We stayed one night at the Fairmont in Georgetown (D.C.) and were disappointed with the quality of the room and the quality of the staff. There were four major issues we encountered, which is really quite a surprise in light of being at the hotel for less than 20 hours. (1) It took more than 10 minutes for the front desk clerk to check us in, and she was unable to the complete the process. The big holdup was the credit card scanner that would not recognize our credit cards, despite multiple attempts to swipe, insert, etc. We concluded that the technology glitz was with the Fairmont because 30 minutes after checking in we used one of the failed credit cards at a local museum. The front desk staff member at the Fairmont seemed overwhelmed and wasn't trained in how to manage such an occurrence. (2) The thermostat didn't allow us to turn the temperature up by one degree from 72 to 73. We had to make multiple phone calls and eventually maintenance staff tweaked a setting in their computer to allow us to adjust our temperature. Again, another 10 minute consumption of time that seemed entirely unnecessary. (3) The electrical outlet on the nightstand desk lamp was broken, so instead of waking to a fully charged mobile phone I awoke to a completely drained mobile phone. Luckily we had about 90 minutes to recover before needing to leave for our flight (should have printed our boarding passes the night before as a backup!). (4) Despite paying for a "Signature Room" upgrade that was advertised as fully remodeled, the bathroom wallpaper was filthy and damaged. The experience at the Fairmont did not feel like a $400 a night experience. At checkout the staff member gave us a $100 discount, but I'm left feeling like each of these problems should have never taken place. I offered to share my experience with the manager on site, Joe, but the staff at checkout declined this.
I debated whether to go with my Fairmont reservation or my reservation at the nearby Canal House. While Canal House reviewers note the rooms are small, maybe we should have given it a shot anyways!
