New York’s Union Square is an upmarket residential and commercial district in the city and so,
a Hyatt property a block away must be pretty nice, right?
Find out the truth about this hotel, coming up.
I used to work, live and goto school right around Union Square, so I’ve known of the
Hyatt on 13th & 4th since the day it opened- and have always looked forward to the chance
to stay there.
The location is ideal in just about every sense of the word.
Transportation is easy with the 4, 5, 6, N, R, Q, W, and L trains stopping right at the
square.
These 8 lines, plus a possible transfer at 42nd street will get you to literally anywhere
you need to go in Manhattan.
Add on top of that, convenient access to just about any coffee brand in the city, multiple
24 hour pharmacies, a Whole Food and a Trader Joes- you will truly be wanting for nothing
when staying on the square.
So, location and convenience are what the hotel definitely has going for it.
From the exterior the hotel has a handsome facade with the upper floors being a bit more
big box design.
Before I go any further though- I want to explain one thing.
When I created this channel, it was my small effort to, at the time, prop up properties
in Vietnam, where I live.
I had no interest in filming or publishing negative reviews.
Here’s the thing though, sometimes experiences are just bad- sometimes really bad- and if
my small voice in this arena can redirect your hard earned money to a more, let’s
say deserving property, then I consider that a win for you and for the channel.
I will never seek out poor experiences just to rack up views, but I need to be honest.
And so, on with the tour.
The lobby is nicely outfitted, if not a bit small.
I was surprised of how corporate the crowd at this hotel was and so the lobby was frequently
full of business people conducting meetings or just literally meeting a colleague there.
Considering how business oriented this hotel ended up being though, the wifi was shockingly
bad throughout my stay.
For my stay, I booked a courtyard view king room- the cheapest category on offer at the
hotel and the only category of rooms with courtyard views.
Considering how beautiful the photos advertised for this property are, some of the design
choices in person- or perhaps lack of design choices were surprising and boring.
The room- well it felt a lot smaller than advertised- which later I found out to be
true.
One small window and barely enough space to sit at the desk without constantly hitting
the bed with the feet of the chair.
While they advertise modern rooms with pops of vibrant patterns on the headboard and throughout
the room- in reality, it was all very black and white and nothing felt particularly premium-
it was feeling much more like a Hyatt Place, rather than a proper Hyatt.
At checkin they made a relatively big deal about giving free water and handed me a small
brown bag with two tiny bottles.
The evian of course, was chargeable.
The desk was well stocked with outlets and ports but the surfaces were worn fairly hard-
keep in mind this 178 room hotel is around eight years old and was closed for much of
the pandemic- according to the staff.
Things in general were also not as clean as you’d hope for.
The black curtains were covered in lint, the light fixtures were all dusty and the duvet
cover was physically smaller than the comforter inside.
Otherwise you had your standard TV, and very small closet.
I would say that the bed had convenient night stands on each side, but one was taken up
by a coffee maker that probably predated the hotel.
Any larger pieces of luggage would need to be stored on racks in front of the closet.
The bathroom was fine, but again not the layout as advertised, which showed an open floor
plan integrated into the room itself.
I will give them credit though for lots of storage space in a relatively small bathroom.
The shower was a decent size but the controls were awkwardly behind the inward opening door-
the second room I was in which I’ll explain in a moment didn’t have the same problem.
So, the second room.
That night I got back to my room around 19:00 and there was a lot of noise coming from two
places.
The most annoying came from what I thought was the rooftop as I was on the top floor.
It sounded like someone was rolling a heavy cart over a not so smooth surface, but was
loud- happening every five minutes or so- I assumed it would stop by 22:00.
The second was a ridiculously loud AC unit.
Long story short, 22:00 comes around and the noises continue.
I found out it was actually from the service elevator shaft directly behind my bed.
I called the front desk to ask if they would use the elevator all night, to which I received
a reply of, “Of course they need to use it, you can come down and get a new key”.
The agent’s attitude aside, I didn’t want to move, but 30 minutes later the sound continued-
and so I was given a different room on the third floor.
This new room, although the same category was around 20% larger and as advertised online.
At 23:00 the front desk agent knocked on my door to give me a Breakfast voucher.
Breakfast the next morning was okay- but the staff were not trained that well, with the
server not knowing what an Iced Americano was.
The restaurant is nicely decorated, but despite how busy this hotel felt, was still near empty
when I was finished at 8:30.
After the meal, I wanted to go checkout the rooftop lounge which was one of the things
I most looked forward to.
Got in the elevator and hit the “RT” button, which worked.
On the way up, two other staff got on.
One asked me why I was going to the roof telling me there’s “nothing there”.
I said, I’d seen photos of the rooftop online- to which he replied, clearly aggitated, “Well
yeah of course, this is a building, every building has to have a roof… but you can’t
go to ours.”
The other employee who was a front desk agent said, to him “you’re right, you’re right”
as if to try to calm him down.
I was honestly speechless.
Not just because there was no rooftop to see, but also because I can’t remember the last
time I’d consistently seen such bad attitudes from staff at an upscale hotel.
I just wanted to get out- and so I checked out 20 minutes later.
So here’s the Flip Flop Score.
The room design was lacking, some rooms did not match photos online and they just felt
like black & white boxes.
5/10.
The condition was only slightly better, but this hotel is definitely in need of a renovation
soon, 6/10.
The service was the worst I’ve had the entire year, two points just for the free breakfast.
The common areas were nice, but filled up quickly and felt too busy, 7/10.
Credit where it’s due, the location is fantastic, an easy 10.
Cleanliness, especially since they just recently reopened was not up to par at a 6.
The F&B venues were nicely done but the amenities in general were lacking, a 9 and 6 respectively.
Connectivity was a joke, I ended up using my phone as a hotspot the entire stay, 2/10
and finally convenience was a strong point at a full 10 out of ten.
Overall, a very disappointing 63 out of 100.
There are many beautiful and deserving hotels in New York- this is unfortunately not one
of them.
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