Well, where do I start? We are literally sitting in MBJ Airport waiting to catch our flight out as I write this review. From the moment we stepped out of the transfer car and onto the Secrets property, the best way I can describe nearly every interaction or experience is…UNDERWHELMED! The entire reception staff seems like they have no idea what is going on and no organization. You get to the resort around 12 noon and check in, but can’t get into your room until 3, so they just tell you to go grab lunch and come back for your room keys. Ok…not a big deal, but annoying. Then we finally get our room keys and head to the room, but we can’t find our room because there are no lights on and no windows at the end of the hall where our room was. We literally had to use our flashlights in our phones to see the room numbers. Then we get in our room and find that it was cleaned, but very minimally. There were food crumbs on the coffee table and in the corners, the toilet bowl tank was nearly falling off, the mini fridge and bar were hardly “fully stocked”, with only a few waters and a few Cokes, and the bathtub was disgustingly filthy. I did go to the front desk and complain (which I rarely ever do), and the manager attempted to make it right by switching our room and upgrading us to Prefferred Club, but we would have to stay in the original room for the night and change rooms the next day. The next afternoon they called to tell me the new room was ready, so we went down to pick up the keys. Since we were traveling with another couple, and we were being upgraded to Prefferred Club…we asked if the other couple could also be upgraded so that we could all enjoy the same amenities and not have to split up. I was informed that it wasn’t possible to upgrade the other couple unless I paid $150 per night for the upgrade. At this point, we just wanted to get on with having fun, so I paid for their upgrade. Come to find out the next morning that our friends have to check out by 12PM, but their upgraded room will not be ready until 5PM. I felt like this could have been handled much better. Being they already had the old room booked for 4 nights…the chances that they already had someone to fill that vacancy already is very slim, and they should have been allowed to stay in the first room until the upgraded room was available. Instead…they were displaced for 5 hours…luckily they were able to stay in our room until then. So, now that the room situations are handled (our upgraded room mini bar still wasn’t fully stocked), we set out to enjoy ourselves finally. Unfortunately, we were never made aware of one of the 2 swim up pool bars were closed for construction….which made the only other pool bar available very crowded & loud. There were guests everywhere blasting their own music from their own speakers so we couldn’t hear any of the reggae from the actual resort. The food was disappointing to say the least. Think microwaved tv dinners on steroids. It was edible, but in no way were we wowed by any of the food…be it from the buffet or any of the sit down restaurants. The exception to this is Barefoot Cafe, Oceana, and room service. Their food was enjoyable. As our stay progressed we started to notice that any of the “higher level staff”, like anyone you needed to make reservations or changes with…it always seemed like you were bothering them to ask for anything. And many of them would be blatantly talking on their cell phones and completely ignore you. Most of the wait staff, pool staff, bellman, maintenance crew, etc were very nice and pleasant. We also noticed signs of and physically saw roaches in both rooms. Now, I know we were in a tropical climate and bugs are unavoidable, but we were grossed out. And lastly, there was ZERO policing of the Preferred Club amenities. Literally anyone can wander into the Preferred areas and no one checked anything. What is the point of paying extra for exclusive areas when just anyone can stroll on in and setup camp? All in all we were very disappointed. We don’t get to travel very often…and this was a splurge for us. I purchased this trip for my wife’s 40th birthday on several recommendations from people that had been here years ago. Well, in talking to some other guests that were there when we were, and had been there previously….it seems the common consensus is that the quality of the resort has taken a dive since Hyatt took over a couple years ago. We may be back to Jamaica, but I can assure you we will not be staying here, or at any Hyatt owned properties.
