I will add more if I recall.. I am beat..but wanted to get it out
Hotel Review on Anaheim Desert Inn & Suites
Dates of stay.. March4-7, 2011.
We arrived at 7:30am Friday morning to the Desert Inn & Suites. Exhausted from almost no sleep the night prior, we flew into Long Beach, easy flight from Oakland.
The office was a bit busy with people arriving and people checking out. I checked us in and informed them that our other party would arrive in about 2hrs. We had planed to check our bags at the desk, as we always do at Disney (let me add..we are DVC members and always stay at the Grand and decided to stay off-site to stay with my dds cheer team for nationals). The man said it was fine to check in our bags that did not fit in the lockers. He kept looking behind me at my step-mom and dd; I assumed it was because he was trying to figure out if bags would fit in the lockers. Later I find out he was watching what they were doing. I was going over room stuff with him, while my Step-mom and dd were putting on park shoes and making bags lighter to take into park. This is when the iPad was placed into her suitcase, she had not heard the conversation about lockers, and assumed it was safer to leave in the suitcase in the office than to carry around the park. I almost put my camera bag in my suitcase, but decided to get a locker because I didnt want to rearrange all my stuff. So I fill out the luggage tag, change my shoes and take the 3 bags to the door to the office, the man walks over and gets them while we were there. We checked to make sure we didnt leave anything behind and went to the lockers and put a lot of stuff in there.
Fast forward to 3:30pm.. We arrive back at the hotel to get our room key. We get the key and our bags; empty our locker and head to our room. We all pass out; we dont even open our bags. I did notice that one of my outer zippers was open, but I knew I had nothing in those pockets and ignored it.
At 6:15 we are getting ready to go to dinner and WOC, when the girls wanted to play angry birds. My SM went to get it and could not find it. She tore her bag apart and then we tore ours apart, it was gone. We spent over 20min looking for it, even under the beds. Both DD and SM remember clearly putting it into the bag. She had a spot she put it in. So after pondering and searching, I had a gut feeling the staff had it. I had a flashback of reading some reviews on Disboards about peoples stuff disappearing out of their rooms. But I was like no way, this is not happening.
I called the front desk around 6:40. I asked if an iPad had been turned in. They said no. I said ok, well we checked our luggage in and it was inside a suitcase and it is gone. The man quizzed me on if the luggage looked like it had been gone through, who checked us in, who else was in the lobby, asked me if my dd took it, crazy questions. I said um no, it was left in the bag that we checked in, at this moment it hit me that the man was watching in detail were the iPad was placed and this is why he was asking so many questions about when we were coming back, etc. I told him the iPad needs to be returned or they will be reimbursing us for it. I asked him if I needed to call the PD, he said well if that is what you need to do. The man was being very very defensive. I said ok then I will call them, again knowing that they had to have it.
I called Anaheim P.D, they were very busy but she said she would call when an officer was on his way. At that time we decided to go visit the office and go to dinner. We checked the lockers again, no iPad and our bags would have fit, we were exhausted and clearly not thinking.
We go into the office and all the men look suspicious. There were 3 of them. The head guy again asked me a bunch of questions. I tell him again how I checked in bags, etc. He said he called the guy who checked us in and he confirmed my story, but no iPad. I notice all the cameras and point out were they cover and confirm that they have cameras in the room that stored the bags as well as the lobby were they were sitting. I said perfect, so we can review the tapes and follow the iPad. The man says yes, but he cant review the tapes only the supervisor can. So we left, but again said well hopefully someone will turn it in to lost and found. Again, giving them an out, as we just wanted it back. He also asked if we had any witnesses.. I said yes, our friends were in the lobby checking in when we were. They may have seen us with the iPad. He asked for their name/room number. I assumed it was for their in-house report
.
The P.D called at the end of dinner, before WOC, I said we werent at hotel, she said that is fine I will cancel the call and call when your back. I did not want to ruin the trip for my dd and her friend because of thieves. On the way back to the hotel I called the PD, the dispatcher was very very nice. He said if they cant pull the tapes they are probably telling the truth and without the tapes we cant do anything. He said it happens a lot, but call in the morning and they will send out an officer to review the tapes. So we get back to the hotel, again feeling creped out..
I was up early on Saturday morning to deal with this. My SM had her ds and ds gf contact their banks and change passwords, since the iPad was used by them also. At 7:30 I call the front desk and tell them who I am and ask when the Supervisor would be in. He said oh at least another 30min. I said ok, I would call back then because Anaheim PD is meeting me to review the tapes with him. I again said well I was hoping it was turned into lost and found over night so I could avoid all this PD stuff. He said ok and hung up.
About 15min later the phone rang.. we all looked at each other like No way. I bet the iPad has been found! I answered the phone; it was a guy saying he had a note left for him from the night before about a missing iPad. And that the guy who checked us in found it on the bench were we were sitting and had it put in the safe. And that it was in the safe the entire time. So we go down and get it. A man comes out from the office and says that his house keeping staff found it in the afternoon on the bench and he put it in the safe. We were dumfounded at the lies. He said we get accused all the time of stuff going missing and families get the PD out here,etc. My SM said well you better fix that you have a problem. He was lying. The staff said they called the supervisor, he said he was never called. He also said he was available when all this started. Im like um you told me the guy who checked me in found it, and now housekeeping. He had no answer. It was not left on the bench, the staff that was there ALL DAY knew nothing about an iPad being turned in. I was so done and over it. The guys in the office all looked away when we looked in. It was a very uncomfortable position to be in. But having the iPad back was most important to us. This was my Dds competition day. I did not need to deal with lying thieves on top of it all.
On the way back to the room we run into our friends, the same ones who were the
witness. She tells us that when they got back to their room last night around 11pm, none of their room keys worked. That is just to odd IMO. She waited almost 40min to get new keys brought to her. She refused to go get them, as her keys had worked earlier. I was like no way, I gave them your name because they said they needed it. I know why now.
We were locking up all of our stuff and had the Do not disturb hanging at all times. Still appalled at what we just went through.
We also found that if you let your kids take a bath, it will leak into the room below you. We found this out yesterday.
I will also add that our friends, the same ones who were locked out of their room, let housekeeping clean their room yesterday for the first time (she is doing a report when they get home as well, so I wont go into all of her details) but her very nice personal blanket was missing. They went to the office and were told that housekeeping removes all the lines from the beds, she informed them that no, it was not on the bed it was with their personal things. They were told housekeeping did not have it, but they did fold a grey blanket on their bed. Again, it was not on the bed nor was it grey. She told them she would call PD if not returned. And guess what
today it magically appeared. After housekeeping had no idea of any blanket that did not belong.
So this was our awful stay. I will never ever ever stay there again or off-site. All of the employees seemed shady. I am thankful the iPad was returned. I wish I could have watched the videos.
That created an issue. You can't really mail cash. Luckily they weren't far away, so they drove back to get it. They were beyond happy to have the money back. 
