Renaissance Paris Vendome Hotel

Possibly the worst hotel I have ever stayed in. Rooms are painfully small, yet expensive (and I have been to Paris probably more than 50 times). Many issues with room type and checking in. The loudest and most disruptive street in all of Paris, couldn’t sleep at night or in the mornings (or anytime really) due to the constant loud excessive noise, similar to a full-time construction zone as loud as possible. Brought this to the attention of management several times, and nothing done about it. Terrible experience and will never EVER stay here again. Steer clear.

A hotel that doesn’t bother serving women customers. The 5 star hotel has no tampons in the entire hotel and took 3 days to restock. I asked for tampons around 8:30pm at reception when all stores are open in Paris, and I was told they don’t have them and will look for them. I wasn’t in a rush so went for a few drinks at the bar, coming back an hour later and was told there was none. It was incredibly frustrating because the hotel always has champagne, wine and chocolates and endless sweets in stock yet they don’t have any tampons. I was told the pharmacy at opera is already closed and there’s nothing they could do. I was furious and had to ask “am I expected to bleed in the hotel bed?!” There were 2 staff there and the female staff were kind enough to offer me some from her personal possession, 2 tampons and a few pads. It was ridiculous at this price and in the middle of Paris I had to “beg” for such. I asked to file for official complaint and the other staff simply gave me a piece of paper to write down and said he’d hand over to manager tomorrow. No reference and no promise to follow up Later I found there’s a carrefour 3min walk from the hotel and they had tampons. The staff could have advised me or get them for me but they didn’t. Next day nobody tried to contact me and I came back to hotel asking for tampons again and was told again they didnt have them in stock. Clearly the complaint was not being looked into and the they didn’t even bother addressing the problem. I asked about my complaint and was told it was delivered and again there was nothing they could do. I was furious at this point and asked how angry do I need to be for the problem to be looked at?! They gave me business card of the front desk manager and told me she would be the only one in charge and only one I can complaint to. They offered this time to buy my some from store but I already have what I bought yesterday and was asking out of principle. The next morning I found the front desk manager and she admitted that she didn’t have time to contact me yesterday and that they didn’t have time to restock. Again she apologized but all these apologies are so meaningless without any actions. She said she would make sure to have some by end of day. I came back again in the evening and they told me they had them now. I had to find it online myself the official complaint channel to raise my grievances. The entire process has been incredibly frustrating. And I still can’t believe this is happening to a 5 star hotel in the middle of Paris in 2023. I decided to post the story here so more people can see and please ask for tampons if you can at hotels you stay. They wouldn’t care unless women are loud enough to be taken seriously.