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| - Just like Las Vegas, it seems, you either love this place or you hate it. First off I should say, that no one from the hotel met me at the airport, carried me on their shoulders, paid me to upgrade to the penthouse suite and other such nonsense that other reviewers have claimed. I am not saying they are lying but...
I decided to pay the premium room rate just to see how nice it could be during an overnight in Las Vegas. That was mistake number one. Satisfaction with this hotel seems to be directly related to the room rate. Had I paid $79 a night, I would honestly feel differently about the quality of my stay. What a disappointment our stay turned out to be!
First the good stuff. As everyone mentions the rooms are stylish, high tech and we had an amazing view. The view was great -- if not exactly as depicted online. All the high tech stuff worked, which I was grateful for after reading other reviews, but by then I was too tired to mess with all the gadgets. We were able to hook up the iPod and listen to music. I liked that we could hook up our iPods to the sound system and the bed was unbelievably comfortable. The bathroom was nice. I imagine the SkySuites are fabulous.
I wish I had better things to say about our stay. When we arrived around 10 pm on a Friday night there were long lines to check in. It goes very slowly. Some people were already drinking in line. I imagine at 9 am or whatever strange hour other people check in, that doesn't happen. Or on a Wednesday if there's not a convention in town or the hotel's occupancy is at 20 percent. If you arrive when there are no lines, it will go faster.
They must get lots of complaints, so I wouldn't like the desk clerk's job either. It shows in their attitudes. The guest ahead of me had an issue that took 45 minutes to resolve. They could have taken him aside to deal with his complaint? I (and the guests behind me) would have appreciated it. There was no organization; some lines moved faster and unfortunately I was in one that did not. An officious looking woman in uniform finally came over and shyly told us to not congregate but to make sure we were in line. Thanks. Now the issue required several trips to a non-smiling manager, lots of shaking his head. Again, I would've appreciated it if the manager would have come over, dealt with the guy and made the line move faster! Very quickly I was becoming unimpressed with the Aria.
Apparently, rooms with two queen beds are limited in number. If one King bed presents a problem stay elsewhere. If one King was what you reserved, you'll be content. When I finally made it to the desk clerk, I got a half hearted greeting, and when I asked what that was all about (as in you are aware I've been waiting now 45 minutes for him to finish) she quickly replied "sorry he wanted to change his room." I understood why. I had made my reservation months prior online and she tells me that they are booked and can't give me the Deluxe room I reserved and paid for but one on a much lower "smoking optional" floor. What does smoking optional really mean anyway? It means it's a smoking floor. Come on folks, that's insulting enough. Of course if you're a smoker, it's not an issue. Shame shame shame.
She'd take $50 off the room rate. Not just no but come on you must be kidding no. I could have and would have stayed at the Palazzo, the Bellagio, Caesar's Palace, Planet Hollywood or any other hotel on the Strip for that price or less. It's pretty obvious what I'll do next time. So discussions with another "manager." Instead of two beds we can get a "deluxe room" with a King. I had wasted already an hour of what was a brief visit to Las Vegas.
The staff did nothing to make up for all the inconvenience and changes. I asked for a late check out and was told no. Okay I can't really complain about that. But then housekeeping knocked on our door at 9 am. Yes it was my fault I did not set the "privacy" switch! I can't blame the hotel staff for not knocking because either the room was vacant or we didn't want to be disturbed. I don't know who wants housekeeping in Las Vegas at 9 am! It reminded me of a terrible Holiday Inn in Texas where the leather-faced manager tried to force us out of our room before check-out time!
Check out was efficient since not a lot of people were checking out and I got a robot-like "sorry" when I said our stay was disappointing. When I heard that they get a lot of complaints and unhappy guests it was easy to see why.
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