The Whitney Hotel, Columbia

my father comes into town about twice a year, and wants something close to all of his kids and areas around town. great location, can get anywhere in 10-15 from the hotel in columbia. i don't know about the BAD reviews, but we've never had a problem. YES, the living room furniture is a little dated/retro, but never dirty, torn, or any holes! ALSO i don't usually get a hotel room to sit in the living area and criticize furniture. Its cute, comfortable, clean, and more like a mini apartment than a hotel room. I've never had a problem with the staff either. SURE the hotel could probably use some minor upgrades, but honestly its an older CLEAN hotel in a great location. I don't know where all these horror stories are coming from, but my dad keeps going back there, and being a stuffy military man he does have his standards.

Stayed here for BCT graduation. The place was very clean, linen was all almost brand new, free full breakfast was good a different main item every morning. The furnishings are a lil bit old/dated but still very nice. We booked a one bedroom suite and they moved us up to a 2 bedroom suite for free. They had a billing error charging our CC twice but the manager worked on it all day to get it fixed ! She gave us a free lunch, and took a nights stay off after it was all fixed. If I ever have to stay in SC again anywhere near Columbia you bet I will be found at the Whitney !!!

I booked this without reading reviews first. Needless to say, when I went back to read reviews it made me a little nervous. Talk of dirty floors and nasty sheets, broken glass, etc scared me because I was traveling with two small children, one of whom is crawling everywhere. When I went to check-in, the lady at the desk could not find my reservation. Turns out I had mistakenly reserved for the wrong night. She said it would be absolutely no problem to change it and did so with a smile on her face. We were assigned room 402, end unit(which was nice). Getting off the elevator, a strange smell permeated the entire floor. Thankfully it did not continue into our unit. It only smelled of 'hotel.' First thing I did was scour the entire unit for anything strange on the floor. Nothing. Next thing was turning back the sheets. Nothing. And lastly, checking the bathrooms. Nothing. Everything was as clean as any other decent hotel I've stayed at. Granted, the place needs a major reno but this wasn't advertised as the Hilton! The furniture and appliances were pretty retro but that at least made for interesting conversation for the evening. The next morning we tried the free breakfast and it was wonderful. Toast, waffles, bagels, muffins. Fresh fruit, yogurt, applesauce, cereal. Cheese omelettes and sausage. Four kinds of juice, coffee and milk. It was just fine and we all left with full bellies, even my two kids! The worst part of my stay was that one of my kids half-turned one of the deadbolts on the bedroom door and then shut it, so we were locked out of that room. One call down to the front desk and someone was up within five minutes to unlock it. They also promptly brought a travel crib and two clean sheets for it when asked. I would definitely stay here again and I'm not sure where all these bad reviews are coming from. You people must be expecting a 5-star hotel. It's not! But it's not bad either!

Who hires these people. Rooms trashy. Dirty and run down. POOR MAINTENANCE. This place is a rip off at these prices. The Marriott down the street was recently upgraded and is nice, I will stay there from now on. You dont want to ask anyone at the Whitney for a ride to airport either, Limo is on its last leg, literally. I went down once around 10:00 and the entire staff was crammed into what they call the breakfast area, eating- Are the customers paying for all the food that the employees eat? Obviously. Speaking of the staff, that is a questionable bunch. As far as I am concerned there was no cleaning staff and the rest of the staff I came across were not friendly and seemed rather pre-occupied. Will never stay here again.

We have used the Whitney for more than 15 years as the place for overnights when there was no room at the homeplace. Weddings, holidays, reunions etc. We had noticed it becoming a bit run down and had not stayed in a couple of years. I needed a place quickly for the weekend of 1-05-08 so even after reading the reviews I gave the Whitney one more chance. They have stepped up and are renovating the rooms and replacing furniture. While it is not extra plush, the location and set up more than make up for it. If you are making reservations be sure to ask for one of the updated rooms.

And only once did we get a room that was somewhat clean. I read the negative review further down the page and had to giggle at thinking that this customer and I had to have experienced the same room. I can relate to the cracked window glass, dirty and torn couch (try flipping over the cushions if you don't believe me!), grease spattered stove/oven, hole in the floor of the laundry room (with what I'm sure was mold around it). Other co-workers of ours had worse experiences than we did. How about mold in the dishwasher, bathroom sinks with toothpaste still left in them, and a condom left by the side of the bed? As mentioned above, we were forced to stay here for work purposes. We had three total weeks of accommodations, so I can attest that we had three seperate rooms that were all substandard. It's really quite sad given that the two bedroom suites are really intelligent with their layouts and the prices are really great. All they have to do is take a good steam cleaner to the floors, fix the cracked glass (we experienced this in many rooms. Oh, and don't even try to open the windows as they don't open and are held shut with electrical tape!), and repair the upholstery in the living rooms. I suppose it would also be helpful to fire the cleaning staff too. It's a real shame...

We checked in September 2, 2007 and checked out September 2, 2007. We were assigned room 409, end room. The room itself was very large, however terribly dirty and with holes in the walls. The kitchen stove was not cleaned, the oven looked like something out of a horror movie. There was a utensil left in the sink (not ours), there was a hole in the floor where the laundry room is (inside hotel room) with the floor crumbling around it and the walls were flithy! There were scuff marks all over them, dirt, food (ever hear of a sponge) with small holes in 2 area's. The room was non-smoking and we found a glass filled partly with soda with cigarette butts floating in it under the couch. The window to the balcony was cracked all the way accross which was sharp, and the floor had more stains on it then actual pattern. The vent was filled with dirt and dust and was covered with rust, and we found a razor on the floor (NOT OURS!) With 2 kids with us, there was no way we would even think of laying our bodies down in the beds. Fearful of bed bugs at this point. All in all this was the most disgusting hotel I have ever seen. The only shining light in this nightmare was the front desk gentleman, Paul, who was very accomodating, and polite. Needless to say we were not charged for this flop house. There are plenty of hotels in this area, and in a better location closer to restaurants etc.. and I urge anyone to stay elsewhere. I would have rathered slept outside. The cleaning staff should be fired. The worst part is, the one cleaning staff member claimed the room had been vacant, which then meant, it had been sitting that dirty for quite a while!! We took pictures and sent them to the dept. of health, it was that bad and that dirty. I am convinced the only good reviews written are ones written by employee's of this place. I also noticed the reviews were very old.

I've stayed in quite a few hotels in Columbia and The Withney was no doubt the best** The location was convenient- The beds were *Oh My God* GREAT!!

Our suite was so charming. Very clean and neat. The suite was very large. Much larger than you would expect. Well worth the money and the location was perfect for our needs. Would definitely stay again.

only thing positve was limo service to hotel, customer service was a joke, i stayed b4 i left for honeymoon on next day, had to go downstairs to get champagne and candy i paid for 4 weeks in advance since it was never delivered, also the bridal party had arranged a suprise gift of paying for the nights stay and both they and i were charged until i corrected them a week later after someone finally asked if we noticed there was no charge for the hotel stay, avoid like a plague, reccomend embassy suites on greystone blvd