About two weeks ago, my office booked a couple of hotel rooms at the IHG StayBridge Suites in St. Petersburg (Tampa) for us to be working at the Tampa Bay Boat Show on the weekend of March 9.

When my admin booked the rooms, the rate page said that a deposit was required but did not specify how much the deposit was. We were in a hurry to secure these rooms before all were gone for the boat show so we didn't check into it. My past experience with hotel deposits is that it is normally 25% of the total cost of the reservation or the cost of the first nights stay. Makes sense, right?

The Oxford Dictionary defines a deposit as "A sum payable as a first installment on the purchase of something or as a pledge for a contract, the balance being payable later." I think all of us if asked or surveyed would agree that a deposit is just that - a partial payment to secure a future good or service.

But no, when the deadline for the deposit had passed, IHG charged us for the FULL amount of the entire reservation for both suites (over $2,800) instead of charging a normal deposit. Their claim is that the deposit for this reservation is the full amount! It did not specify this on their Staybridge Suites website (not a discount website) and did not specify this on the reservation confirmation email. Also, it does not say in either place that this rate was a discount, non-refundable rate. We have saved PDF copies of both the website and emails to prove this.

I have a huge issue with how they are positioning this rate and deposit as paying for the entire amount of a reservation 10 days before a reservation is not a deposit but actually a PrePaid Rate. That in my book is false advertising and not looking after customers. I am sure there are other customers who would accept those terms if properly communicated, but I am not one of them.

My BIG problem with this is that the market research we were scheduled to do at this boat show for a client has now been cancelled and we have been trying to cancel these reservations since March 1st. We know we have missed the deadline on the deposit and have told IHG customer service that we are willing to forego a normal deposit but that we can't agree to pay the entire amount of the reservation as a deposit since that was never communicated in writing when booking and especially in the confirmation email. They are trying to hold us to a contract term that never existed in writing to us.

After three attempts to call the hotel and speak to a manager (left voice messages for Adam the hotel manager with no returned phone calls), calls to the reservations escalations desk, and calls to my credit card billing team to ask what to do, we remain unresolved on this issue. I would love to cancel this reservation so that StayBridge Suites has a week to be able to go ahead and rent out these rooms, but have run out of ideas on how to bring this to completion and still pay a reasonable deposit. With a total price tag of over $2,800, this is large enough for us to fight legally if we have to. I really, really don't want to do that if we can resolve with other means.

Anyone on these forums have any ideas? I have been traveling for 18 years as a marketing executive and have never run across this problem before.

Scott