Absurd hotel pet fees

We travel around Illinois to visit my wife's family and also go to various weddings (they never end ).

Well, the good thing is that Alice (our 20 lbs Pug) is now allowed at these little towns hotels, but the non refundable pet fees are absurd.

Doubletree Bloomington: Room was 69 USD, non refundable pet fee was 50USD

New record: Courtyard, Marriott St. Charles IL for wedding over Thanksgiving. Room was 64USD, Pet fee 75USD.

So the room was actually less than the non refundable pet fee.

I think it's time to use the power of Flyertalk to stop this craziness. I will contact Randy and get the contact information for the appropriate connections at Marriott, Hilton and other chains.

If you have gotten charged an absurd pet fee, please post it in this thread and I will make sure they get the message

Oh, and Randy Petersen has a little Shih Tzu

I have a dog and agree that some hotels are ridiculous in their fees. Sure, I understand there may be extra cleaning fees and I will pay for that, but it would take a $10/hr employee an extra 5-10 mins to do a bit more vacuuming or slightly longer to shampoo the carpet.

Tommy I totally agree with you on these hotel pet fees. Letters to the top management stating your displeasure will also help. @:-)

Of course, the longer the stay the more reasonable the fees become.

A few years ago, we stayed at a Residence Inn for 8 months as we relocated to Boston area. The pet fee was $100 total for our two cats.... not a bad deal.

I actually wonder what extra cleaning occurs when you have a pet. Do they REALLY do anything more?

I think the truth of the matter is that they don't really want to have the pets stay in the hotel. I've seen dogs locked up in owner's cars in the parking lot to avoid paying a pet fee!

Usually, I give my business to Motel 6 since they have no pet charges,

Yeah, but then you have to stay at a Motel 6.

The kids and I stayed at a Super 8 near Las Angeles for Thanksgiving. They charge 20 per night per pet. Good thing we only had the one dog with us, eh? They were very impressed with how well behaved he was (he's huge and people seem to think misbehavior is proportional to size, i think. lol)...and only charged me 15/night for him at check out. As they're the only hotel within 45 minutes of our family that would allow a large animal, I was just glad they gave me a break on the extra cost. It would have been nice to stay a little longer, but the pet fee was before taxes so I was paying over 100/night.

To believe that a "little" extra vacuuming is sufficient to remove all traces of a pet from a hotel room is surely a sign that one is totally acclimated to the smells/hair etc that pets can produce (and leave behind!)...

I cap the limit of what I'll pay in a pet fee at $50. If it's more than that, and it's only for 1 night, I'll board the kibblers. I've found that I prefer the Petsmart Petshotel. For about $60/day, they can stay in the same suite. It's all indoors, so I don't have to worry about Cobaka demonstrating her Houdini routine. Also, there's someone there all night.

High pet fees that are non-refundable are extreme. But high refundable deposits are reasonable. I can just see my "little angel" (HA) doing a fair amount of damage in an unfamiliar setting while I may be in the bathroom with the door closed. He just shredded another bed at the doggie hotel last night. I'm sure there have been more than a handful of dogs that have caused a hotel to need to not only clean the carpet, but toss the bedding and the mattresses, perhaps some lamps and furniture, and repair walls and doors. I'm sure it doesn't happen very often, but leave a big dog locked up in an unfamiliar hotel room, alone, and what do you expect? Him to have champagne and roses waiting for you when you return?

No different than an airline charging $25 for the second bag or $100 for a 52 pound bag vs. a 49 pound one. It is all about revenue and they charge what people are willing to pay. They are offering a premium service (allowing your pet) that many of the competitors won't allow, so they charge for it. Simple laws of economics, supply/demand, etc.

Thank you for that nugget of information

Pets are free at the majority of real city properties and pretty much always free with extensive services at high end properties and I'm pretty sure that the corporate offices of these various chains agrees that pet fees shouldn't be higher than the room rates in these little town locations.

No problem seeing that people want to make money, but newsflash: People don't want to pay these fees, we pay dog sitters or dog hotels to take care of the dogs because that's cheaper. The best dog hotel in Chicago charges 45 bucks, that's where our threshold is. If these idiot small town hotel GMs were smart business people, they would charge a nominal fee for dogs and then they would actually get customers like us when their competitors don't allow dogs. Guess what the occupancy is in these little towns on the weekends these days? Trust me, they need every dollar they can get.

I for one will never stay at any of these properties that charge absurd fees period, And will make sure everyone I know does the same

Drove cross-country (CA to PA) in September with 1 kid and 2 furballs. One dark and stormy night we had serious car trouble 30 miles west of Peoria, and limped the car, with no headlights, into town (thank you, Mr. Illinois State Trouper for your assistance!). Using an outdated GPS and a cell phone with intermittent reception, I got a number for the local Residence Inn which I know accepts pets, albeit with an obscene $125 non-refundable fee, and secured a reservation for the 4 of us. The desk clerk was an angel in human form as he spent 25 minutes on the phone with me talking us through town (GPS lost signal in the storm) to their location, hidden behind a shopping mall. Once we got there, I was prepared to pay the fee, 'cause by then I'd have paid anything to get off the roads. However, seeing my Marriott Rewards card at check-in, he knocked the fee down to $25.

Marriott may have lost (in theory) $100 on this, but gained a loyal customer for life.

BTW, if you're traveling with a litter box, those new jumbo XXL Ziplocks hold a standard size one, and keep the litter from getting all over the trunk.