theLuxuryTravelExpert

I would like to have some advice on the following topic.

7 weeks ago, on March 19th, I booked a 5 night stay at the Park Hyatt in summer in a Park Studio Suite King. Total rate was 0 US $ per night. Obviously, the price was wrongly displaced, but nevertheless, I was able to book the suite at that rate online and I received a confirmation email displaying that rate.

2 days ago, May 7th (almost 2 months later!), I received the following email from a Hyatt representative:
Of course, I was upset by this email, for 2 reasons:
-The incorrect rate of 0 USD per night was publically available. As a customer, I did nothing, absolutely nothing wrong. (Park) Hyatt made an apparent mistake here.
-7 weeks have passed since the booking before I was informed; this is way too long and an unacceptable time frame to inform a customer about a rate that will not be honored (especially since I have now booked my plane ticket).

Hyatt responded to my email:

I certainly understand your frustrations and disappointments with this situation. A system error caused an incorrect rate to be displayed and while technology is designed to make everyone's lives easier, we've all experienced how it can also do the opposite.

I know that the rate was available to you online when you changed your reservation, but unfortunately, we cannot honor the $0 rate. The nightly rate will be $975 per night for the Park Studio King. As compensation for this error, I have credited 30,000 points into your Gold Passport account. This is enough for a free night at this hotel or any other Hyatt hotel.

Again, I sincerely apologize for this error and any inconveniences it may have caused.

I wrote another email that IMHO Hyatt made several mistakes here, not only with the wrong price display, but also and especially the way they want to solve (or actually, not solve) this by causing – and not resolving – problems for their customers. Therefore, I repeated my request that (Park) Hyatt would indeed honor the reservation as booked, which seems to me the only logic thing they can do since we are talking about customer service here and since Hyatt is the only party that made a mistake.

Their response:

I would like to extend my deepest apologies for any inconvenience that were caused by our website. The rate of $0 was a technical error. Please know that Park Hyatt New York is not yet opened for business, which caused a delay in the hotel catching this error. We have taken actions to make sure that the error will not occur again. Dr. Sagaert please know that the hotel is unable to accept the rate of $0 and that the new nightly rate will be $975.

Please know that Hyatt truly does value your business, and I am happy to see that *** had placed the 30,000 points in your account. With that said, I understand if you choose to cancel your reservation.

Park Hyatt does not want to change their position, which I think is rather shocking, especially since the booking was made 2 months ago. I am still convinced that the only right thing they can do is honor the rate since they (and not myself as a customer) made mistakes and they now put me in a lot of trouble. What should I do? Any advice? Contact one of the senior managers? As an SPG plantinum member, I can only tell you how happy I am with the Starwood resorts (over the past few years, I had a couple of issues with reservations, but they always solved it correctly, with the customer in mind). All suggestions are welcome!

lawyertalk

You've received more than enough.

britishcanuck

I think there is a difference between a rate of say $50 a night for the room, vs $0. I don't think you'll have too much luck. I would ask for a better rate than the daily rate, but expecting 5 nights in a suite for nothing is a little much.

todorovic

Wirelessly posted (iPhone 5: Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 7_1_1 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/537.51.2 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/7.0 Mobile/11D201 Safari/9537.53)

I'd suggest that you have been compensated adequately and your continuing effort to get them to honor the $0 rate will lead nowhere. If I were you I'd ask for a discounted regular rate (say 50% off) or simply cancel and book somewhere else - plenty of hotels in NYC.

jibi

In New York, there is no legal standing that remotely suggests they must honor the rate. In fact, the law is on their side as this is an obvious mistake/error rather than an attempt to deceive the consumer. The simple fact that they offered 30,000 points is far more than they should have offered. If you want customer service, you have it in those points and then some.

It sucks that you are traveling from Belgium to New York and already have the travel booked, but there should have been some logical contingencies and realistic expectations from your position regarding your hotel booking.

IncyWincy

Is it possible to simply use the 30,000 points on a room there and forget about a suite? This way, you are far ahead - you effectively stay at the PH New York for free, albeit in a nice room and not in a suite!

taipeiflyer

Get over yourself... You already scammed them out of 30,000 points. Enjoy your windfall and find some other property offering free rooms to try and extort from.

hailstorm

You're biggest mistake was not letting us know about the rate after you booked the room. There is safety in numbers...it is very easy to blow off a single disgruntled customer, but not so easy to ignore a hundred...

hamhead

iluv2fly

What they said.

If the situation were reversed, would you honor something like that? Methinks not. Move on. And the sooner the better.

atravelguy

Can't really think you are in a lot of trouble when you knew from the beginning something was wrong. The OP openly acknowledges the rate was an error, and decides to roll the dice and book flights (and obviously not check with the hotel first to avoid them catching said error) and is outraged that they would not allow the OP to not pay $5,000+ with taxes included. Take the 30,000 points (lucky you) and call it a day.

antonius66

Yeah, its not even a super low rate that you could argue (even though it would be a terrible argument) that you did not know was a mistake, i.e. $100 on an $800 room. A FREE room being advertised on the website? Don't be a (insert variety of things here). You absolutely knew they would never give you a free room and it was a mistake. You did not rely on that, could not have, and if you did, you are beyond help. You got a free gift of almost $600 in points, so take it run like a bandit.

Often1

1. OP is SOL. Period.

2. I would have some slight sympathy if the property had transposed some digits and quoted $795 for a $975 room or somesuch. But, $0 was and remains wrong.

3. OP is an experienced world traveler. His "handle" and his other posts point to premium worldwide travel. Put simply, he knows that hotels aren't free.

4. He made his own bed by lying in wait and hoping that the property would not discover its error which, of course it did.

JetAway

OP's website is sophisticated, impressive and interesting. Hardly the work of a travel novice. So it's somewhat disappointing that he would try to take advantage of this obvious mistake by Hyatt. It actually puts him and his very good website in a bad light.

IncyWincy

Actually, knowing about it now is a lot better than having to deal with it at check-in, for both sides.