The Westin Excelsior Rome

The Westin Excelsior is by far anything close to a 5-Star hotel experience and to begin, I would never consider staying there again. 2 weeks previous to our one night stay, we had booked a lovely boutique hotel several blocks away that far exceeded our expectations and should be a 5-Star hotel in every way because the experience was just that! At the Westin, it began with our arrival and having almost zero assistance removing our luggage from our car...we had just arrived from an 11 day cruise so between two of us there were 3 large suitcases, and one carry on each and very little help to make it up stairs and into the lobby. We arrived around 9am...and did not expect to have our rooms available, but I had called 2 days previously to ask for an early check in which they ended up accommodating about 45 minutes prior to the check in time of 3pm. The porter stored our luggage and when we went to retrieve it... a security guard trying to help us got into quite a heated argument with a porter in front of us...not classy! After checking in- we lugged our luggage in the tiny elevator to our room on the 3rd floor. The Westin is an old historic hotel, but historic does NOT equal 5-Star. The temperature in the room was warm and stayed that was so much so that I had to ask for a fan to sleep. The Crystal chandeliers in the room and the bathroom were dirty and dingy with dangling crystals. The room had a musty smell and the carpets throughout the hotel don't look like they have been replaced since the 1980's. A housekeeping cart in the hallway leading to our room was in its place for 24 hours as well. Back to the room. It simply didn't feel clean and the television is definitely 10 plus years old...who has a flat screen TV today that is 4'' thick? The bathroom was ok from a cleanliness standpoint, but in the middle of the night I woke up to use the facilities only to almost slip and fall on water that had pooled on the floor from a ceiling leak. The next day we headed downstairs to check out and had called for a porter that never arrived so we again schlepped all of our luggage down to the lobby with no assistance and as I went to check out, no one offered to help my husband move the luggage outside until I literally demanded it. The desk clerk comped me my cocktail I had the night before when I explained my disappointment with the hotel. It didn't end there. We had a private car service to pick us up, and it took an act of congress for someone to help us outside to load our luggage then they placed it in the wrong van and had to unload it to put it in the correct one...arguing all the way. Even asking for assistance from the bellman with a mobile phone in hand the night before for a taxi was a joke...All in all, no where NEAR a 5-Star experience on any level and I would highly recommend that if you plan to stay at this hotel...DON'T! We never will again. I also wanted to mention that the Boutique hotel Roommate Filippo was almost identical in price to the Westin and we would stay at Filippo again without question. Get it together Excelsior!!!