I have an interesting story. This occured in August 2008. Warning: there is a LOT of bad, but the end result was VERY good
**Let me preface this by saying CSR was, and still is, our favorite WDW resort. The following situation could have happened anywhere and is in no way reflective of the overall experience we have had with this fantastic resort. March 2010 will mark our 15th stay at CSR and we have 3 more planned for 2010**
We arrived at Orlando International very late, at about 1am. As I had informed our resort, Coronado Springs, that we would be arriving at 1am I called and informed them that our arrival would now be closer to 1:30. After experiencing issues with
Avis we eventually
arrived at CSR at 2am.
Service was lackluster from the beginning of the check-in process. There was one CM working the desk, which was to be expected at such a late hour. As we were checking in the CM informed us that our keys had already been printed and were in the administration office. He then proceeded to just sit there.....after about 5 minutes my DDad asked if he was planning on going to get them. The CM explained that there was a person in admin looking for our keys. The admin CM came out 5 minutes later, talked to the desk CM for 5 mins then disappeared again.
We had now been waiting 15 minutes to receive keys that were already printed. 10 minutes passed and the admin CM returned.
It was now 2:25am. Our request had not been met (Casitas 1 or 3) but we had been placed in the Casitas, so that was fine by us. We were tired and just wanted to get to bed.
So the 25 minute check-in ended and we proceeded to Casitas 5. We opened the door and the room wreaked of smoke
We thought we would just leave the door open for a few mins to see if the smell would dissapate. Now, I've yet to mention that I came down with a slight cold the day before we left and now the smoke was irritating my throat and making my cough much worse.
After 10 mins of airing out the room we called the from desk to see if we can be switched. The desk CM, same that checked us in, says he will check and get back to us. 5 minutes later we get a call from the manager on duty. She offers to stop by the room to "investigate" the smell.
The night manager shows up at 3am. She says the smell is barely detectable, that she has no rooms available at the resort and that she can offer us a "night" at CBR, but goes on to explain that we could drive over to CBR, check in and then we must check out at 11am, return to CSR and check back in at 3pm tomorrow.
Hmm...checking in to CBR for 7 hours doesn't seem like a reasonable solution to us. We ask to stay at CBR for the 3 nights we are booked at CSR. She refuses, saying there is no availability. We ask her to check POR and POFQ. Without actually checking, she says there is no availability and that we will "either take the room we have been given, or take the CBR room for 7 hours, those are the only options"
Let me point out that we were staying during value season, and that just the day before I had checked hotel occupancy to get an idea of crowd levels and nearly all resorts had availability for our dates.
We ask the manager to check WL as we have a reservation there 3 days from now. She refuses and offers to have our room VIP cleaned in the morning.
At this point, it is 3:30am and we have been offered no reasonable solution. We ask the manager to double check that no rooms, not even suites are available at CSR and we offer to pay the difference if necessary. She refuses to check, states at the 7 hour CBR room is the best she can do, take it or leave it.
Well, we decided to leave, all together.
We drove to WL and asked if they had any rooms available. It was 3:45am when we arrived there. The CM said she believed they did have a few rooms and after seeing Dad's ID asked us to wait a moment, went to the admin office and came back out. She stated "actually.....no.....we don't have rooms....sorry." and turned her back to us!
Her tone was odd and we questioned her, she said that she saw we had a reservation at another resort and couldn't check us in there. We explained the situation briefly, and explained we had already paid the balance on the reservation upon check-in and would like to stay here. She flat out refused and went into the admin office.
At this point the night manager calls my cell (we had given her the number when she called initially). Convenient that she calls a few moments after the CM went into the admin office.
We explain that we are going to check resort availability and we will return to CSR tomorrow to address the issues we had been dealing with.
We decided to try the contemporary and arrived there at 4:15am. The front desk CM says "yes, we have rooms available, may I see ID" my Dad hands it over and the CM proceeds to the admin office. 10 minutes later she returns and asks "are you are the _______ family? Well we don't have any rooms for YOU."
At this point, I am near tears. It is 4:30am,
we have been screwed around by Disney management for 2 1/2 hours. We threw up our hands and went to the Hyatt Regency near DTD.
The next morning I called Disney reservations and questioned them on availability. The CM said she had booked many people into rooms last night and was under the impression that the majority of the resorts were opperating at 70-80% occupancy. These resorts included CBR, WL and CR, all of which we has been told had no availability. The night manager had lied. Dad wrote a lengthy letter and we hand delivered it to CSR.
About 2 hours later we received a call from the CSR GM who apologized for the "overwhelmingly unacceptable lack of service" we had received. He solutions were:
1. Upgraded to club level at WL for our 7 night stay that we had booked as woods view
2. Refunded the amount we had paid to CSR upon arrival
3. Compensated us for our 3 night stay at the Hyatt
4. Offered to give us 3 nights in a Jr Suite at CSR to use when we pleased. (we used it to extend our trip by 3 days)
5. arranged VIP illuminations viewing for our trip.
6. Provided us with 4 "front of the line passes" each was good for 4 guests to use like a fastpass at any attraction (with FP) any time during our trip.
It was a wonderful resolution to the worst 2 1/2 hours I ever spent on Disney property.
While we were on the road I saw her talking to someone on the shortwave radio and fiddling with the marquee. Next thing we knew we were pulling up to the front gate of MGM.....just the four of us on the bus. I thanked the bus driver as we got off and as she was leaving I turned around to see the word "SPECIAL" on the marquee. Thanks again to the "special" bus driver that made our cloud turn into sun!
Pure Disney magic!
Our Daughter has a new favorite Princess now as well.
