A few comments on my recent stay at the Sofitel New York. I booked 3 nights using Ovation Reward Certificates I had purchased in a charity option. In case you are not familiar with it Ovation Rewards was a program started by Fairmont and continued by Accor designed for corporate recognition, rewards and incentive programs. A certificate entitles you to one nights hotel in the room category on the certificate with breakfast and includes all fees and taxes. I made my reservation through the Ovation reservation number listed in the certificates which is a call center based in New Brunswick staffed by former Fairmont people. Upon check in no problems and I went up to my room and received a small Platinum welcome amenity consisting of a note, some candies and cookies and a bottle of Evian water. A little while later I received a call from the manager saying that the reservation had not been made properly and he could not accept the certificates for the room and the charge would be approximately $3,000 (...!). I had a copy of my confirmation which I showed to him and stated that the amount owing to be paid at the hotel was $0. After a discussion he advised me that I should phone Accor and tell them what had happened and explain that the booking was not made properly and that it was booked as a Flex rate and that no rooms were available for Ovation Rewards. I queried as to why this was my problem and not his but I agreed to phone Accor and explain what happened. I phoned the call center in New Brunswick and explained what had happened and they connected me to someone in Accor Customer Care who said that they would look after it. I received a phone call an hour or so later saying that everything was looked after, followed by an email confirming it and asking me to reply if there were any problems. The next morning I went for breakfast and was told it was not included and this required another discussion with the front desk and the manager on duty to rectify this and I was told breakfast would be noted to be included for the rest of my stay. Well, the same thing happened the next morning and on the third morning I was also initially rejected but the maître d remembered the last 2 days and he said he would look after it. I decided that I should check my credit card online and noticed that there were 3 holds on it from the hotel aggregating about $2700. I let Accor customer care know and they said I should try and sort it out with the manager so I spoke to the front desk who assured me that they were only holds and they would be lifted. The next morning after breakfast I decided that I should take my account down to zero before checking out later that morning. Sure enough I was presented with a bill for about $1800. I was told that the Ovation Reward Certificates would only cover a portion of the room charges. Again a manager was called and after discussion and showing him my confirmation and the Ovation terms and conditions from the website he agreed to take off the room charges, taxes and fees leaving only my charges for dinner one night in the restaurant. Phew! Over my 3 day stay I ended up spending hours with the front desk, management and Accor customer care to remedy this. Other than that, the stay was fine. Room was in good shape, comfortable and the staff were by and large great and breakfast was also good.