As we were attempting to check into our reserved presidential suite the young man said that the room "wasn't clean yet". He radioed to the room attendant to ask the status of the room. She came to the top of the stairs where she said very loudly "The room is a mess. It's terrible." This prompted the young man behind the counter to start giggling about the situation. We were informed that the previous occupants were pet owners and had pets in the room. We stayed elsewhere.

Stayed for a couple of nights on business. Rates in Bismarck flucuate drastically and this was a few buck less than where I usually stay. So I tried it. A bit aged. Only two stories. Service was fine at the front desk. Room was fine,a bit aged but clean and ample. It is adjacent to the Comfort Inn and they do give you a free beverage coupon for the bar there so that was decent. The bar was packed and a bit run down, but it was fine for a drink. Probably elect to stay elswhere next time around that is more business oriented. The proerty was fine though if you simply need a clean place to stay for a night or two.

We arrived at the Comfort Suites after being on the road for 12 hours to find that our reservation had been cancelled. I booked the hotel months ago with a credit card that expired before our stay. However, I knew this could happen and I called three weeks before our stay to change the expiration date to the new date. I don't recall if I called the property or the nation wide number for this booking. Regardless, they didn't update our expiration date and cancelled our reservation when they failed to place a hold on the card that morning. When we finally got home at the end of our trip we found they'd left us a voicemail on our home phone that morning saying they had trouble with the card.

That being said, they still had availability and we still got our selected room type and rate.
The room we had was a partially divided suite with King size bed and a twin size sofa sleeper. It worked well for us. The room was clean and was quiet during the night.

The property is under construction. It looks like they are going to triple the size of the hotel. We had construction noise (beeping vehicles, etc) outside our window at 7AM. This wasn't a problem for us as we were up earlier than that, but it may be a problem for others. We may have also been placed near the construction because of the screw up with our reservation.

We had the free breakfast and it was pretty good.

My first thought was that parking was bad...partially caused by construction, but also by the fact that more than one place seems to have access to the parking lot. That's not a big deal, but it sort of sets the tone.

My second was that I found it strange, upon entering the hotel (about 10:30 at night) that the TV in the lobby was playing South Park. Personally, I don't care, but because of the language I was glad I hadn't brought my young daughter in with me.

The woman behind the counter was laying with her head on her arms. I waited while she perked up and then the phone rang. It was one of the rooms, asking how the alarm clock worked. The woman said "To be honest, I've never actually been in any of the rooms so I don't know. Just keep pushing buttons until you figure it out." After she was off the phone she checked me in and told me what room I was going to be in, handing me a electronic key. I was going to try to remember her name, because I thought she wasn't being very professional, but she wasn't wearing a name-tag.

Of course, by the time I got back into the hotel with my luggage I had forgotten the room she'd told me --she didn't write it down-- and so I had to go and ask her again. It was on the second floor and the hotel doesn't have an elevator, so I had to lug the luggage up. Not a big deal for me, only a few bags for us, but still unpleasant.

The room we rented was the "Presidential Suite." It would have been fine for one of the lesser presidents, such as Garfield or Taft or Bush, but it wasn't so great otherwise.

GOOD: It was big. It had a whirlpool tub. It was comfortable. The bed was comfortable. It had a kitchen (though we didn't have to use it.) The room was clean.
BAD: Light bulb burned out, door stuck badly, fireplace didn't work, remote controls didn't work well, anemic design and fixtures.

I went downstairs to ask the lady how the fireplace worked (it was too hot for a fire, but I still wanted to see it) but I changed my mind. She had moved from behind the counter to the couch by the TV and was watching South Park. She was also on a cell phone and I didn't want to bother her. I also began to wonder how, if she couldn't work the alarm clock, she was going to be able to tell me how to make the fireplace work. I got something from the vending machine and headed back to bed.

In the morning I tried the exercise room. It is small and the treadmill didn't work, but I didn't feel much like exercise and this gave me an excuse. The breakfast was nice. A lot of variety and good places to sit. There was a woman working at keeping things going and all was well.

The pool was nice as well, at least my wife said so (she took my daughter.) There is a big slide. It's pretty fancy for a hotel pool.

Checkout was easy. That same lady was there. I asked her if she'd been there all night and she said she got to go home for a while between shifts. She still didn't have a name-tag on, but at this point I didn't much care. I mentioned that the fireplace didn't work and the OTHER woman said "Oh, yeah, it has been broken for a while. Didn't someone tell you that?" Again, I didn't care (because it had been too hot for a fire) but I still took it as poor customer service.

Consequently, I ended up staying there the next week (I had already booked it for the return trip, and we were in the same room!) The lightbulb was fixed, but the fireplace was still kaput. The man on the desk was marginally more helpful than the original woman. I guess getting third shift workers to act like they care at that late of an hour is hard when you pay minimum wage. The stay, otherwise, was the same, down to having to elbow the door open to the room. Again, the breakfast was good.

The location was easy to access from the highway, a mall is across the street, and many restaurants were nearby. It's a convientent location, but if I were in town I think I'd try someplace else. Comfort Suites wasn't bad (in terms of the actual nights stay,) but the "presidential suite" wasn't that great, the help was zombie-fied, and a good breakfast isn't enough to balance things out.