The Venetian Macao sucks

Yes, whine whine whine, complain complain complain. But it's really that bad here. Other than the free wireless internet and the really large (and new rooms), this place has serious issues. Here's the full text of my review that I just posted on TripAdvisor:

I am writing this review bearing in mind that this hotel opened fairly recently and must be still working out the kinks. Even still, this place is so awful (for its price point and supposed hotel class) that I am writing my review while I'm still here. If you are expecting the Las Vegas Venetian quality, forget about it.

My family and I checked in yesterday -- we had booked their "Suite Specials" off their website directly which included breakfast and a dining amenity. When we arrived at around 4pm, our rooms were not ready. We had to wait until almost 5 pm to get our rooms. Then, they messed up our reservations and said that they didn't have any of the package amenities included. My mother had to negotiate with the manager for *AN HOUR* before they acknowledged the package amenities.

There are no active bellmen at this place. At least not obviously so. Like many visitors, we had taken the shuttle bus directly from the ferry pier. The shuttle buses arrive at a completely separate entrance from the main entrance, and when we got off, there was no one to help with luggage. We are traveling for several weeks so we had about 5 pieces of luggage and a golf bag with us, and the staff that were "greeting" the shuttle bus made no attempt at helping us, or calling for any luggage help. When we made it through the check-in line, I proactively asked the front desk if we could get some help with luggage, and their response was: "Uh... we could call for help, but it will probably take a long time." Emphasis on the word "long"...given that we were tired after a 14-hour flight + ferry, we gave up and carried our own luggage...across the entire casino with no baggage carts.

My toilet got clogged this morning. I called for help and no one came for an hour. I had to call again and it took another hour before anyone arrived, even though they said that they would send someone "right away".

The concierge is also hopeless and useless. I went and asked for a local map of Macao and she handed me a casino map. Then when I explained that I was looking for a city map, she said that they didn't have any and that I should go to a store to buy one. When I asked for recommendations on the best place for Portuguese egg tarts (a very popular and common local food), she said she didn't know of any, even though she was supposedly a local Macau resident. I finally got an egg tart recommendation from someone who worked at *jewelry* store in the casino.

Later today, I got locked out of my room because my key just stopped working. I was able to flag down a staff member in the hallway, who then told me that he would go and call security, which is pretty standard procedure at a hotel. I waited for about 5 minutes until he came back, but he then told me that *I* had to go call security myself from the house phone located at the elevator bank. I saw that he had a walkie talkie on him, so I don't understand why I had to call, but I did trudge down the hall anyway. The operator put me through to the front desk, who didn't pick up the phone. I tried again, and this time, they said: "Actually, security is too busy. You should just come down yourself to the front desk." At this point I was fuming. I was dressed in hotel slippers (I had just gone down the hall to get ice), and I had to hike across *the ENTIRE hotel and casino* just to get to the front desk. When I arrived, I immediately asked for the manager, who listened pretty apathetically and then just issued me a new key. I then walked back across the whole casino -- in my slippers.

I think a large part of the problem here is that the staff are extremely undertrained and have poor language skills. Since there is a lot of Mainland China clientele here, a lot of the staff supposedly speak Mandarin, or English or both, while the local language is Cantonese. I personally speak all three languages fluently, and yet none of the staff I have spoken with (except the manager) seems all that fluent in any of the hotel's official languages. It's a frustrating game of multi-lingual charades every time you need to ask for something.

In short, I will never come back to this hotel. Even if they comp me.

Enough said.

Update: They did end up comping us for the second night for all the "inconveniences." While a nice gesture on their part, I'm still not coming back.