Well, this morning when I checked out at a Springhill, it was the GM who processed my 2 gift cards - 1 was the $50 gift from Marriott back in May, and the other one was a $200 physical gift card bought at a Ren with the AMEX offer.

This is a long and detailed report on how using a Marriott gift card can often an ordeal.

It took 4 times to get it right even though he apparently knew how to process gift cards, but it was the attempt to fix the automatic billing by the system to the AMEX card guaranteed that started all the issues...

Despite I had informed the hotel via chat before check in that I would pay the stay with gift card, and again when arrived the hotel to inform the lone FD employee (at 3:30PM so normal time) that I would like to pay with the gift card, and if possible, now. She refused, saying that would be better done at check out time "when management would be here, so things would not be messed up." I told her to make sure the folio is notated with gift card payment instead of the auto-billing on the guaranteed card, but I got the feeling something would actually already been messed up...

Yup, something was messed up. When I checked my emails in the morning, I saw the Folio email with the stay paid by the AMEX...

Went downstairs to have breakfast but first dropped by the counter requesting to talk to FD manager - the GM came out and asked what could he help...

Long story short, it took him 4 times to finally get it right - each time it generated an automatic email with the folio that was produced, including one he did not print out for me (the balance went to AMEX after the first gift card was applied), and one he did print out for me, showing the balance went to CASH, but he insisted all was set. Well, it was not because the 2nd gift card has NO reduction, due to he used CASH as payment form! When we was doing it the system actually prompted him to put in explanation as he mumbled about, "what? it wants me to explain..."

Then he swiped the physical card and tried to enter the amount but the system wont let him... (because he already used CASH as payment, so there was no balance on the Folio to pay!)

I actually did not notice the CASH payment because my focus was on the 2nd gift card balance - that wasn't right due to it remained in full value...

He felt embarrassed and bad about holding me up. He asked to make a photocopy of the physical gift card and wrote my room number on it, saying he would get it right one way or the other.

I myself dont feel comfortable on this, especially the gift card after payment, still has 75% value on it. So I suggested him to call Help Desk... He was about to, then asked me how much was the balance should have been left on the 2nd card after making payment... I told him what the balance should be, after the payment was applied.

Then he said, Oh, a Blue Light just went on! I knew what went wrong... After he finally get it done, he explained to me he kept seeing the balance I mentioned after he processed the physical gift card, but for whatever reason he was thinking it was the balance to CHARGE me, and he knew it was not right so he did not finalize the transaction, and kept using different "methods" he thought should charge the "correct amount" ... The first attempt made the payment gone to AMEX and he knew that was wrong so he did not print it out, but the automatic email sent it anyway - hence I saw that later on. The second attempt made the payment gone to CASH, and that of course was wrong but he did not realize it at all... He only saw the "correct payment" was applied and not to the AMEX...

Had I not insisted to get a copy of the gift card balance print out (they can do this but must be done before the Folio is printed), I would not notice the gift card balance shown was still full balance without any deduction...

We spent almost 20 min on sorting out this - the first invoice was generated at 8:51am before I went to have breakfast - I saw he used a partial value of the Marriott gift for payment, and moved the residual value to the physical Ren gift card. The folio returned to being open. We returned to FD to check out at about 9:45am - then went thru the "fun" as detailed above. The final, correct folio was generated at 10:10am.

At the end he said he would give me some extra points... did not mention how much, and I did not really care because part of the issues were caused by the automatic billing system that ran between 2am to 4am each night - that unless there was some manual handling or better yet, someone at the FD the afternoon / evening before, willing to process the gift card payments, none of this nonsense would happen. Somehow for him to reverse the CC payment after a folio was generated, he had to split the first $50 into 2 portions, an amount was to pay the folio, the remaining amount was to ADD the value to the second $200 physical gift card. Then he kept the folio opened, as in the sense of "not check out yet" until the actual check out... That was when all the "fun" started.

He also explained to me that even the 2am folio showed the whole payment went to AMEX, the billing would not be done until auditing which would be performed after physical check out (whether in person or after check out time and the guest not showed up to do the check out in person). Therefore he could reverse the method of payment. He reassured me the amount to AMEX on the folio was still authorization, despite they had already authorized a 50% higher amount of the room rate to the AMEX at check in time...

I expect the AMEX authorization would not become billing but nonetheless I set an alert on the pending amount done at check in... Meanwhile the gift card activities online show the entries he has done, and the remaining value of the gift card is correct. I have 4 folio pdf file with time stamp on each. The final one is the correct one and can be used for dispute should the AMEX is still billed...

Oh, at the end I did ask him the steps on how to process eGiftCard - but I am not really confident on such... given the SNAFU we went thru, and he is the GM. Although it seems to be a genuine mistake he made, confusing the amount of the gift card balance AFTER applying payment, as shown by the system, asking if to finalize, to the amount of payment charged to the gift card... It is unfathomable but it also sounds genuine mistake because as soon as I told him how much the residual value of the gift card should be, he immediately realized he had mistaken the amount being the payment to apply...

I do have his business card but hope I dont need to contact him...nor I expect any extra points from this... Let alone 100K

OTOH, may be I could email him for the "extra points" he promised if that does not come thru. lol.