Yeah, I hear that. Yours was a much more serious incident than mine, belynch, but Hilton's apparent inability to handle complaints which aren't resolved by the first contact is a critical failing.

If I had to guess, it's a failure of metrics/incentives - rewarding the number of support tickets closed, perhaps. If a difficult complaint takes more effort than attaching an account number to a stay or processing a Q3FN, but only provides the same number of boxes ticked for management, then it's an active disincentive for the staff to deal with the hard problems. Far easier to hang a customer out to dry, and deal with a dozen trivial issues to get the numbers up, as the negatives are externalities - they affect only the company and the customer, not the agent.

Glad to hear you've finally got the promised credits back, though, and that it's now all over.