Hilton Grand Vacations at the Crane

Sadly… quite disappointed. Not what I was expecting - we paid for a five star resort experience and at best it was more three star. Such a shame. Our room was well appointed and definitely the best out of the five rooms our party had booked. Well maintained, decorated and the outside space plus pool were kept spotless at all times. The gardens surrounding all the rooms were beautifully kept - the gardening team responsible deserve high praise! The main pools were nicely appointed although accompanied by the sound of building works on daily basis as upgrades are being carried out. The adult pool was quiet but in need of a good clean on the deck areas. Some pool furniture is in need of replacement as is broken Unfortunately, the resort has issues - overall it’s tired and has poor customer service issues across the board from the pool servers/the bar attendants/servers and restaurant staff - not everyone though …particular shout out to Gloria and Shelly at breakfast - they went above and beyond to make our stay memorable and our lovely lady Juanita who looked after our room so beautifully. Ladies, you are all a credit to the resort and could show many of your colleagues how to smile and share the joy of life. Thankyou for your friendship and kindness The management are a new team and are aware that improvements are required across the whole spectrum… specifically the customer service aspect, recording of transactions charged to the room (pay special attention to this as errors were unfortunately regular), poolside cleanliness and lack of staff - especially when the resort gets busy. To be fair to the management team, they made things right financially before we departed My hope and wish is that the deadlines they are hoping to achieve are met otherwise you will pay top £££ for a resort that is clinging to its previous enviable reputation of bygone days … the potential is there but is the investment?

Let me start off by saying we came here for our anniversary and was hoping for a paradise vacation. Our vacation at The Crane was far from it. The Barbadians are lovely, the island is gorgeous, the restaurants in Barbados were great….the resort was a nightmare. A week before our vacation, my husband received call from Hilton about a wine/cheese a catamaran/swim with turtles and a beach party.We were supposed to receive email to confirm which we never received.We tried to call back numerous times and left messages with no return phone calls. Upon our arrival at The Crane, went to concierge and explained the situation. We were told by Concierge that they were unable to help us because we had no email. Not the right answer to give us considering they are concierge and are hospitality “professionals” who provide personalized services to guests that we did NOT receive. We get to our room.The room was warm.As the day/evening went on, the air conditioning was not strong, it was very uncomfortable to sleep and we noticed a mold/mildew odor. Day 2, the air conditioning was less strong and our clothes began to smell of mildew.Called the front desk to complain and were told that management would be getting back to us which they did not. Day 3 the lack of air conditioning and the odor was intolerable. We went downstairs to speak to a manager. We explained what was going on and today was our anniversary and we had excursions planned that day as well as a dinner at The Palm. We were told that there were no rooms to move us to which was not true since the hotel was not filled to capacity. We then told the manager that this is health hazard and at that point, the manager said if we gave her time to find a location for us, we would be able to move that evening. We had to cancel our special dinner reservation for our anniversary and went to L’Azure which is a sub par restaurant and not worth the money. The scenery was gorgeous, that’s it.Once we got back from dinner went back and was told that there was a room for us BUT we needed to leave the room in the morning to move yet again because the owner of the unit was arriving the next day. We did not get into the new room until 9-10pm. Day 4, we had another excursion planned and when we got back we were moved to another room. The mattress was not like the prior rooms (it was hard). The air was slightly better but there was still an odor in the room. Nothing is the same in any of the rooms from what we noticed. In two out of the three rooms there were ROACHES in the bathrooms. Outside at the pool area there were ants all over the place. The pools in all of the rooms, the water was slimy as well as the walls and floors. I tried to make reservation for a deep tissue massage/facial on a day that my husband went on a scuba diving excursion and there were no openings on any of the days…I know that the resort was not filled to capacity. This is unacceptable as well to me. The coffee shop never had anything to eat every time I went in, there was less and less with no replenishment of cakes, muffins, etc. On the day that we were going home, I went in and they finally had replenished their stock. Again, too late. We spent 24-26k in points to come to a place where it was supposed to be a 4star hotel and it was a 0 star as far as I am concerned… We wrote to Hilton and to the Crane and wanted some sort of compensation of our points for 4 out of 7 days being inconvenienced. Management made a determination that we were to be given 3840 points back out of the 26,880 that we spent on this vacation. That is 1/6th of our points back. How is this acceptable. Once The Crane/Hilton made a determination of the points we were to get back, we wrote back to them expressing our disappointment and as of yet, we still have not had a return email or call I am very disappointed in the Hilton Grand Vacation Club. If I could have left earlier to come home without being penalized financially with the airfare, I would have

The hotel is great. However there is nothing around the hotel because of where it’s located. In addition, the beach is not safe to swim in. We had reservations for 9 nights, once we got there we requested for early check out because of these reasons. It was becoming a nuisance to have to drive 30 minutes one way to do anything outside of the hotel, especially with kids. However, the hotel rejected our request and said we could leave early, but they would not refund any of the money. They were not understanding and did not leave us any option other than to stick it out with this hotel for the whole time, regardless of the inconvenience it was causing us. Wish they would have been flexible and upstanding of this.