I sent my son and daughter in-law there for their first anniversary. My reason for choosing the hotel was so they were able to come in from a day of travel, relax, eat, have coffee in the coffee shop later and just relax. Everything in the hotel was closed! The room was not clean the tub had rings in it. I would have put them in a more accommodating hotel if I was advised that nothing was in operation. Very upset and misled.

Please read this review all the way through if you intend to drive to this hotel - it will be worth your time - I promise. Basically, do not waste your time with this hotel. It is located on the rough side of Montreal, and if you like homeless people begging for change on your walk home (because you shouldn't drive as this hotel has no where to park - more on that later...) then this is really the "taj mahal" for you! The rooms were okay - basic accommodation, nothing fancy... however, the problem lies with it's parking lot and staffing. Let's first start with the parking. If you do not look closely, you might miss it! Yes...there are only about 20 parking spots available for guests, meanwhile, there are over a hundred rooms available - you do the math. It is first come, first serve - and luckily for us, we got a parking spot. After a late evening out to see the sights of Montreal, we came back to the hotel in order to get the car to drive my local friend home. When we got back to the hotel, there was another guest's car illegally parked and blocking our car. We went to the front desk to explain the situation. The staff member stated that he was going to wake up that hotel guest (this was at 515am), and ask them to move their car. We suggested an alternative answer, in hopes not to hassle the other guests, but for the hotel to pay for a taxi to take my friend home which would have costed no more than $10. That was not a reasonable solution to the hotel staff member, so he immediately proceeded to wake up the hotel guest and made him move his car - needless to say that that guest was not pleased whatsoever! The front desk person provided the following answer "he shouldn't have parked there anyway". Odd thing is, should it not be the responsibility of the hotel staff to ensure that guests do not park in the lane ways that will block other guests from exiting in the first place so that this does not need to happen? Common-sense would dictate a yes answer, but the Taj Mahal answer is a "no". In any case, upon my return from dropping off my friend - the guest who had blocked me ended up parking in my original spot - so I was forced to park my car in the lane way. We explained this back to the front desk staff, and he provided us with a dangle sign to place on our mirror like this was a common occurrance. We offered to leave the keys with the front desk so that they could move the vehicle, but they did not want to take them. At approximately 830am, we received the nasty call to ask us to remove our vehicle which we promptly did as we understood the inconvenience it placed on others and witnessed it first hand. At the time of check out at 11am, we proceeded to explain to the front desk lady of our upsetting experience, and suggested that an apology and/or a small discount of $5 or $10 dollars to offset the experience was in order. The front desk staff person proceeded to explain that it was our fault - that we should not have parked there and blocked others too! Meanwhile, the original point of the matter was to provide the feedback on the fact that they were not managing the parking lot properly to prevent this from happening! When we continued to press and explain our point, she said "why don't you just shut up?". At that point in time, we realized that this staff member did not know the first thing about hotel hospitality, and was obviously working in the wrong industry. She then told us to leave, but then we stated we needed an invoice for the room, and she just assumed that we booked through the internet without even checking her records and stated that she cannot give us an invoice if we booked online - which we did not. When we finally able to get our invoice, she crumpled it up and threw it over onto the floor. Mind you, this was all in front of other hotel guests. If this is the type of hospitality you look for on your vacation stay, the Taj Mahal is the perfect hotel for you. Otherwise, steer clear away as the management of this hotel needs to address the very real concerns regarding their parking lot and more importantly, their staff.

For 80$ we had a very big room, sofa, tables, night lamps, private bathroom and a nice view...the hotel is located next to a central bus station so I suggest you avoid the noisy rooms that are on that side of the hotel! :) Overall I was very satisfied for the price. The location is great, 5-10 minutes from downtown, plus there are a few libraries around.