trip) on a Thursday at 10:30am. There have been times we have stayed there that they have switched our rooms to something we did not make a reservation for because they ‘ran out’. Again, you would have thought I learned my lesson, but alas. Because of this, we have learned to now check in first thing when we arrive and before doing anything. Sean goes up to the front desk speaks to an individual and asks if there is any upgrades and to make sure we get a high room. The woman at the front desk promptly tells Sean that we would not get a better room than what we were in and that we would get a high floor room with no issue. We went about our day, went to dinner, went back to the hotel where Greg took our stuff upstairs and would you like to see our room view?!
It was on the seventh floor and with as many times as I have stayed there and the woman at the front acknolwedging that piece of information and if you remember, Sean had already been told that we had NOTHING to worry about as they had plenty of rooms, this is what they gave us! Here is the very best they could do with allllll the rooms they supposedly had…
And that my friends is it…the final stay I will ever have at the B…oh and their Wi-Fi sucks…that is all.
Dear B, take it from someone who knows the importance of customer and guest relations, you need to do either a complete overhaul or a major in-house training ASAP. In fact, I offer training just like this to Advisors that I feel that your front desk staff would benefit from. It can be done virtually. Feel free to go to danarobb.com and get more information. Otherwise, you will continue to lose business and your ratings will continue to plummet as shown on every travel rating arena there is.
