- Joined
- Jun 6, 2005
- Messages
- 15,573
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- Resorts Owned
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Grandview At Las Vegas
[triennial - points]
PriceLine's web site says that at the hotels, a credit card is required for any additional hotel specific service fees or incidental charges or fees that may be charged by the hotel to the customer at checkout. The charges may be mandatory (e.g., resort fees) or optional (parking, phone calls or minibar charges) and are not included in the customer's offer price.
That feeble disclosure about the resort fees prompted me today to send off the following complaint to PriceLine via their web site, with hard copy via USPS as back-up.
This message is for the PriceLine Complaint Department.
Some hotels & resorts are now adding what they call a daily Resort Fee to the amount they charge for accommodations. PriceLine discloses that, sort of, but without indicating ahead of time whether a particular Name Your Own Price reservation request does or does not involve added Resort Fees & if so the amount of the fee. Plus, even with that weak & incomplete disclosure, there is no way for the customer to check anywhere to find out on his or her own whether a particular Name Your Own Price reservation will or will not involve Resort Fees.
That completely undermines the Name Your Own Price concept. Except for the possibility of unknown Resort Fees, PriceLine does a good job of disclosing the price + tax & fees before the customer pulls the trigger on a Name Your Own Price bid. Without specific advance disclosure of Resort Fees, PriceLine now puts customers in crapshoot mode.
You may say the amount is small -- only $5-$10 or so per day -- but (a) that misses the point & (b) the opportunity to get great reservations at known Name Your Own Price rates is the main appeal of PriceLine. Mess with that (via unknown Resort Fees) & you're chopping away what draws customers like us to PriceLine in the 1st place.
It's not so much the actual Resort Fee that causes major irritation as it is the uncertainty over whether the fee will or will not be charged. If I know ahead of time, I can adjust my Name Your Own Price amount accordingly. Since I don't know (because PriceLine doesn't say), than I can't really Name My Own Price -- all I can do is Partly Name My Own Price.
I don't like it that way, & I would expect PriceLine to tell participating hotels & resorts that it's their obligation to fold their "Resort Fee" into the amount they will or will not accept when PriceLine customers submit Name Your Own Price bids for accommodations. That's not much to ask of the participating hotels & resorts, & doing so would bring back consistency & eliminate uncertainty in PriceLine's famous Name Your Own Price concept, which has been weakened by the current method of dealing with Resort Fees.
BTW -- a similar gripe applies to PriceLine & HotWire & other web sites' advertised hotel & resort prices, when the advertised prices do not include an undisclosed fee that the travelers may be stuck with at check-out (or check-in, mox mix). If there's going to be an added fee, just do the straightforward thing & add it in & show it as part of the advertised price. It's a matter of Full Disclosure & treating customers with respect.
Saying there "may" be an added Resort Fee is no more than partial disclosure at best, is incomplete information for sure, & is unworthy of business dealings by high-quality business operations.
Give customers a break. Disclose all the costs before we commit, not just most costs with a question-mark hanging over possible Resort Fees.
When I show up at a hotel or resort with a PriceLine reservation in hand, that's supposed to be all I pay. When Resort Fees are involved, show those ahead of time, right there on the screen that shows the daily bid amount times the number of days, plus tax, plus PriceLine fees. Just add 1 more line showing the resort fee times the number of days & add that into the total so that I know the complete specific cost of my PriceLine bid before I go past the point of no return. Then if my bid is accepted, collect from me all that's due for the reservation -- Resort Fee & all -- & add that to what you pay the hotel, the same as you do with the rest of the money the hotel gets for that reservation. When I pay for my hotel stay via PriceLine, that's supposed to be everything that I pay -- all fees, all taxes, everything. I don't want to pay PriceLine & then pay more at the hotel. Show all the costs ahead of time, charge all those costs when the PriceLine bid is accepted, & keep it simple for the customer. That's not much to ask, & it will go a long way toward restoring my satisfaction in logging into PriceLine to bid for travel.
If PriceLine responds, I will report back via TUG-BBS.
That feeble disclosure about the resort fees prompted me today to send off the following complaint to PriceLine via their web site, with hard copy via USPS as back-up.
This message is for the PriceLine Complaint Department.
Some hotels & resorts are now adding what they call a daily Resort Fee to the amount they charge for accommodations. PriceLine discloses that, sort of, but without indicating ahead of time whether a particular Name Your Own Price reservation request does or does not involve added Resort Fees & if so the amount of the fee. Plus, even with that weak & incomplete disclosure, there is no way for the customer to check anywhere to find out on his or her own whether a particular Name Your Own Price reservation will or will not involve Resort Fees.
That completely undermines the Name Your Own Price concept. Except for the possibility of unknown Resort Fees, PriceLine does a good job of disclosing the price + tax & fees before the customer pulls the trigger on a Name Your Own Price bid. Without specific advance disclosure of Resort Fees, PriceLine now puts customers in crapshoot mode.
You may say the amount is small -- only $5-$10 or so per day -- but (a) that misses the point & (b) the opportunity to get great reservations at known Name Your Own Price rates is the main appeal of PriceLine. Mess with that (via unknown Resort Fees) & you're chopping away what draws customers like us to PriceLine in the 1st place.
It's not so much the actual Resort Fee that causes major irritation as it is the uncertainty over whether the fee will or will not be charged. If I know ahead of time, I can adjust my Name Your Own Price amount accordingly. Since I don't know (because PriceLine doesn't say), than I can't really Name My Own Price -- all I can do is Partly Name My Own Price.
I don't like it that way, & I would expect PriceLine to tell participating hotels & resorts that it's their obligation to fold their "Resort Fee" into the amount they will or will not accept when PriceLine customers submit Name Your Own Price bids for accommodations. That's not much to ask of the participating hotels & resorts, & doing so would bring back consistency & eliminate uncertainty in PriceLine's famous Name Your Own Price concept, which has been weakened by the current method of dealing with Resort Fees.
BTW -- a similar gripe applies to PriceLine & HotWire & other web sites' advertised hotel & resort prices, when the advertised prices do not include an undisclosed fee that the travelers may be stuck with at check-out (or check-in, mox mix). If there's going to be an added fee, just do the straightforward thing & add it in & show it as part of the advertised price. It's a matter of Full Disclosure & treating customers with respect.
Saying there "may" be an added Resort Fee is no more than partial disclosure at best, is incomplete information for sure, & is unworthy of business dealings by high-quality business operations.
Give customers a break. Disclose all the costs before we commit, not just most costs with a question-mark hanging over possible Resort Fees.
When I show up at a hotel or resort with a PriceLine reservation in hand, that's supposed to be all I pay. When Resort Fees are involved, show those ahead of time, right there on the screen that shows the daily bid amount times the number of days, plus tax, plus PriceLine fees. Just add 1 more line showing the resort fee times the number of days & add that into the total so that I know the complete specific cost of my PriceLine bid before I go past the point of no return. Then if my bid is accepted, collect from me all that's due for the reservation -- Resort Fee & all -- & add that to what you pay the hotel, the same as you do with the rest of the money the hotel gets for that reservation. When I pay for my hotel stay via PriceLine, that's supposed to be everything that I pay -- all fees, all taxes, everything. I don't want to pay PriceLine & then pay more at the hotel. Show all the costs ahead of time, charge all those costs when the PriceLine bid is accepted, & keep it simple for the customer. That's not much to ask, & it will go a long way toward restoring my satisfaction in logging into PriceLine to bid for travel.
If PriceLine responds, I will report back via TUG-BBS.
Alan Cole, McLean (Fairfax County), Virginia, USA.