What's the book corporate America doesn't want you to read? Find out now -- or you could get scammed.

“They have declined to honor the discounted rate”

July 21, 2010

Question: We were offered a special rate of $199 a night at the Hilton New York, as part of a package deal by the organizers of a trade show. Although we specifically requested this rate at the time of booking, the reservation agent reported that she could not find it on Hilton’s system. We were denied this rate and instead booked at $239 a night rate for three nights for two rooms, resulting in a $250 overcharge.

We took up the matter with the organizers of the trade show, who later informed us that there was some kind of glitch in the reservation system and that we should get the special rate. When we checked the hotel Web site, we saw that they were indeed offering this special rate — though it was not offered to us.

I have spoken with the reservation agent and also emailed the hotel but they have declined to honor the discounted rate without offering any reason other than saying that the erroneous bookings made by them are nonrefundable. I would appreciate it if you can resolve this. — Joy Valentine, Chapel Hill, NC

Answer: If you were offered a $199 a night rate, you should get it.

A review of the email correspondence between you and Hilton — which I’m sparing my readers because of its length — shows you repeatedly asking the hotel to fix the rate error, and hotel representatives repeatedly refused your request.


The main reason they won’t do anything is that the rate you booked is a special prepaid, nonrefundable price. So in Hilton’s view, you accepted a higher rate and agreed to its terms, and you’re stuck with it.

Now, let’s just say for argument’s sake that Hilton is correct. Let’s say you reserved a room and paid for it, and agreed to all of the terms and conditions. And let’s also assume you weren’t entitled to the $199 rate. Would you be out of luck?

I think not.

Since Hilton is a hotel company, it should care if you’re having a negative experience (particularly if you haven’t darkened the door of its property yet). So, while this hotel may technically be right — and I’m not saying it is — it still has a compelling reason to ensure you’re happy.

Hilton could have worked with you or, even if it didn’t adjust the nonrefundable rate, it could have offered a voucher to offset the extra cost, or a free room night, or at the very least, a sincere apology for the misunderstanding.

It did none of those things, as far as I can tell.

You might have enlisted the help of your conference organizers to fix this. Meeting planners have a lot more power than individual hotel guests, because they not only represent a huge number of customers, they also make decisions about future conventions. A problem with a hotel can be enough reason to choose a different hotel for next year’s meeting.

As I look at emails between you and the hotel, I think you should have also considered using another argument. You wanted Hilton to revise your rate on a technicality. Instead, I might have simply mentioned that you were not having a positive experience.

Hotel employees are trained to do everything in their power to make an unhappy guest happy. I think your argument about rate availability for a convention just took this discussion in the wrong direction.

I contacted Hilton on your behalf, and it agreed to honor your $199 rate.

(Photo: G rufnik/Flickr Creative Commons)

Christopher Elliott is the author of Scammed: How to Save Your Money and Find Better Service in a World of Schemes, Swindles, and Shady Deals. Critics have called it “eye-opening” and “inspiring” — it’ll “grab your attention and won’t let go.” Order your copy now on Amazon, Barnes & Noble or iTunes.

Tagged as: , , , ,

13 comments

  • Fernando

    You’re being inconsistent here. It’s ok for passengers to bitch and moan to hotels when they can’t get an advertized rate but when it comes to advertized “mistake” fares with airlines, you’re against that? Why the double standard, Chris?

  • GeekChic

    I don’t see where Chris is being inconsistent. He’s argued that people should not expect sympathy if they try to abuse a “mistake” fare (or rate). I don’t consider $199 / night a “mistake” rate. That’s fairly typical of a conference rate at hotels (having problems getting the conference rate is also par for the course in my experience…)

    If the OP were writing to Chris about a $5 / night advertised rate that they had tried to take advantage of – I suspect you would have read a different answer from Chris.

  • Steve

    Yup, I think there’s a pretty huge difference between expecting to get a reasonable rate you should be eligible for, and taking advantage of a “mistake” rate. I wouldn’t call the promise of $199/night for a hotel room a mistake, particularly when the regular rate is $239/night. If someone had told this person they were entitled to a $19/night rate, that would be another story – clearly, that wouldn’t be reasonable.

    I think Chris has been consistent on pricing issues whether it’s an airline or a hotel (and wasn’t his post a couple days ago about a woman who didn’t get the fare she was promised on a flight after having to make changes?): he doesn’t expect businesses to honor rates that clearly were mistakes that were not meant to be posted, but he *does* expect them to honor legitimately quoted rates. I agree with him on that.

  • Charles

    Hotels routinely offer a “conference rate” to the conference. The conference is looking for a venue and can bring a large number of customers as a block. That’s gold for a hotel and well worth that pathetic 17% discount. I just attended a conference in Greece where the conference rate was less than half price. A chance to fill a hotel for a week is powerful.

    But, there is another factor that should be mentioned. The conference often gets the meeting rooms and some support for free in exchange for filling rooms. How do they know what rooms are filled by the conference and not just regular visitors? The conference rate, of course. If they don’t fill sufficient rooms or people don’t claim the conference rate (like if they didn’t offer a discount), the conference can get hit with a large bill for facilities. That’s part of the contract. So, denying the conference rate could also harm the conference organizers.

    Messing with a conference is stupidity. I would think Hilton management would kick whoever didn’t immediately get this straightened out.

  • Carver

    @Fernando

    I too must disagree with your analysis. Chris is completely consistent. The $199 rate was not a mistake but a real rate that the OP was entitled to. As such the OP should receive the rate.

  • Thalassa

    Chris was right to intervene this time. However, I can see where the OP should have taken at least two steps they did not take.

    The OP shouldn’t have agreed to book a room at $239. They should have first contacted the organizers and thus would have discovered the glitch. They also should have checked the website before booking. That would have solved the problem.

    And of course, they shouldn’t have booked a nonchangeable rate.

  • Chicky

    The only thing I’d disagree with Chris on here is the tack the OP took. I mean, he could have mentioned he wasn’t having a positive experience with Hilton, but the crux of the matter is he was attempting to get a rate the hotel offered. He was attending the conference and was fully eligible for the discount. He should have been offered the discount when he brought this to Hilton’s attention. I don’t think he was quibbling over a technicality, regardless of how the “customer service” people at Hilton saw it. This was about $250 extra, not whether a customer was actually happy. Forest for the trees and that sort of thing.
    This is another sterling illustration of how something that should have taken five minutes to correct became a “thing” that Chris had to poke a company to fix. It’s always a “thing” with these companies. And again, I’d be willing to bet it cost Hilton more than $250 in time, bandwidth and effort to refuse the rate than it would have cost them to just do the right thing FIRST!
    The OP was right, Hilton was wrong. They should have admitted it and fixed this on the first e-mail. Period.

  • Jeanne in NE

    My husband and I had a similar problem in Boston at the Westin next to the Convention Center. He had 2 conferences back to back, with the Westin as the same conference hotel. Both conferences had special rates, but not the same special rate. When checking in, they tried to tell me that they could not honor the conference room rates unless we checked out at the end of the 1st conference and *maybe* then the special rate for the 2nd conference would appear on their computers.

    I called over a manager. After about a half hour of arguing, what we all agreed to was that we’d have the same room for the entire stay, we’d get the 1st conference rate for the first 3 days, we’d have to present ourselves in the lobby on the end of day 3 and go through check-in procedures again to get the 2nd rate for the next 2 days.

    We had a similar problem with the Four Seasons near Times Square in NYC. In both cases, I had our documented confirmations and rates printed and ready to hand to them. At least at the Four Seasons, we were treated decently after the initial problem at check-in. The Westin was just plain rude when we presented ourselves for our second check-in. Maybe that’s just Boston? (No, it wasn’t us – our parents did a good job raising us all those years ago.)

    I don’t know what it is about conference room rates that sets off those computers (and the people working those computers). I totally empathize with Ms. Valentine.

  • Arizona Road Warrior

    I agree with Thalassa that the OP shouldn’t have book a room at $239 rate especially a non-refundable nonchangeable rate. She should have first contacted the trade show organizer that the hotel didn’t have the trade show rates in their system.

  • Adele

    It could also happen that the hotel only guarantees the conference ‘x’ number of rooms at the discounted rate. For example, they might only give them 100 rooms at $199/night. Once those rooms have been booked, the conference rate is “sold out” and unavailable. This has happened to me before when I had to book a conference only a week or so in advance and ended up paying a higher rate for the room.

  • Ernest

    The issue should not be about a special rate, it is about Hilton’s failure to do what is right. A price, conference rate or not does not matter, was offered and not received. The real issue is that once again Chris had to step in to get Hilton to do what they already knew was the right thing to do.

    Hilton should be ashamed for not fixing the problem on their own without being prompted by Chris. It makes me wonder how many people actually got cheated.

  • Paul

    We just had the Hilton treatment at the Doubletree Arctic Club in Seattle. Our business group’s 3 times yearly meetings have a finite number of attendees, we nearly always have perfect attendance so blocking the correct number of rooms is not rocket science for our organizers. I called rather quickly after being advised of where we would be meeting, the room rate quoted & the group name and reference number.
    I was told first they had no such group or number in their system. After confirming info with organizers, I manged to get around the national reservations desk and got the Seattle property day shift manger on, as I recall, my third call attempt. I was told the block of $190 rooms was full, but that rooms were available at the rack rate of $239.
    After a significant discussion regarding how the block could be full since I knew that not all of us had made our commitments yet, we finally arrived at a suitable solution; a confirmation number for a reservation as advertised, which was actually honored when we arrived.
    Others in our group were not so lucky or persistent, and allowed themselves to pay the $49 +taxes addition daily, or to find accommodations elsewhere after being told that not only was the block full, but that the hotel was fully booked.
    I have been to several meetings, conferences & conventions in the last 30 years and I can tell you unequivocally that if the Arctic Club was fully booked the bulk of their guests never left their rooms while we were there. The foyer, bar and restaurant were practically deserted, but the Polish/Russian bakery 1/2 block away had a nice 2 days of business just from our group, and in fact opened 30 minutes early for breakfast for us on our last day.
    There were other petty side issues which made our stay memorable in all the wrong ways, but they do have nice pillows there and we have ordered a set for our home from their supplier.
    It is difficult to comprehend why such pitifully low-rent treatment is apparently becoming the norm what used to be a respectable hospitality chain.
    The kicker to all this is that due to flight schedules we took a room at a Comfort Inn in walking distance from the SeaTac airport for our last night in the area. About half the price of the Arctic Club, 100% as promised, as priced, including on demand door-to-door shuttle to airline departure desk. Smaller TV, more pedestrian pillows, but we slept through most of our stay there, so it was right near perfect, plus we even got a guest discount at the restaurant there with out asking as opposed to being told after eating a late lunch at the Doubletree that the guest discount that was mentioned when we checked in only applied to the dinner meal. Oddly none of who had that late lunch had heard that qualifier at the desk. Amazingly all of us had the same hearing impairment.
    It was deja-vu all over again to read your Travel Troubleshooter just 2 weeks back from our trip.
    Thanks for the affirmation.

  • SHINGWAI WONG

    We have booked 5 rooms 3 days ago in Comfort Suite Tucson during 1/29 – 2/13 at the rate of $58 & 2 rooms from 2/3-2/9 at the same rate through CHOICEHOTEL.COM. We received proper confirmations from the hotel and this rate was published in all other websites such as Expedia, Orbitz, Kayak. But the general manager in Tucson called us yesterday and said this rate could not be honored. Even if we have made the reservation, he would not give us the rooms in January 2011. Enclosed is his email for your reference. Actually he is offering this rate $58 in Aug & Sept, $69 in Oct and Nov, but he wants $169 during our requested period. He says the lowest is $129. What can we do? Just saying “computer error” can bleach the agreement?

Previous post:

Next post: