The Chicago Hotel Collection River North

We were accommodating another room upstairs. Upon my return to the hotel, they switched my room back to the original room we did not prefer. We had booked a room with a view. Why would you require me to pay the full amount for a room that was initially reserved at 8 am?

a week ago

First off - prices were misleading. Expect to pay whatever you paid online again at the front desk as an "amenities fee" when you check in. Then, they charge a $125 deposit which I never got back after 2 weeks. I finally gave them a call, and they tell me I've been charged $100 for blood on towels (result of unanticipated period). I've never had a hotel do that before! Is washing with bleach not part of the usual treatment process for linens here? Anyways, the woman said she would send me an invoice for the fee, which is CRAZY that they tried to charge me without sending any kind of invoice until I inquired about it. After doing some research I tried to call back to try and get at least some of the $100 back, since everything I read said it was extremely unusual for a hotel to charge based on period stains, but no one would take my call. Do not stay here unless you want to feel like you did something wrong for experiencing a normal bodily function. Plus, I still never got that last $25 of my deposit back. This place is run by liars and frauds.

2 weeks ago

Booked a room for St Patrick’s Day in advance and put down the deposit, however after arriving the front desk employee told us that the hotel was overbooked and we don’t have a room, which was quite the surprise because we hadn’t been told about this at all. The employee had stated that there was not a phone number on file even though there was a phone number when booking the hotel. Since they didn’t have a phone number on file apparently they couldn’t contact me at all that the room had been cancelled even though they had emailed me previously and could have sent an email if a phone number wasn’t available. The employee at the front desk then told us to just book at the marriot or the sister hotel in the collection, even though the sister hotel did not have any availability through the website however he insisted it did. Eventually he told us that he can’t help because he is trying to give us solutions to our problems, even though the biggest problem is that this hotel somehow didn’t know how many rooms they had an just took as many bookings as they wanted. It seems difficult to believe the employee that they just found out they were out of room this morning, unless they are just using a google form and manually putting their reservations into a spreadsheet it seems they they didn’t care about their guests and instead just wanted to collect as much money as possible, attracting many people with cheap rates at a nice hotel just to send them on their way as soon as they arrive in the city. Despite never staying at this hotel in the end, the 10 minutes that was spent here were some of the most unbelievably worst customer service that I have ever had in my life, with both the employees and the business as a whole.

3 days ago

Horrible Experience – Unsafe and Unprofessional Staff My stay at the Chicago Hotel Collection was the worst hotel experience I have ever had. Within just five minutes of arriving, an employee named Rosie made me and my kids feel completely unsafe. She aggressively motioned for me to move my vehicle, even though she was parked in my designated spot. While backing up, she deliberately continued reversing towards my car, despite having plenty of space to move forward. It felt like she was intentionally trying to scare me, pretending she was about to hit my car. When I reported this to the front desk employee, Jamal, I was met with sarcastic and dismissive comments. He accused me of exaggerating, told me to be "fearless," and assured me that Rosie “wasn’t going to do anything.” It was clear that they had no intention of addressing my concerns and were only siding with the employee. No one ever apologized for this horrible experience. There was no manager available until Monday, leaving me with no one to escalate the issue to. I felt so unsafe and uncomfortable that I ended up leaving and booking a stay at a completely different hotel. I lost all the money I paid for this place, as they refused to negotiate any kind of refund or offer any solutions. Instead, they simply told me to "close my eyes and go to sleep." To make matters worse, they charged me twice for the deposit and couldn’t provide an explanation when I called. This hotel is unprofessional, dismissive, and lacks accountability. Their staff prioritizes protecting each other over helping guests. If you value safety, respect, and decent customer service, avoid this place at all costs.

3 months ago

I already stayed at this hotel once a couple of years ago, and my experience this time in July was pretty much similar. I made my reservation on Expedia. The price was approximately $78 per night, which seemed reasonable. BUT this hotel has an issue with adding extra fees, like a Resort Fee, for example, which for me was $43 per night. This fee makes no sense to me because the hotel is very basic. Where exactly the “resort” parts are, I still haven’t figured out after two stays here. On top of that, there are additional fees, which brought my final nightly rate to $133. I think you’ll agree with me that paying an extra $55 in fees when the nightly rate is $78 is absolutely insane! This aspect is very annoying, but it is what it is. To be fair, the hotel does inform about these extra fees on all booking platforms.|Another annoying part of my stay was the silly online form you have to fill out before check-in. Without completing this form, they won’t let you check in to your room. This form felt pointless to me - a total waste of time. Speaking of check-in, like my previous visit, I once again had to deal with kind of rude and unfriendly front desk staff. The older Latino lady at the front desk had a slightly negative and unhappy attitude, and she was very strict about following her “protocols” for check-in. I believe she had some arguments with the guests checking in before me. I caught the end of her conversation with them, and she was raising her voice and being rude. I didn’t like her at all - she is super unprofessional! I really think the hotel should hire more polite and educated front desk staff who know how to treat their customers with respect. On the positive side, I was allowed to check in at 2 p.m., as promised. I called very early in the morning to ask if my room could be ready early, and they prepared it for me. They also honored my request to put me in a room on the second floor, as I didn’t like the ground-floor location last time.|Like before, I really liked my room (this time it was room #216). The room was pretty big, modern, and nicely designed. It was ideally clean, and all the furniture was in very good condition. The large window let in a lot of natural daylight, which was a plus. However, the biggest issue with this room was its location right next to the metro railways. I could clearly hear the trains as they passed, and I could see people inside the trains, which made me feel like they could see me too. For this reason, I’d recommend staying in rooms on the first floor to avoid having the railways so close to your window and to minimize the noise. The Full bed in my room was comfortable but tiny. I really wish they would replace these beds with Queen-size beds to give guests more space to relax. Another minus was the lack of a closet. There were only a few hooks on the wall for clothes, but the hotel didn’t even provide hangers. On the plus side, I loved the bathroom design! The bathroom was very spacious, with a large shower stall and modern equipment that worked perfectly. The bathroom amenities were of good quality and smelled nice. The Wi-Fi worked fast, which was also a plus.|The hotel’s location isn’t bad. The distance to the center of Chicago is walkable, and it’s also easy to get to Old Town from the hotel.|Overall, the hotel is remodeled and was very clean every single day of my stay.|Would I recommend staying here? More likely, I would, because the rooms are actually nice. But make sure to check all the taxes and fees before making your reservation. The cheap price you see initially is not the final price - there’s a lot of extra money added to the rate.

3 months ago

Chile'...When you arrive to the hotel, they will tell you that there are additional fees not originally stated in the reservation (We went in |November 2024). They have a resort fee you should be aware (50+) of and a fee for making the reservation ($50 per night AND it's taxed--WILD) in addition to the reservation already made. The room is decently sized, but the TV was older, challenging to navigate, the audio was terrible and it was confusing. Parking was terrible, there is no view from the very, and I mean very small window in the room, the bed is VERY squeaky (we asked them to fix it, they did not), the elevator stopped working for a full day, you run the risk of getting towed (use SpotHero for parking in Chicago--thank me later lol), you get charged for clean towels and sheet if you ask, and the front desk personnel had an ATTITUDE. Not starting off on a good foot here. We went for a weekend to experience Chicago, so we were only in the hotel to sleep and shower. So you can imagine when we get charged $100 for "stained towels"?????? I'm sorry what? If I was in my early twenties I might question what I might have done to "stain towels" but as people in their thirties I know for a fact there was absolutely nothing that we were doing to stain any towels, whatsoever. We were determined to have a good time, and Chicago was wonderful. The only plus was to this hotel was that it was near down town. Besides that, this had to be one of my worst hotel experiences. We've tried calling to dispute these so-called "stained towel" charges and have received an attitude, gotten hung up on, and had our calls ignored. This is very unprofessional, and it seems to be that we are unable to reach the manager. Long story short, save your self the stress and stay somewhere else...ANYWHERE else.

a month ago

Do NOT go. I was asked at the time of arrival a surcharge of 400 USD on an original booking of 200! They state that they "provide the information at the time of booking"... but white on grey text in font 5 at the bottom of the email is hardly any information... Honestly I would not suggest this place, not now, not ever, just for this downright scammy business practice. I don't know how it is inside because thankfully I was able to get the original booking charge disputed and got my money back. But this was a pain to deal with through and through, how this is even legal is beyond my understanding, because these surcharges are literally for nothing that has to do with the hotel, but I digress

2 weeks ago

I was informed as I checked in that an additional $141 would be added to to my hotel fee for “service fees and amenities.” However, I was already charged service fees when I booked the room and what amenities there were I’m still unaware of. What started out as $87/night ended in $406 for two nights, one that I didn't even stay for. ||There was an elevated train right outside my window that ran every 10 minutes, all night long. The thermostat in my room wouldn’t go above 65 degrees and, as it was about 10 degrees outside, I was very cold all night. In the morning, I called the front desk to ask to switch rooms and no one answered. I went to the front desk and no one was there. ||Clearly they spent a lot of money trying to make this hotel hip but the space feels uncomfortable. I didn’t see one other guest in the hotel the entire time which made me feel creeped out and unsafe as a woman traveling by myself. ||I ended up switching hotels for the second night of my stay since I felt unsafe and barely slept the night before due to the train and temperature. When I emailed the hotel asking for a refund for my second night all I got back was “refund denied.” I’ll be elevating my claim. Wish I could shout from the rooftops that this hotel is crap.

2 months ago