* if the host replies claiming this is a lie. I’m happy to provide any proof through PM!
The description for this listing is inaccurate than the actual stay that is provided. The listing describes this stay as a night at the marina bay sands hotel (mbs) for 3 adults. That is what my friends and I purchased for roughly $494 US dollars. We figured this meant it would include access to all of mbs’s amenities for 3 adults. However, soon after the “check-in process”, my friends and I realized that our host has only provided us with a room meant for 2 adults. After looking up the type of room provided to us on mbs’s website, we realized the maximum amount of people for this room is 2 adults. This made us feel uncomfortable as we could never fully relax in a hotel room that was never meant to fit all of us.
I will also provide additional details as the entire process from “check-in” to “check-out” was strange.
Before the stay, our host asked us if we wanted to pay more to upgrade our stay. These options included a higher floor, extra rollaway bed, or garden view or city view. However, due to the cost, my friends and I just wanted the base rate that would be a room on one of the lower floors of the hotel.
First, for check in, we were instructed to come to the hotel at 3 pm. Upon arriving, we were told to wait outside at a spot next to the hotel. After waiting outside in the heat for 30 minutes, a man approached us with our room keys. I asked him a question about our host, and he only replied with “I do not speak English”. *note, this man was not our host who we had been in contact with before. Regardless, my friends and I were tired and just happy to get out of the sun and into the room.
As we got into the room, we were pleasantly surprised to see our room on the 47th floor. It also came with a rollaway bed. While we did not request these things for our stay, our host said she did a “free upgrade”.
After checking in, we see the tv with the information about our stay. On the tv are 2 names that we do not recognize at all. These are the people that are “staying” and “checked-in” to the hotel. We thought it was strange but ignored it at first as we just wanted to get to the pool and enjoy our stay.
As we get to the pool, the hotel staff is checking our QR code and key cards. It says each guest must have a key card to enter the pool. However we were only given 2 key cards with the room. Still not understanding the whole situation, we figured that we could explain to the staff that there are 3 people in the room. As we explain to them, they said they checked with the front desk and that we only have 2 people registered to our room and that we must register the 3rd person. However, our air bnb host repeatedly told me through the Airbnb messaging app that I should never go speak to the front desk nor should I mention that this is an Airbnb.
I tried messaging the Airbnb host about the situation, but they were unforgiving and slightly passive aggressive. Stating multiple times that they guarantee 3 people can go to the pool, just not all at the same time. They told us to try to go in from the other side of the pool, but at that point we did not want any more trouble at all. It was strange to stay in a room that wasn’t really meant for all 3 of us as we couldn’t fully use the hotel’s amenities (pool, restaurant, etc.)
After this exchange of messaging with our host and encounter with the pool staff at mbs, we were very skeptical of our stay. It was late in the day, our flights home were tomorrow and we just wanted to get a good night sleep so we decided to stay in the hotel room. After not messaging our host about the status of whether we were sent to the front desk or not, she repeatedly kept on messaging me through the Airbnb app and eventually tried calling and messaging me through WhatsApp.
The check out process was even stranger. We were preparing to just drop our key cards at the express checkout in the lobby, but the host messaged me in the morning saying that they would come to my room to collect the keys at 12. I asked why we could not use the regular checkout and they said that they have booked the room for 2 nights, so another guest is coming in after us. This most likely explains the “free upgrades” that were given to us and other people who have stayed here in the past who mentioned said “free upgrades” in their reviews. It must just be the person coming for the 2nd or there after nights that actually paid for the upgrades.
As we were getting ready to leave, we thought the host would be the one checking us out. Instead it was a similar process to check in. After answering a knock at the door, a man, woman, and child came into the room without introducing themselves and asked for the keys. They then stayed in the room and watched my friends and I finish packing. We quickly gathered the rest of our belongings and left.
Upon looking at the room bill on the room tv,the host paid 400 Singapore dollars for a room on the 47th floor for 2 (or more) nights.
Sure, this would be a great stay if correctly advertised for 2 people as the guests wouldn’t run into any trouble. But overbooking the amount of people