The Palms South Beach

My sister and I checked-in on Thursday, March 20 and scheduled to stay until Monday, March 24. After the first night, my sister woke up the next morning itching and found red spots on her calves and ankles, which developed into itchier swollen welts throughout the day. We found pictures of bedbug bites online closely resembling the ones found on her legs and body. Our strong suspicion is that the long light blue body pillow (which can be found in every room in this hotel) is thriving with bedbugs.

We immediately called the front desk and spoke with the acting hotel manager about our situation. To my surprise, the first question he asked was, Have you told anyone about this? That is not exactly the response I expected to hear from a hotel manager who is truly concerned about his guests. And despite his apologies, I did not feel that he had a good grasp of how devastating the situation was. To top that, there was no call to action and no effort to go above and beyond for the customer. I had to request for the uncased pillows to be removed from the beds and the sheets completely changed in our new room.

We got a new room. Having to pack up all our stuff two days before we check-out was an extreme inconvenience and a complete waste of time. As a result of this, our plans for Saturday night were ruined and I am now sitting in the hotel room writing this complaint instead of having a good time!

Most importantly, my sister is now suffering from constant itching, and worse, from public embarrassment. We are both completely uncomfortable with sleeping in your beds with fear of waking up to the sight of our bodies tattered with bedbug bites. I noticed that there are a lot of families with young kids that stay at this hotel. If I were a parent, I would be extremely concerned for their health and safety.

Bedbug-infested beds coupled with bad customer service can quickly leave you with a tarnished reputation in the hotel business.

Pros: Nothing, Anything I liked about this hotel was overshadowed by my terrible experience
Cons: Bedbugs and very poor response of hotel staff to alleviate siutation

Typing this review via free wireless access prvided by the hotel.

Guests with lots of tech toys will love the fact that there power outlets everywhere, there's one near the console table that has 4 outlets charge your Blackberry, 2 phones, camera battery etc...

LCD TV! 37" non tilt but is cool

There is a surcharge for this hotel to use their ammenities, hmmm didn't ask if there was an option to not use it, since we're only there for the action south of the hotel.

Why not 5 star? Two reasons,
(1) where's the ice machine? Why is it so far, not one on each floor...
(2) Early check-in is not offered, 4:00pm means 4:00pm not 3:30 pm when we arrived, we were told to wait 30 minutes before we can gain access to our room (neighboring couple got a free upgrade and was apologized to, we got out rooms cheap via Expedia, they probably wouldn't do that for us)

#2 lead to a discovery of their restaurant, which is great, try their spinich dip with toast points with a tasty crust of cheese.

Pros: Free Internet, steps to beach, great restaurant, bath robe
Cons: Tad far from the South beach action (13 blocks), no coffee maker (standard room)

The hotel was absolutely AMAZING! I love the southern feel to a hotel that offers palms trees & the best PINA COLADAS' I've ever tasted. My friends and I definately enjoyed our stay and could definately see ourselves going back again....
maybe getting married there..

THANKS AGAIN!

Pros: great staff, cozy
Cons: Distance from SOBE