Cali L
Google
I don’t leave reviews often, but wanted to warn others about the resort management and lack of transparency.
Overall, the resort is beautiful and service on property is great. Expect to pay 30-50% more than the advertised cost with fees. BUT If anything goes wrong, DO NOT trust what management tells you — they will likely not reimburse you for any issues. If you’re okay with that (or get travel insurance), then you should definitely visit the property since our stay was otherwise great.
DETAILS OF OUR EXPERIENCE
To start off, the resort itself is beautiful and every staff member we met on property was helpful and polite. There’s a ton of activities on property, and it’s a very nice, quiet getaway surrounded by nature. We found a few ladybugs on our bedsheets, but the rooms were otherwise very clean. Expect to pay 30-50% more than the advertised price due to the daily fees and taxes charged throughout your stay. We booked with a 3rd night free promo code, but the per night fee came out to almost double what the “pro-rated” nightly cost we were quoted on booking was, so not sure if the promo really made much of a difference in the end.
Now for the bad part. We had booked a 3-night stay, and got unlucky because there was a city-wide power outage on our 2nd day. The Preserve did not have any backup generators, so it lost power as well.
On the night of the outage, we were told by the front desk and staff members that this was an unusual occurrence and they had no idea when power would be restored (this was about 30 minutes into the blackout). Because we lived 3 hours away, they recommended we leave early since they weren’t confident power would be restored any time soon and assured us that we would be reimbursed for the remaining nights, given the severe weather event and lack of heat/power on property. We took their advice and checked out early.
In the days after, we called the resort management multiple times to confirm that we were properly checked out and would be reimbursed, getting confirmation each time that they would process it as soon as the system lets them — on the day of our original check-out.
On the day of our check-out, we did get a call from management that they had processed the refund and we should expect to see it on our credit card statement in a couple of days. We thought that was the end of it, until we were charged almost double the amount we agreed on the next day. We thought it was a mistake and called management, who agreed it was a mistake and said they would speak with their accounting department. A day later, we get an email that the charge was actually correct, and all the previous discussions were incorrect because the resort policy was that we would be charged the full fee since we “cancelled”.
Now, the amount itself was not that much and we luckily did have trip insurance coverage from our credit card, but we were overall disappointed by management’s response to the situation. To be clear, the power outage was in no way their fault, and we would’ve completely understood if they told us at the time that, if we chose to leave, it would be considered a cancellation. Instead, we were told the same thing by multiple people over the course of a week, then charged almost double that, and when we inquired about it, were told it was our fault for choosing to leave and “per their reservation policy” we would be charged the full amount, including taxes and fees.
