The Pro`s And Con`s Of The New Yorker Hotel
Pro`s . . .
Great Location, Subway Station Next Door, Taxi Rank Outside, Beautiful Art Deco Interior, Comfortable Lobby, Reasonable Sized Rooms, Choice Of
Either A Traditional Looking Diner Or Restaurant For Your Dinning Needs, Good Friendly Internal Security Staff With Being Asked For Your Door Card Every Time Before Entering The Lift Day Or Night.
Con`s . . .
Very Rude And Can`t Be Arsed Front Of House Staff, Bathroom Dingy With Paint Flaking Off The Painted Tiles, Room Windows Filfty, Complicated Remote Control For The Television, No Tea/Coffee Making Facilities. No Room Safes Only The Hotel One Which You Have To Queue Up For.
We saved up for years to go to New York City and chose the Art Deco New Yorker Hotel as our base to celebrate both our 30th wedding anniversary and our fiftieth birthdays. We chose Virgin Atlantic for our flights. The flight, airtrain and the train journey went without a hitch.
DAY ONE
We entered 8th Avenue via the subway entrance and saw the New Yorker Hotel for the first time on the other side of the Avenue and said "Wow" , We crossed over and entered the lobby, again it was wow ! . . We felt like millionaires, We went to the front desk to check in, There was a long queue but we eventually got to check in, It went down hill from here, we got a smack in the mouth from the curt front of house staff.
The time was shortly after 3pm (Their Check In Time) , We were told that we would not be able to have our room till about 4.30pm by a curt receptionist and that it would cost a $1 per bag to leave them in the baggage room, A good start we thought ! . . . Our card was declined for the deposit for some unknown reason, we went over to the Hotel internal ATM and was able to withdraw $300 for the deposit ! . . The ATM charges $3 per transaction by the way, Cross the Avenue to MacDonalds opposite and they have a free ATM as so do many eateries and shops over there. . . First Lesson Learnt !
We handed the $300 over and received a receipt, we then deposited our luggage and handed over $3 and then went out for a walk and grabbed a bite to eat, went back about 4.15 and luckily our room was ready and we received our room key. We entered the lift and got out on the 29th floor and headed towards our room, Now the feeling we got walking along the dingy corridor reminded us of the movie "The Shining" and kept expecting to see a couple of twins playing at the end of the corridor ! ( Spooky )
Upon entering the room we were fairly impressed, It was what we were expecting really but not what we call refurbished. It had a nice Art Deco feel about it, but felt it was a bit dingy, the view was of the Hudson as requested but was not as good as it was cracked up to be, we have had better rooms in Travel Lodges !
From what we could see only the walls have had a lick of paint, a modern flat screen television with a complicated remote control installed and possibly a new carpet. Original fittings all being intact and very Art Deco and we liked it, There is no tea/coffee making facility and the windows were filfty. The bathroom has a recently new wc pan installed but the rest of it looked original, the bath looked old and has seen better days, the wall tiles have been painted over and was flaking of and there is black mould in places.
Oh Well we thought, you get what you pay for, bearing in mind the location and cost of accommodation in New York City. And we were generally happy with it overall, we unpacked and went downstairs to use the New Yorker Hotel safe and discovered that you have to queue up with all the other guests either checking in or out etc every time, the desk staff were curt when asked to have access to the safe, and this went on every time through out our six day stay.
We then headed of out to explore the Big Apple and put the first episodes behind us. We got back about midnight and went to the desk to use the safe and got the same cant be arsed and curt treatment again ! . . No problems with the security staff and went to bed.
DAY TWO
Next morning we went downstairs to use the safe, A queue . . and again the cant be arsed and curt treatment and we went out for the day, we got back early evening to get changed to warmer clothes for the evening (Wont Bore You With Safe Episode Anymore) We entered the room and noticed a red light flashing on the phone, got changed and went downstairs to enquire about the phone.
We were told by a curt Mark/Marcus that we had been smoking in the room and the house keeper and a member from security can vouch for this by their noses and we would be fined $250 and the red flashing light was a phone message to this effect. We were shocked to say the least as we had not had one smoke the night before or that morning or indeed during our whole stay there in our room, we had every time gone downstairs and stood outside the front of the New Yorker Hotel and watched the world go by.
We had a heated argument with Mark/Marcus who was very curt and eventually he agreed to waive the charge but warned us that if we smoked again in the room the fine would stand, with that we went ballistic and said the fine should`nt have been given in the first place as we had not ever smoked in the room and to check your cctv to see how many times we have been seen outside and why the smoke alarm did not go off, we walked away and went outside to have a smoke and then went to bed.
DAY THREE
No Problems . . . Apart from the safe access! . . We decided to put the previous events to the back boiler.
DAY FOUR
One of our room door entry cards failed, went to the lovely friendly reception! to explain and to have it reset, we were met by a very curt Erica who had come across as very friendly on the phone when dealing with our booking our side of the pond , Oh how wrong we were, She reset the card and then lectured us on us smoking in the room and our fine, An argument followed and was assured the fine etc would resolve itself on checking out.
DAY FIVE
No Problems . . . Apart from the safe access!
DAY SIX
Oh what fun we had ! . . We decided to make sure that we checked out early so that the New Yorker Hotel did not have any reason to be cross with us! . . We arrived at the friendly front desk about 11.30am to check out, a curt male receptionist proceeded to check us out and started to write a pay back of only $50 of our $300 deposit, with that we told him to stop right there and asked why only $50. He replied that you have been fined $250 for smoking in the room, an argument followed and we were passed over to a front office manager namely Birgit Schmalkowski ( Cruella )
We tried to argue our case with this bad example of a female manager and was told in a very rude and curt manner that on no account would the fine be waived and just wish we had our cam corder on us at the time to record the converstation, we asked when the Mark/Marcus would be in on duty and she replied "when are you leaving new york city" we replied "when is he in" . . back and forth this went until she said "3pm".
We replied "ok . we will be back then" . . We went shopping in 34th St and went back to the New Yorker Hotel about 3pm, Mark/Marcus was a few minutes late getting in but give him his due he came straight to us on entering the front desk, an argument followed but sense prevailed and we got our money back. The conversation we had with him is recorded unbeknown to him, and makes interesting viewing !
Watch the video and make up your own mind as to who is wrong or right . . .
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