I suggested a a recent PWG meeting that the PWG not hold their next San
Diego meeting at the Suites San Diego Downtown by Marriott (701 A St).
Several people suggested that I discuss the issue on this DL.
At the meeting last December, I experienced a problem with being billed for
the night after my departure at this hotel. I believe that we should not
spend our money at a hotel where the manager assumes that customers are
liars in a plausible situation where his records are too incomplete to know
what really happened. The manager told me that this situation is
infrequent, so I would expect him to give me the benefit of the doubt in
such a situation.
The hotel billed my AMEX card for Friday night even though I had checked out
of the hotel on Friday about noon and returned home Friday afternoon. When I
called the hotel, the manager said that he had no record of my having
checked out on Friday.
I explained that I had received the bill under the door Friday morning, and
I had gone to the desk to correct a small error. I assumed that I was
checked out at this point. My receipt said that Friday was my scheduled
check-out day, but it didn't have a zeroed out balance to indicate final
check-out. The hotel computer does not maintain an audit trail which would
show that I received two receipts on Friday. The desk clerk perhaps forgot
to press the check-out button. In addition, the hotel maid said that the
room was occupied on Friday night. Did she make a mistake? Did some unknown
person slip into the room? No one knows.
The manager's best offer was a future free night at his hotel. I finally
offered to send him a copy of my San Francisco airport parking receipt paid
on Friday afternoon. He accepted. A few days after he received a fax of the
parking receipt, he credited my AMEX card.
I am bothered by a hotel manager who gives less credibility to a customer
than to a computer system with flawed and incomplete information, especially
when it appears not to be a costly problem for them. I would expect good
will to be worth more than catching an occasional free-loader.
I hope we will stay elsewhere for PWG's December meeting in San Diego.
Bob Herriot