The Ritz-Carlton, Charlotte

When you go, PLEASE coordinate your stay with guest relations expert Joeey Stewart. Joeey is absolutely amazing at curating your stay and makes it most pleasurable. Aside from the awesome Joeey, the bed is comfy, food is great and location is a 10!

I just spent a surreal and frustrating three hours in the Ritz lobby. This was an anniversary weekend. Check in at 4, spa at 5, dinner at 8. What could go wrong you ask? We arrived at 3:30 and were told the room was not ready. No problem. Ate at bar. Checked at desk again at 5. Still not ready. Wife went to spa appointment and I kept her bags in lobby with kids. Wife finished spa at 6, room still not ready. Kiera the manager said they were cleaning room but she has no way of knowing when a room will be ready. I suggested that she should know that and it may be a staff management issue. She assured me it was not. I also suggested if they could know when a room was not going to be ready and it was going to be late, she might text so I could choose to do something besides sitting in their lobby for three hours with luggage and kids. Finally put my kids in an Uber and sent them home and we went to our dinner reservations. The kids were originally supposed to stay in the room and order room service. After I sent the kids at 6:30 the front desk came over to say the room was ready. No thanks at that point. I asked Kiera the manager if we were going to be charged for the room. She said no. I will update if that winds up not being true. Customer service has taken a serious dive here. We’ve stayed here many times for a fun weekend night to get out of the house over the past 15 years. New years, anniversaries, random weekends etc. No longer worth the frustration. Do yourself a favor and stay at home and order really good and expensive takeout. You will save $2000 and avoid a lot of frustration. Update: I spoke with Asia the manager on duty 10/2/24 at 9:30pm to discuss the room charge on my credit card for the room they did not provide the previous weekend. She tried to get me to say that "I put my credit card in the machine for authorization". I have a charge on my account for the suite that Ritz Carlton did not provide and I am not happy to say the least. I suppose I will have to contact my bank to claw back the charge. If that battle to get my money back is not successful I will update again. Again, buyer beware. I don't expect magic, but when I pay nearly 2k for a suite for the night, I expect things to go relatively smoothly. Having the room ready at the assigned time is something the Holiday Inn can do. Earlier in my life I cannot remember one time being charged by a cheap hotel for a room they did not provide.

The Punch Room was a great find. I was in Charlotte for a night and ended up here after the Jazz venue I was initially looking for was closed. The service was excellent, the food, drinks, decor, city views and atmosphere was top notch. Highly recommend.

Once again, the Ritz sets the bar when it comes to exquisite experiences. Our server was simply extraordinary in every way. It was Vicki's 70th and we got stuck in Charlotte, not making it to NYC for her celebration (flight cancelation). She totally made up for it and created an experience for us that was unforgettable. Champagne toast, excellent wine suggestions and fabulous food, thanks to the incredible chefs in the kitchen; perfectly cooked/seasoned filet for Vicki, spectacular sea bass preparation for me. Thank you to everyone at the Ritz for making our evening special after we were unable to complete our trip the way we had planned. Sincerely appreciated. PS - Best bread in the universe!!

Ya there are reasons people stay here and I know what they are ... none of them come close to being worth spending time you'll never get back at this pretentious stuffy anti-social building. If you're into networking it's the opposite. Everything here is a big deal...I do mean everything. The staff don't know how to act & behave like everything they do is a magic trick or requires some esoteric insight. Some of the dumbest people I've ever seen. I've been to many other ritz carlton's and haven't seen one like this. If someone covered my stay here I would out-of-pocket go somewhere else, it's that bad. If you must go check it out because of the location and it being the only 5 star rated hotel in the city ...If you must get it out of your system go only one night and get the hell out . It's sad there are places like this ...There didn't used to be.