This guest was disappointed because of her expectations, not the quality of our hotel. Her complaints:

1. She didn’t feel “a part of the family.” We have guests at our hotel, not our family. We try to be as friendly and welcoming to those guests as possible. We don’t go knocking on our guests’ doors and asking them if they want to join our family. If in the course of the day they approach us, stop us or talk to us, we hope they find us to be some of the best informed and friendliest hotel owners in town.

2. She complained that the sliding glass door was broken and the palapa leaked. After this guest vacated, we discovered that a screw had come out of the floor track for the sliding SCREEN door. It took approximately 3 minutes to fix it. The palapa in the room they were in is watertight and does not leak. There is a small amount of water that collects beneath the air conditioner on the far side of the palapa. It’s called condensation. It is cleaned up every day.

3. She says the “garden is very small, hot and humid.” Our cenote garden is quite large, taking up an entire lot within the hotel grounds. It contains a stone terrace, a wooden deck which is large enough to comfortably accommodate several people at once, a garden walkway, a waterfall, a second walkway to a hammock and two staircase entrances. As for being hot and humid, we promise guests a lot of things, but weather control is not one of them. We live in the tropics. You shouldn’t come here if heat and humidity are a major concern.

4. She complained there was no pool, and she could not stand the midday heat. As she notes, we have never claimed to have a pool. Not having a pool is a specific decision on our part. We are not a resort. We are a small hotel which attempts to create an atmosphere of the old Caribbean, i.e., simple rooms, lush gardens, laid back atmosphere and an awareness of our natural surroundings, including the Caribbean Sea which is two blocks away. And we think our prices reflect our simple but attractive accommodations. If this guest had told us she was suffering from midday heat problems, we would have given her free passes to Mamita’s Beach Club and suggested she cool down with a margarita on the edge of the ocean.

5. And now the “straw that broke the camel’s back”: no coffee. Before this guest made her reservation, she inquired as to whether there was a coffee maker in her Superior room. We told her no, but that the Deluxe Kitchen Studio rooms had not only a coffee maker but an entire kitchen. She decided to stay in the lower priced superior room without a coffee maker. It puzzles us that she then says she ran the streets with a coffee mug trying to find coffee. There are numerous coffee shops in the neighborhood. One is directly across the street, several more are within a block. As the guest herself says in the review, her outrage over not having coffee served to her at the hotel seems a bit “silly.”

6. The guest concludes that since she left early (after one night in the hotel-- all of these complaints come from a single night’s stay) she should have a refund. It appears that not only did she not read our website and our reviews (no coffee, no pool, no restaurant), she didn’t bother to read our correspondence, reservation confirmation or the reservation form she filled out and signed on check in—all of which state there are no refunds for early check out. What we find even more humorous is the fact that this guest never even asked for a return of her money. She checked out early but offered no complaint or explanation as to why.

This guest came to our hotel with an unreasonable expectation. She had a vision of a vacation that included several elements (obviously important to her) that we do not offer. Those items are not reflected in our style or our price. She made a mistake. But rather than admit it to herself or the people traveling with her, she decided to blame us.

Our hotel is not “running down.” If anything, it’s in a constant state of improvement.  No other small hotel in Playa has won tripadvisor.com's “Best Bargain in the Caribbean” award. But that doesn’t mean we sit on our laurels and don’t keep trying to get better. Even as we type, the superior room bathroom sink areas are being retiled with a beautiful Caribbean blue color tile which we think make the rooms look brighter. Yesterday, all of the beds throughout the hotel were fitted with beautiful new bedspreads, again reflecting our favorite color, Caribbean blue. Our next project in the weeks to come is to place stone tile on the private balconies of some of the rooms. In addition, over the past weeks our guests have watched as a local artist has sculpted our uniquely designed logo in cement on a wall above our garden. Many of our guests have seemed to enjoy watching Omar create this work of art.

We have said it before and will say it again: Do your research before you go to a hotel in another country. Figure out what is important to you and spend the amount of money necessary to obtain those amenities. If you want a pool, stay at a hotel with a pool. If you want in-room coffee service and a restaurant on the grounds, stay at a hotel which offers those things. But please, don’t stay at a hotel which could never meet your needs and then criticize it for your choice.

Tony & Cheri, Owners
Luna Blue Hotel & Garden