Fairmont El San Juan Hotel

I usually do not leave bad reviews, but I felt somewhat tricked by other descriptions and advertisements (particularly from travel magazines) of this hotel as a “five star,” “luxury” resort. I had also visited this hotel years ago and remembered it being nice, but as described in another recent review it is now old and rundown. The customer service was not up to a five star standard by any means. When we arrived, we were told that our room had failed inspection (honestly don’t know what this means) and that, despite booking months in advance, there was no other room in the more than 330 room hotel that fell within our booked room category. We were told we could leave and get a refund or stay and get a free breakfast. The hotel refused to give us any money back if we stayed. We booked through Amex fine resorts (still very confused why this hotel was approved for Amex fine hotels) and even tried to get them involved to help us, but to no avail. Despite this being an absurd resolution, it was 9 pm and we had no other place to go, so we stayed. The room we were ultimately given was dusty and needed a paint job. The hallways smelled like an indoor pool. I questioned the cleanliness of the place the entire stay with the information that our intended room had failed an inspection. Service for everything was slow and food was 6/10. This hotel is not cheap and there are much better hotels available for the same price point that are actually five star quality. I would not recommend staying here and would never stay here again.

We enjoyed one night at the hotel and would consider the property again but be more careful with my booking. The common areas are the main attractions for this property. The casino, bars, restaurants, pools and beach offer a little something for everyone. However, we found the prices very high for the quality of the offerings but understand it takes a lot to maintain such a property. We chose to go off property for dinner to Casita Miramar and were very pleased with the restaurant. I reviewed it separately. One mistake I made was not paying enough attention to my booking. I booked accessible rooms that made the bathrooms less desirable for our stay. This was entirely my fault but feel it is important enough to mention. Accessible bathrooms are obviously designed for the safety and convenience of guests who need the features. Unfortunately, these design features may increase risks for those not needing the features. This particular design offered no water barrier to the entire bathroom floor. We needed to make a barrier with towels to keep the entire floor from getting wet and slippery. Once again, I booked these rooms and I am not disappointed in any way with the hotel. The intent is to simply create awareness for others.

What didn’t go wrong is a shorter list than what did go wrong. We arrived the first night to a room that did not fit the website description and wasn’t very clean. It looked like there was zero effort to vacuum the carpet and dust/wipe down the surfaces. In addition, the room felt like a cell. The website said floor to ceiling windows yet our room only had about a two feet of windows from the ceiling down, the rest being a cement wall. We arrived late and just wanted to go to sleep and figured we would talk to the hotel about the room in the morning. Little did we know sleep was not in our future. The hotel is a club, both in the lobby and at the pool, so there was music blasting from every direction which kept us up all night. After speaking to the hotel in the morning, they gave us a new room. In the process of switching rooms, the elevator broke down on us. While the hotel was helpful and timely in getting us out of the stuck elevator, it was not ideal. We spent the day at the beach and only spent time in the new room before going to dinner. In this time, the room next to us was blasting music which wasn’t an issue given it was not late but was a sign for what was to come later. In getting ready for dinner, we called for extra towels because one had a large stain on it. An hour and a half later and four phone calls with housekeeping (including one where they called to tell us towels were already sent even though we still had not received any) we finally received towels, making us late for dinner. While getting ready, we also noticed mold in the bathroom which was just another thing to add to the list of issues/dirt throughout the hotel. We arrived back from dinner ready to sleep after the sleepless night we had before only to be greeted by blasting music once again. At this point we decided our vacation would be better spent elsewhere given the previous 24 hours of problems so we booked a new hotel and left. The hotel staff was apologetic and made the exception to give us a refund for the nights we did not stay even though it was non-refundable. We confirmed the refund with them twice, in which both times they made it seem like a simple phone call from our credit card company to release the funds and we would receive the refund. Well based on all the other issues we should have known it wouldn’t be this easy. To no surprise, the credit card company had a hard time with getting the refund finalized. We spent many hours on the phone and even needed to return back to the hotel to work with the managers to get the refund process going, meaning more time of our vacation was spent around the issues with the hotel rather than moving on to enjoy ourselves elsewhere. Moral of the story, do not stay here unless you are looking to party and stay up all night and don’t care about the cleanliness of where you are staying. We will never understand how this is considered a five start hotel and received multiple awards. It is important to note that through all of this, the managers Gabriel and Stephanie were helpful and kind and did what they could to make the various situations better. It ultimately was not the experience we were looking for on our vacation but they deserve to be recognized for their efforts.

The Bungalow/ Room smells of mild dew , the fridge leaks and the door does not lock properly . I have address these problems with the front desk and nothing has been done .the staff is lovely and the hotel lobby and restaurant are very nice . It was a disappointment because of the room .

My husband and I got married in San Juan last weekend. Although we had booked a ground level poolside villa, there was a mix up with our reservation. The hotel comp'd a night which we appreciated and the overall experience and service was wonderful. I never write reviews but the main reason I am here is because of the service we received from Mayra, the housekeeper. who assisted room 265. She deserves a promotion just on genuine kindness and willingness to help. Coming from a restaurant management background, she is someone I wish we could have hired and someone I hope this hotel truly values as an employee. She blew us away with her service and was what made our stay standout. She mentioned she has been with the hotel for a long time and I hope she gets a promotion very soon!