A surprise cleaning fee
Question: A few weeks ago I missed a flight from Dallas to Los Angeles. My airline offered me standby tickets on the next flight, which left the following morning, and I was told I could stay overnight in the terminal or pay for a room at the Grand Hyatt DFW. I decided to get a good night’s sleep before my flight.
The hotel quoted me a nightly rate of $135. The room was in reasonably good shape when I checked out of the Hyatt the following morning, only five hours after arriving. But when I received my credit card statement, I discovered that my Hyatt bill came to $357. I called Hyatt to find out why the hotel was charging me an extra $222, and was told I had to pay an “excessive cleaning†fee.
I spoke with the head of housekeeping, who said vomit had been left on the carpets and drapes. I know I didn’t do this. In fact, I think this is a mistake on the part of one of the staff somewhere down the line, but they aren’t admitting to it.
But several phone calls later — and a promise by the head housekeeper to have the head of the consumer affairs department call me — I still have not heard from Hyatt. It’s been almost three weeks. Can you help?
— Kris Barraca, Los Angeles
Answer: If a hotel plans to charge you an extra $222 for your room, then at least it should be upfront about it. And adding an “excessive cleaning†fee to your bill after you’ve checked out — without so much as an explanation — isn’t what I would call being upfront.
In the seven years that I have been writing this column, I’ve never come across a $222 cleaning fee, although I suppose it’s technically possible to accrue such a charge. But if you stayed in the room for only a few hours, you would have had to throw some kind of party in order to rack up a bill like that.
If a hotel needs to impose a cleaning fee after checkout, there is a correct way to do it. The guest needs to be notified either by phone or in writing, and not broadsided on a credit card statement.
If you get a little rowdy in your hotel room and are afraid that you might have to pay a cleaning fee, there are several ways of avoiding an unpleasant surcharge. Try to tidy up as much as possible and leave a generous tip for the housekeeping staff. That almost always does the trick.
If a hotel insists on imposing an unmerited surcharge for cleaning, and doesn’t respond to a request for an explanation, you can — and should — dispute the charge with your credit card company.
I checked with Hyatt, and it agreed to take another look at your case. A representative called you and said that, upon further examination, it seems that something on Hyatt’s end got “muddled.â€
Hyatt apologized and refunded the cleaning fee.