My recent stay at the San Diego Marina Marriott was cut off abruptly when my family and I were booted out a day early.

One year earlier I had made reservations at the hotel for a conference from Saturday July 29 to the Sunday August 5. At the time I made the reservation the Y2K computer concerns were not allowing online reservations after December 31, 1999.

I had never experienced a problem with hotels honoring their reservations and did not insist upon a written confirmation. Probably the travel wise know this was a mistake. Nevertheless I recall making reservations by telephone with Marriott before and not getting a written confirmation. I called and confirmed the reservation a couple of times and when we checked in the front desk clerk verbally stated we were confirmed until Sunday August 5. We did not receive a written statement of the check in and check out dates.

We ended up having to return home a day early unexpectedly. On Wednesday we let the front desk know that we would be checking out one day early on SATURDAY. However, on Thursday a warning "To Those Who are Checking Out on Friday" was slipped under the door. It warned that a "big conference" was coming in on Friday and no late check-outs would be possible. I thought I had better make sure they had us checking out on Saturday and spoke with someone at the front desk. Sure enough they had changed our check out to Friday.

When the front desk attendent checked the reservation record she said it had been changed many times. When I insisted that it had not been changed by us, except for having the courtesy to advise them of our checking out one day early, she said something about how their reservation system could change the reservation automatically(?!?) She also kept questioning me about the documentation that I did not have: Didn't we have a mailed confirmation? Didn't we have a written statement of the check out date? I told her that if Marriott had provided it I would have had documentation. She stated they were "over booked" for Friday and she didn't know what she could do but assured me she would do some checking into the reservation record and leave a message. When I got back late Thursday night there was no message.

After my business meetings were concluded on Friday I returned to the room to find my husband had begun packing our things. He said the hotel took the position that if we did not have documentation of our check out date they did not have to honor our reservation. If we did not check out they would physically remove our belongings from our room. The only concession they made was to pay $14 as the difference between the rate we had had at the Marriott and the rate (not including tax) we had to pay at the Gas Lamp Hilton (a new hotel which is a good alternative to the Marriott for a convention center hotel in San Diego).

The result was that we had to spend hours of our last day packing and moving to another hotel, getting settled and then packing again in the morning for our departure from the area. It was not an experience I would like to repeat.

The moral of the story is:
With Marriott make sure they put the departure date in writing.



[This message has been edited by 2bgrounded (edited 08-13-2000).]