The Worst Hyatt Hotel Ever. I’ll Never Stay Here Again.

As a Hyatt Diamond, I like to think I’ve seen some nice properties, including the Park Hyatt Paris Vendome, and soon to be the Park Hyatt Milan.

That brings me to what I believe is the worst Hyatt hotel ever, and one I’ll certainly never stay at again.

Back in July, Ben from One Mile a Time noted that the Concourse Hotel at LAX airport was transitioning from being a Radisson to now being owned by Hyatt. Soon, it will be branded as the Hyatt Regency – LAX Airport. For now, however, Hyatt owns and manages the property, and all stays will include the usual Gold Passport benefits – including acknowledgment of status, ability to use upgrades, and accumulation of points.

After a JFK to LAX flight on Friday night, I checked into the Concourse Hotel fairly tired. I just wanted to go to bed, and was looking forward to seeing this hotel as it made it’s transition to the Hyatt family.

The lobby and ground floor aren’t too bad, though are clearly dated.

Checking in was a nightmare as there was only one clerk working for a long line of guests. Maybe it’s just me, but 10pm at a major airport – one of the busiest airports – isn’t exactly a late time, or a time I’d expect them to be understaffed. With international flights departing, and many flights arriving it is prime time for folks to want to check in or check out.

After checking in, I headed to my room on the 10th floor. It was a standard King room. Upon entering the room, I felt like I was walking into a sauna. Looking at the thermostat, the temperature was set to 80 degrees. 80 degrees in California, on a reasonably warm evening already? Sheesh. I attempted to turn on the air conditioning, but over the course of the next half hour nothing would change.

The room was dated, and full of old-school furniture. While I understand it had previously been a Radisson, Hyatt should have updated the rooms to at least look like the mid-2000s, instead of keeping it in the Brady Bunch era of yester-year.

In the bathroom, I found the biggest surprise of all. There were flies swarming around the toilet, and dead insects in the sink. In the shower, I found major paint chips and the last guest’s hair strewn on the bottom. There was rust on the door hinges, and grout that probably hadn’t been cleaned in years.

Outside the bathroom came more surprises. There was carpeting peeling back from the wall, and mold on the air conditioning vents. As I wiped my finger along the vent, a layer of dirt also came off.

Though frustrated, I was willing to put up with the room for the night simply because I was so exhausted. However, after about 20 minutes of waiting for the air conditioning to kick in, and not seeing any result, I gave up and went down to the front desk for a new room assignment.

The front desk was poorly staffed with a long long of customers waiting in line. I spoke with a young agent was didn’t seem like he wanted to be working. After expressing my frustration, he assigned me to a suite on the 12th floor.

The suite that I was now assigned was just as dated as the original room, though much larger. There was a desk to the right, and a dining room table straight ahead. There were couches, and a bed at the end of the room.

There was one MAJOR problem with this room, however. I sat down on the couch with my laptop to reply back to some emails, only to fall directly into the couch, causing my butt to hit the floor and legs to fly up in the air. Upon removing the cushions to the couch, I found out it was missing springs inside and the couch was completely broken. Great. I’m glad this Hyatt hotel feels that it’s acceptable to put a broken couch in a room. God forbid an older couple were to stay in this room, they’d nearly kill themselves sitting on this couch, causing a major lawsuit.

I actually hurt myself getting up from this couch and pulled a muscle, not expecting to fall to the floor.

Not wanting to press the issue further, I stayed in the room sucking it up for the night.

As a Diamond, breakfast was included the next morning in the hotel restaurant. Included was anything directly off of the menu, or the breakfast buffet. The buffet itself was full of once-frozen entrees and sides, and the pancakes were hard and crispy.

I went back to my room to admire the one thing this hotel has going for it – the view. There’s a nice sight of the runways of LAX and the surrounding valley.

And then I noticed this…someone had kissed the window and left a lipstick mark of a pair of lips.

I was fed up. I called Hyatt and complained. I was told that nothing could be done until I checked out. I went to the front desk and spoke with the manager on duty, who offered to wipe my bill completely, which was a nice gesture. While I was happy I didn’t have to pay, I was still frustrated a hotel could be this poor, especially for a Diamond member who should at least receive some half-decent form of respect.

Unless this hotel reforms itself, I’ll never stay here again and won’t recommend it to anyone else, either. I wouldn’t recommend it to you, a reader, and hope you can read between the lines about how poor this property is.

I’ll never stay at the Concourse Hotel at LAX, a Hyatt Affiliate unless they fully refurbish this property and turn themselves around.