The Plaza Hotel Columbus at Capitol Square

HOW DO YOU GIVE LESS THAN 1 STAR????

I rarely write negative reviews, but after our stay at The Plaza Hotel Columbus Square from November 14–16, 2025, I feel obligated to share what happened. What we experienced was far beyond disappointing. It was completely unacceptable.

Before our trip, this property was advertised as part of the Marriott brand. Only upon arrival did we learn that it had been de-flagged by Marriott, with no prior notice or communication. Had we known this, we would never have booked here, and everything that followed made that painfully clear.

It took three separate room changes before we found a room that

* was even moderately clean,

* had a functioning HVAC system, and

* included the pull-out bed we needed.

To make matters worse, the TV in our final room did not work at all, and we ultimately had to accept having no hot water, meaning cold showers for the entire stay.

The rooms are extremely outdated, neglected, and dirty. The phone handset was covered in some kind of grease or lubricant that took major effort to wash off my hands. Several electrical outlets didn’t work, leaving us scrambling to charge basic devices. Bathroom supplies—tissues, toilet paper, clean towels—were barely stocked.

The entire property feels abandoned and unsafe. The décor looks unchanged since the 1980s—old, worn-down furniture, no flowers, no updated photos, nothing that matched the images on their website. The atmosphere was so vacant and eerie that it genuinely felt like walking into The Shining.

Staff interactions made the situation worse. The morning front desk agent acted irritated that we complained about legitimate issues, while the evening agent was apologetic and clearly embarrassed. She even told us it was her last night working in “this place,” which said a lot about the conditions.

The restaurant area was empty. When I came down for coffee, the hostess was practically asleep at her stand. The bar looked like it hadn’t been restocked in months. The bartender openly commented that the new owner was “super cheap,” and based on our experience, that was not an exaggeration. The breakfast was a buffet style set up. With no customers anywhere to be found, and based on all the other issues in the hotel, there was no way to know how old the food was. Hours or Days ??

There are four elevators, yet only one was operating. The other three were locked at lobby level for unknown reasons. Riding the single functioning elevator felt unsafe and unnerving.

If you read this and still stay at this hotel, you will have no one to blame but yourself. This property should not be operating in its current condition. Our stay was unacceptable on every level, and I strongly recommend choosing any other hotel.

We had no heat in our room. We had no hot water. They gave us the incorrect room. The parking garage elevator was inoperable. Despite raising these concerns to staff, no corrective action was taken, and management failed to contact me in the weeks following my outreach to hotel and Marriott.

Stayed here for business in late October. The last time I stayed, it appeared the hotel was getting a little better. Well, after the recent owner change, it has gotten a hundred times worse! There is no longer a Starbucks in the building which is not a surprise - there are almost no guests here. There was not one person in the bar or restaurant except for myself ordering carryout. The last time I came here, there was water with fruit and ice in it for guests in the lobby. The water container is still there, but it looked like it was left over from weeks ago, half full and no ice or fruit. Not sure if there were even cups.

Not one ice machine in the hotel was working - and there are many floors. What is even more hysterical is the signs on various floors direct you to other floors where the ice machines there are not working. So not only do you have non-functioning machines, you have employees who don't care enough to even change the signs.

What was really amusing is the rooms have coffee makers that require individually wrapped coffee with an included brew basket because the coffee makers don't have any basket. Some genius had ordered individual coffee packets with no basket to insert into the maker which meant there was nothing on the maker to hold the coffee packets. Maintenance came - he handed me an old decaf coffee with a basket that must have been left over from whoever ordered correctly. So I took the basket from that packet and placed the regular coffee packet in it. It would have been hysterical if not so pathetic.

But perhaps the worst issue is the hotel had no heat. When I turned the thermostat in my room higher, air conditioned air blew out. Maintenance came but could do nothing because the heat was simply not working or not on. It would not have been such a problem, but it was a cold night, in the low 40's. All the employees had heavy coats on and space heaters. At least maintenance brought me a space heater.

I am at a loss - a major hotel in a downtown area. Owners - either put in the money to renovate the hotel or sell it.

A horrible experience. I arrived Thursday, waited 35 minutes for the valet attendant, who never showed. I then had to go inside to check-in and the front desk associate had to handle the valet and STILL charged me. Later that evening I returned after a day with family and the valet attendant said to just park out front because the attendant did not show up, so I said ok no problem. I then get into my room for the night and it was pretty chilly, so I turned the heat up and fell asleep. Shivering throughout the night, by morning the heat still never came on. I alerted the front desk, letting them know I would be gone for most of the day and hopefully it’s fixed before I return. Come back, heat is STILL not working. Tried to valet my car again, and after day two, someone was finally working, howeved this time said he cannot park the car because it is a Tesla and they “don’t know how to drive or what to do with those”. They did however refund my $140 valet, however the headache was annoying, but no problem. My room was still operating with no heat. The front desk attendant would leave for breaks, leaving lines of customers and no one attending the front. I spoke to a gentlemen named Liam (the most helpful) and he assured me that the hear would be fixed. They brought me a space heater! I then went to check out and he said “call Expedia to request a refund, we have approved it in our system”. I was thankful. Well what does Expedia say..”the hotel will not approve any refund”

Nice staff bed was decent.
No heat in room, only a space heater.
Fan was extremely loud.
Room incredibly outdated
Stains on all furniture.
Dirty walls.
If you want a bath and a shower at same time, this is for you.
Hallway smelled of stale cigarette smoke.

They gave my business trip 1200 square foot room away even though I booked ahead of time. I ended up having to pay a day of double the price at a sister hotel of Marriot for them to tell me the hotel I originally booked with would have to assist me for compensation. Once I spoke to the manager at that location who took an hour to contact, they said they had faith in the front desk and nothing they could do for what we needed, could not comp a free room for me even though it was a three level downgrade in comparison to what I originally booked in advance for.

Clean

From the moment I arrived, it was clear the room had not been properly maintained. The furniture was stained, the headboard was broken, and the overall cleanliness was unacceptable. Even more concerning, no housekeeping service was provided at any point during my six-night stay, and there was a gross plastic cover underneath my sheets. To make matters worse, the shower never produced hot water, forcing me to take cold showers each day.

Good location for the activity that we needed to go to, everything was in walking distance, we went to the theater. The bathroom was a decent size, the shower was nice, hot, with good water pressure.

desk staff polite

Location is great. My room was clean and lots of space. Upon arrival they did share that their network had gone out so there was no tv or wifi in the rooms. This was not a concern for me because I do not watch tv and I use my own hotspot. However, it was a concern for the large conference staying at the hotel. It was extremely quiet even with the large number of guest staying in the hotel. Valet was backed up, but it was just more than they had prepared for. The valet staff was nice. For the cost of the room, it was worth it. The bed was comfortable. Where there is a need for improvement is ensuring enough food in the restaurant. Day 2 out of 4 of my trip, I did get wings and they were great. It's a very traditional & classic hotel with lots of open concept to relax with friends.

I would probably give this hotel 1 star but I am giving it two because I feel like the woman at the front desk is doing her best with what she has to work with. It’s obvious the hotel is not managed or maintained properly. I travel a lot for work and have Diamond status with Hilton, I ended up staying here because it was part of the room block for a conference and the only hotel left. This stay did not convince me to want to switch to Marriott brand hotels. First when I checked in and got settled in my room while on a meeting someone who had been given the same room and attempted to come in. Mix ups happen no big deal at first. I went to the restaurant in the hotel and they were out of pretty much everything. Then my key card didn’t work and I was told that happens sometimes because of old locks. Then the next day it happens again so I ask am I doing something to cause this staff says no. Well as I’m standing by the elevator the manager says something to the staff member and I get called over from the elevator. He goes we need your ID and I’m thinking ok I guess that would make sense they probably should have verified that before fixing my key and then says that they didn’t have my name and didn’t properly assign me to the room during check in and that’s why my lock keeps not working but they just keep forgetting to get it updated when I come down. Also explains why someone else tried to come in my room. There is a phone in the room why not call or come knock on the door instead of letting me come in and wait for the elevator get all the way to my room to then have to come all the way back down. Even though that was fixed my key card has continued to need to be fixed everyday. Also the do not disturb sign on the door means nothing. I came back and noticed I had new towels and that the bar soap I was using was gone. I figured the sign maybe fell off. Well today it is definitely on the door and someone tried to come in to clean but couldn’t get in because of the security lock. When I opened the door he looks at his paper and goes sorry thought I needed to clean this one. The location is fine but it’s a 20 minute walk to the convention center so keep that in mind if that’s why you are staying here. From reading other reviews I would say I got off easy because my air and hot water worked and I slept fine. In general I’ve stayed in nicer Best Western Hotels and Comfort Inns for half the price. If you are expecting a high quality hotel, I would look elsewhere.

It had a wonderful location in the city.

It’s hard to say. It was so run down.

I stayed at this location a year ago when attending a nearby music festival. During the entire weekend, my room had no hot water. I made several requests to the front desk to fix this issue and each time they told me someone would take care of it, after 4 days the issue was never resolved.

Fast forward, I decided to give this hotel another chance as the location is very convenient for the shuttle stop to and from the music festival. I made a reservation in January for 4 nights in September. Less than a week before my arrival, they cancelled my booking without any notice. I was never contacted—no email, no phone call, nothing. I only discovered the cancellation by chance, when I checked my trip status in the Marriot app. This is completely unacceptable.

To make matters worse, when I tried calling the hotel directly, they never picked up my calls after multiple attempts. I spent over an hour on the phone with Marriott's customer service, and they were unable to explain why my reservation was cancelled. They offered no insight, no apology, and worst of all, the only thing they could offer was to book a new stay at a different hotel for over $400 more than what I originally paid for my stay. A case number was opened for my stay 734452258. I was told the hotel has 3 days to respond to the case with reasoning as to why my hotel was cancelled; it has now been 5 days with no follow up.

This experience was incredibly frustrating and disruptive to my travel plans. If you’re looking for reliability and basic professionalism, I strongly recommend booking elsewhere. I won’t be trusting this hotel again.

I had a reservation at the Palace Hotel for the night and checked in around 7:30pm. Gave my license and credit card and they told me the room wasn’t ready yet, just “a little time.” Fine, I went out to grab a bite to eat down the block. Came back an hour later and the lobby was packed with people waiting. When I went to the desk they said there’s still 30 people in front of me waiting for rooms. 30 people! There was only one woman at the desk handling everything while 50+ people stood around. The “manager” was apparently somewhere in the building but didn’t show his face the whole night.

By 11:30pm I had already been waiting 4 hours. I even tried calling other hotels nearby but nothing was available, so I was basically stuck here waiting homelessly. I was hoping for an early night after traveling all day but that was not happening. Staff were not sympathetic at all, no water, no updates, nothing.

Then at 1am, things got even more insane. They suddenly announced that the cleaning crew was too tired to continue cleaning rooms and there were only 4 rooms left total. Only the next 4 people on “the list” would get a room. They even asked for volunteers to take a dirty room that “looked like” the second bed wasn’t used. I cannot even believe that was a real option at a hotel. Thankfully I was 3rd of the last 4 and finally got a key. At that point I had no energy left to even review the room, I snapped a couple pictures, but I’ll just say even without this whole disaster I would not return to this hotel.

The worst part of this entire episode and what really needs to be emphasized is the manager on duty, Jim Oguntumi, was nowhere to be found. Imagine 45 angry paying customers with confirmed reservations standing in the lobby and the manager refuses to show his face. Absolutely unacceptable. This was one of the most bizarre and upsetting hotel experiences of my life.