Best Western Rewards - Creepy new Policy?

I just stayed at 2 different BWs this week after a long hiatus. They both demanded that they not only SEE my driver's lisence (as some places do just to make sure that your credit card name and the driver's lisence name match - i.e. not a stolen card), but then they wanted to scan it and Keep it on file.

I asked then why they need all that info and they each babbled on some scenario that if I burned the room down, then they would know who did it.

This is creepy and starts the transaction off as though I INTEND to be a criminal. That's no way to foster business. No other hotel chain does this and I stay in many. With ID theft these days - I dont want that "kept on file" forever and trust their systems. I am a clean-cut scientist.

Am I off base here in my outrage? What's next? Take my DNA at check-in in CASE I commit a crime in my room?

I am a long standing member of the Gold Crown Club also...

This policy probably says more about BW clientele than BW.

Tell them "no".

Please identify to all of us here exactly what properties these were, so we know to avoid them.

The low-end mixed-quality chains have properties that are starting to do this. My last cross-country drive, I ended up switching back to staying at BWs because on the way out, a Choice Hotels property (Comfort Inn Princeton, WV) insisted on entering my drivers license# in the computer. Using some of the same "what if you damage the room" nonsense.

The two BW properties I stayed at on the way back West did not do it (Independence, MO and Limon, CO), so I can recommend them as OK.

I don't think it's a chain thing - it's a small-town authoritarian-mentality thing. I know that complaining to Choice corporate didn't get me anything other than a form-letter "our hotels are all independently owned and franchised so we can't specify policies" nonsense. Try complaining to Best Western corporate and see what they have to say.

Both hotels were in Houston, TX. Strange since they are about the only state left that believes in true individual freedom.

I will try what the earlier replier said and just say NO next time. I thought about it at the time but did not want to fight that battle at the time since I was VERY tired and needed a room.

PS: they were both very nice BW hotels in good parts of town...

Both hotels were in Houston, TX. Strange since they are about the only state left that believes in true individual freedom.


Well, AFAIK the NH motto is still "Live Free or Die".

So what happens if you don't have a driver's licence????

I just stayed at 2 different BWs this week after a long hiatus. They both demanded that they not only SEE my driver's lisence (as some places do just to make sure that your credit card name and the driver's lisence name match - i.e. not a stolen card), but then they wanted to scan it and Keep it on file.
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No other hotel chain does this and I stay in many.

Asking for ID is SOP at U.S. Starwoods. The reservation confirmations by email state that ID is required at check in. No property has asked to scan my ID, however.

No other hotel chain does this and I stay in many.
Well, I've had it happen at Best Western, I've had it happen at Choice properties, I've had it happen at TripRewards properties, etc. (Tho not every every location of any of them.) Perhaps you don't stay much at lower-end chains other than BW, and thus you don't notice that's it's more common at all the lower-end chains?

Some photocopy (Baymont in Plano TX), some (Comfort Inn in Costa Mesa) type the license number into the computer.

(I haven't been keeping track of them, so I can't remember the specifics other than these two.)

They both demanded that they not only SEE my driver's lisence (as some places do just to make sure that your credit card name and the driver's lisence name match - i.e. not a stolen card), but then they wanted to scan it and Keep it on file.Aw, your picture isn't THAT bad!

PS: they were both very nice BW hotels in good parts of town...Wait, you said this was Houston... :D

I see this more frequently at "lower-end" motels, but occasionally at upscale Holiday Inn brand places. I don't worry about it... my picture's pretty good.

well, as security becomes more and more an issue, our freedoms become less and less. BUT WE STILL HAVE THE FREEDOM OF CHOICE!

the other day I was talking to the cable guy about my bill, after the usual questions of name, address, account number, etc., he insisted I set up a "security question" (with an answer that I have already forgotten) then insisted I choose a password, .......you get the idea!

well, as security becomes more and more an issue, our freedoms become less and less. BUT WE STILL HAVE THE FREEDOM OF CHOICE!

the other day I was talking to the cable guy about my bill, after the usual questions of name, address, account number, etc., he insisted I set up a "security question" (with an answer that I have already forgotten) then insisted I choose a password, .......you get the idea!

Welcome to FT, deaken! ^ :)

I don't think that having to set up a security question for an account is in the same league as having a backwater hotel's IT staff responsible for your personally identifiable information ad perpetuam.