Hilton Ocean City Oceanfront Suites

My wife, daughter, and I were here in December 2023 for a 3-day vacation around the Christmas holidays. We liked the rooms and the location of the hotel but there were aspects of the service that left a sour taste in our mouths. First, as far as the rooms go, they are spacious and well equipped. Our room had two queen beds along with a separate sitting area that had a couch, a TV, and a table plus four chairs. In between the sitting and the sleeping areas, there was a kitchen with a full (not a mini) fridge, an electric range, an oven, and a dishwasher. There were also a fair number of bowls, pots, and pans, along with silverware that one could use. Given our preferences, we used the kitchen each morning of our 3-day stay to make oatmeal that we had. We were also able to use the fridge to store all of the leftovers from the meals that we had outside. Second, as far as the location of the hotel goes, it is very close to the beach. One can literally walk out of the hotel lobby and within a minute walk into the sand. Even though it was fairly chilly in December (unsurprisingly), on one of the days of our stay we went to the beach and my daughter made sandcastles for a while. The negatives of our experience pertain to the service, especially what we experienced on the very last day of our stay. The usual check out time is 11 a.m. but because my daughter wanted to use the pool before heading out, it would have been tricky for us to check out by 11 a.m. Accordingly, I called the reception in the morning and was told that I could check out as late as 12:30 p.m. and based on our conversation, I understood that a fee applies only if guests check-out past 1 p.m. However, at 12 noon, when I went to the check-out desk to confirm our late check out time, no one had any record of that time being 12:30 p.m. and moreover, the person at the front desk was unfriendly. That was frustrating. Then as we were back in our room hurrying to get out, a staff knocked around 12:25 p.m. asking us when we were leaving. That was also stressful. Being in the dead of winter, the hotel was not very busy and had many empty rooms. Under those circumstances, they should have been more willing to accommodate a later check out time and at the very least, recorded the later check out time correctly as 12:30 p.m. and not as 12 noon. (And by the way, there is no clock adjacent to the indoor pool which makes it hard to keep track of time when one is swimming and is without either a wristwatch or cell.) In addition to the indifferent and occasionally unfriendly customer service, some other minor issues were that the dishwasher did not clean dishes very well. Even though we used the highest "heavy" setting, when on the last morning, we needed clean bowls, we found that the bowls in the dishwasher were dirty and needed to be cleaned manually. But because there is no dish scrubber in the room, that made it difficult to clean the bowls by hand. Lastly, the closet doors in our room (613) did not move smoothly and they seemed out of alignment. All in all, this was a fine hotel based on the size of the room, the amenities available, and its location, but there are aspects, especially related to the somewhat indifferent customer service, that preclude me from rating it as a 5-star and making it our default go-to hotel when we next find ourselves in Ocean City, MD.