Your thoughts on this hotel reservation situation?

[sk!mom]

So the reason they typically don’t make stay-overs switch rooms is because the housekeeping work for someone mid-stay is a lot less for a checkout. So they don’t want to have a double check out clean for moving someone when they can have a midstay and only one check out.

I think it does stink if they book you into specific rooms and then don’t honor them and don’t give some sort of credit for it. Anymore I haven’t been able to reserve specific rooms though, I can put in a request but it’s not guaranteed.

This is what I was going to say. The hotel had let you reserve 3 specific rooms so they should have told the "stay over" that they would have to change rooms. They didn't because of the extra cleaning of a check out. It was easier on them to move one of your party.

I would write a review- not overly negative, "This is our favorite hotel because of the ..... We were disappointed this trip though that despite confirming our reservation of rooms xxx, the hotel chose to accommodate a stay over and move one of our party."

I depend on reviews so I appreciate those who leave honest ones. I can then evaluate if the negatives are things that would bother me. For instance, the only negatives for our recent Key West rental were about how close it was to a couple of noisy bars. For our group of 6 adults, this was a positive so we went ahead and rented but we had been forewarned of the noise as is anyone looking for a quieter location.

 

[nkereina]

As someone who's worked in a major hotel chain, I agree with PP that its less work for housekeeping. But in addition to that, from the front desk perspective, the "stay over" guest is there in front of them at the present. We were always trained to satisfy the guest in front of you that's already patronizing the hotel versus worrying about guests that come in later. Anything can happen with guests who are not yet on property from a last minute cancellation or change to a complete no show. It happened a lot, so we always took care of guests in our presence first. This is why many people who arrive late in the day don't get their room request - if the front desk moves room assignments around to accommodate guests who have checked in earlier, you might have had yours switched out.

 

[marcyleecorgan]

I didn't pay months ago....just reserved the rooms back in May.

Oops, mis-read. Well, I still would be angry. It's not like you made an ADR... it's a reservation... that's supposed to be for reals

 

[cabanafrau]

I feel the hotel is out of line in that they offered up the specific details of the rooms they were committing to your reservation the week before, with room numbers. I get that the general policy of the hotel industry is there are no guarantees. This hotel clearly doesn't operate by that policy in that they voluntarily offered up the specific room numbers the week before. Absent some type of unforeseen mechanical or structural failure they made their bed -- and OP's family should have been the ones lying in it. You give your word to a customer, you better have a good reason for breaking it.

 

[allison443]

This actually happened to us many years ago on a trip to WDW! We had a reservation at one of the downtown Disney hotels and when we checked in (late afternoon) they told us no rooms were available, people were overstaying and they legally had to let them stay! We had to stay at a motel in Kissimmee that night. I think they paid for the motel though.

 

[kaytieeldr]

I 'm genuinely surprised that a hotel allows customers to reserve specific rooms.

 

[mjkacmom]

As someone who's worked in a major hotel chain, I agree with PP that its less work for housekeeping. But in addition to that, from the front desk perspective, the "stay over" guest is there in front of them at the present. We were always trained to satisfy the guest in front of you that's already patronizing the hotel versus worrying about guests that come in later. Anything can happen with guests who are not yet on property from a last minute cancellation or change to a complete no show. It happened a lot, so we always took care of guests in our presence first. This is why many people who arrive late in the day don't get their room request - if the front desk moves room assignments around to accommodate guests who have checked in earlier, you might have had yours switched out.

When we travel to large dance competitions, they usually reserve s block in large business hotels like marriotts and Sheratons. Everyone wants two beds, but they never have enough. Even if you reserve a double, if you get there late in the day, there is a good chance you are getting a king.

 

[SharonZ]

The situation stinks, but I wouldn't be overly upset - those things just don't bother me. To me, you request was not able to be honored, it happens.

 

[Kitty 34]

The situation stinks, but I wouldn't be overly upset - those things just don't bother me. To me, you request was not able to be honored, it happens.

I wasn't overly upset at all.....just wondering if this is the norm.

 

[CrankyDad]

Not sure if this is the right wording for the title or not??

I called back in May and reserved three beach front rooms next to each other first floor at a hotel we have frequented before up at Mackinaw City on the Straits. When I called I was made clear they were under new management which was fine with me one way or another. I just wanted three rooms next to each other on the beach for my various family members that would be joining us for the long weekend. She said the rooms would be 14, 15 and 16 which I said great.

I even called the hotel about a week ago just to make sure we were still all set for those rooms for three nights. She gave me the all clear, see ya in a week response.

Soooooo, when DH and I got up there the other day to check in (sons and families were still enroute) we were told that she couldn't give us all 3 rooms together because a couple that had spent the night in one of the rooms the previous night wanted to stay over as she put it. In fact she said they had many "stay-overs" for the weekend and she was quite frazzled about it.

Well long story short.......we only got two rooms together and the third room was on 2nd floor facing the parking lot in another building. I wasn't going to make a fuss and I didn't as the 2nd floor room actually was very nice according to one of my sons.

I just think it was odd she was accommodating "stay-overs" vs someone making a reservation 2 months ago. Maybe it's the usual and I've just never experienced it before??

Your thoughts if you want to share......

Hotel GM here. That is very common. Guests extend their stay all the time. If it was an ada room and current guest did not need it we would move them. If not they stay and arrivals are juggled to make do

 

[ronandannette]

I was wondering if people were liking it for the reference, or if they just thought it was a good point. Good to see someone got it LOL

Got you; I think most people did. It's one of our vacation rituals, while on the way to the rental car office, for one of us to say to the other "So, do they know how to keep the reservation?"

 

[QueenIsabella]

I see this as a complete non-issue. I would be more sympathetic if the OP had young children, and needed adjoining rooms to accommodate the kids being near Mom and Dad.

We go to a resort every July. This was our 23rd year. The staff is like family. Every year, we've had the same room. Until this year--we had to change our week due to DS12's Scout camp, so we were there a week later. Got our room assignment, and were scratching our heads--it wasn't room 302! We ALWAYS have room 302! Clerk checks the reservation--sure enough, we'd reserved room 302, but we'd asked for it on 7/26 of last year, and the current occupants asked for it on 6/17 of the previous year. Too bad, so sad for us. We went on and stayed in room 129 and had a fabulous vacation.

I will also say--same resort, our DD23 has us add a room for her and her cousin. They add on late, like May, and aren't put in 304--they're way down in 148. NBD. We still saw them plenty. This year, they were in 127, right next to us, but given that they're young adults, they were on a completely different sleep schedule from us old fogies. We spent plenty of time with them.

 

[Mickeyluver37]

I have heard that "squatters" like that have the law on their side.

If that's true, it didn't work for me at All Star Movies. I went down every night to ask if we could stay one more night, and was told no (because they were booked) every time. They didn't even find me something else on property. Luckily the morning of check out, POP became available and I booked it myself from my cell phone.

But, I'm not complaining. It wasn't Disney's fault our plans changed and they were booked. Just as the hotel OP is talking about should have said NO to the stayovers in that room, or made them move. I would bet that since the hotel itself wasn't at capacity, they don't have the sophisticated enough technology (like Disney does) to see that those rooms are booked, and offer the stay-over family the parking lot view.

 

[cabanafrau]

If that's true, it didn't work for me at All Star Movies. I went down every night to ask if we could stay one more night, and was told no (because they were booked) every time. They didn't even find me something else on property. Luckily the morning of check out, POP became available and I booked it myself from my cell phone.

But, I'm not complaining. It wasn't Disney's fault our plans changed and they were booked. Just as the hotel OP is talking about should have said NO to the stayovers in that room, or made them move. I would bet that since the hotel itself wasn't at capacity, they don't have the sophisticated enough technology (like Disney does) to see that those rooms are booked, and offer the stay-over family the parking lot view.

I agree with you that is what the hotel should have done. However, I'm sure they realized that it was likely the stayover family would have changed plans if they had to suddenly "downgrade" to parking lot view, meaning they would have sold less rooms overall -- and it was more pleasant to say yes to the guest currently in front of them and claim situation beyond their control when OP's family got there. Odds were against OP's family deciding to skip their reservation and select another option upon arrival. Doing what they did meant the hotel sold an unused room. But will it be worth it over time if OP's family, long-term return customers, elect to choose another option in the future? That's the real gamble the hotel took.

 

[mummabear]

You are an extremely gracious person and a super-star at going with the flow. I personally wouldn't grind an axe in a review, but then I doubt I'd have let it get that far. When I arrived and found the promised accommodations unavailable, I would have pressed until they came up with a situation that was agreeable to me, not just took whatever they handed me. At that point I would consider the problem properly resolved and wouldn't feel any need to give a bad review.

I still personally would include it in the review, plus the information about the "solution".
That is what reviews are there for, to tell.people what the place is like. In this case they repeatedly agreed on a room booking then did not provide it, even if you are happy with the resolution in the end, it is still relevent info

 

[eileenjez]

At one hotel we checked in and found our room "occupied". Went down to front desk and they said no the room was empty and the people had checked out. It turned out that the people had not checked out but had asked the housekeeper if they could stay and she said yes. It was auto check out at 11 so front desk assumed they had gone.
At another one we had made reservation for a king bed and got to hotel and was told they had given it to someone else with no reservation. Didn't make a fuss but in the morning I talked to manager and the room was comped. Seems like the front desk was giving rooms to others that just walked in and asked if there were any rooms available. I wonder how many other rooms got comped that day.

 

[RedAngie]

I 'm genuinely surprised that a hotel allows customers to reserve specific rooms.

Two years ago we stayed at Cabana Bay at Universal for several nights, with plans to go elsewhere in Florida for several days, and then return to Cabana Bay again for a few more days. When checking out the first time, we told the desk clerk we'd be returning and asked for the same room. She looked up the reservation and put in the request. When we returned, a different desk clerk seemed surprised that a specific room was requested and was granted.

I realize it was a request only, not a guarantee. If we were assigned a different room it would have been fine.