A government rate for a weekend stay?
Question: I can’t get my hotel to honor a rate it confirmed, and I could use a little help.
I recently called the Hampton Inn Asheville to reserve a room for two nights so I could attend a database software training class on federal government travel orders. I asked for, and received, Hampton Inn’s version of the government rate, which was $81 a night. A reservations agent gave me a confirmation number.
In a separate phone call, a colleague attending the same training class also made a reservation at the Hampton Inn and received the same rate and a confirmation number. Several days before the class, my colleague got a phone call from Hampton Inn with some bad news. Apparently we’d both been offered the wrong rate. The new rate for Friday night was $149. The representative asked my colleague to pass the news along to me.
I contacted Hilton Hotels, which owns Hampton Inn, and was told that someone from the Hampton property in Asheville would contact me. But when I got the call from Hampton, the representative refused to adjust the rate, insisting that no one travels on government business on Friday or Saturday. I can assure you that this is not correct.
I have not yet canceled my reservation, but I find it odd that I can go online and get a $114-a-night rate for Friday. What would you advise me to do?
– Cheryl McClure, Atlanta
Answer: Don’t cancel your reservation. Hampton Inn needs to honor the rate it offered you and your colleague when you phoned.
This isn’t a “fat finger” rate — a price that’s too good to be true. It appears to be a legitimate government rate that was withdrawn for reasons that aren’t entirely clear.
It should be obvious to even the janitor at the Hampton Inn that the government doesn’t stop working on the weekend. And besides, there are ways to confirm that someone is traveling on government business. Why not ask for an ID, for starters? I’m sure you would have been happy to show yours to the desk clerk when you checked in.
Instead, your government rate was taken away and replaced with what looks like the hotel’s undiscounted room rate, also known as the “rack rate.”
Come on.
You could have done one of two things. First, you might have phoned the Hampton Inn in Asheville and spoken with a manager. A one-minute conversation would have cleared this whole matter up. Second, you could have just shown up at the property with a printout of your confirmed room rate and insisted that the hotel honor it, even though you knew it didn’t want to. A manager would have been called and after a one-minute conversation, I’m sure your rate would have been adjusted.
Oh, there’s a third option that I almost forgot about: Me.
I contacted Hampton on your behalf, and it turns out the hotel goofed. According to a phone call you received from a manager, the hotel never should have changed your rate. The manager blamed the screw-up on a trainee, and the hotel reset your rate to $81 a night.
Or so the manager said. In fact, when you checked out of the hotel, you were presented with an invoice for $149 a night. Once again a manager was called, and your rate was finalized at $81.
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