Guest Review of the Brentwood Bay Lodge & Spa in Victoria BC
21 November 2011
It's taken me a while to write this review....the events happened about a
year ago but it was such a bad experience that I'm compelled to share it.
My wife surprised me with a birthday trip to Brentwood Bay Lodge, a small
inn that advertises privacy, quiet, and views of a bay. She booked the
nicest room – a 1 bedroom suite with a balcony and private hot tub. This was
a package rate that included a daily ala carte breakfast and $150 dinner
credit at their fine dining restaurant.
Guest Review of the Brentwood Bay Lodge & Spa in Victoria BC
After a 7-hour trip (car and ferry) from Seattle to Victoria, we checked in
on a Thursday in the early evening. Upon check in, we found note next to the
bed that said the hotel was doing construction on a new condo wing. Such
construction would take place weekdays between 8am-4pm. Next to the note
were a set ear plugs and a half bottle of wine. Uh oh.
We were awakened the next morning (Friday) at about 7:30am to the sound of
construction right next to our room. The workmen were visible out the
bedroom window and were right next to the balcony. They were building a huge
new building adjacent to the hotel and right next to our room! There was no
privacy and we had to draw the window shades (eliminating the view of the
bay), and didn't want to use the hot tub in full view of the workers. The
noise and lack of privacy forced us to leave the room for the day.
Guest Review of the Brentwood Bay Lodge & Spa in Victoria BC
We arrived back at 4pm thinking construction would be over (per the bedside
note), but it went on until at least 6:45 when we left the room for dinner.
We figured since the weekend was the next day, we could just relax about it.
Nope.
We awoke Saturday around 7:15am to a deafening sound which turned out to be
a cement truck right outside my door. There were also workers outside our
balcony. I called front desk who called the hotel owner. The owner said
construction was not supposed to happen on weekends, but that they could do
nothing about it because due to nice weather, the contractor ‘had to” to do
a cement pour (this was January BTW).
Guest Review of the Brentwood Bay Lodge & Spa in Victoria BC
The hotel offered to buy us dinner in the hotel restaurant, but since I had
already prepaid for a dinner package, this was small compensation. At
breakfast later that morning, our waitress told us the hotel was paying for
every guest’s breakfast, which again had no value to us as our package
included breakfast.
The construction continued until dusk (around 6pm).
When I checked out of the hotel Sunday morning, I was given a voucher for a
free 1 night stay. Given the 7 hour trip it takes to get the hotel (driving
and ferry), a 1 night stay offer was insulting given that I’d have to pay
them for another 1-2 nights to make the long journey worthwhile.
The hotel never informed me about the construction when I booked the stay.
Given the inn was advertised as quiet and private, my wife would not have
booked this hotel had I known about the construction.
I have videos and photos of all the construction, the cement truck etc and
sent them to the owners hoping for better compensation, but they were not
responsive.
The hotel looked very nice, the restaurant was good, but I've never been
treated so badly by the management of a hotel. It was a total bait and
switch and they made no attempts to try to make it up to us. We were super,
super disappointed!
