nohbdy

First off, my question: Does anyone have a contact at the Banff Springs who can help remedy a situation?

Background: A little over a week ago, I booked a 3 night stay at the Banff Springs through Amex FHR. Amex FHR is running a promotion where you can stay 3 nights and get 1 free at the Banff Springs. My stay was booked within the terms of the promotion and my reservation details reflect the discount.

Today, I received the following e-mail:
Upon contacting the hotel and Amex FHR reservations, I have learned the hotel doesn't want to honor my rate because they are overbooked. Amex is fighting on my behalf because Fairmont is violating their contract with Amex FHR. However, Fairmont is refusing to honor the rate.

This is my first experience with Fairmont and I am downright shocked at the way they are treating a potential guest by refusing to honor the rate as booked and as indicated in the reservation details.

The rate isn't even all that great!

Jasper2009

Sorry to hear about your trouble - I�ve never any such issues.

Just to confirm I got the info right:

1) You made a booking through AMEX FHR booking a "3rd night free" offer and you received a confirmation e-mail / number
2) you didn�t do anything and the hotel contacted you by e-mail (above message)

If so, I�d be persistent. If you don�t have a confirmation number, you�re out of luck IMO.

I�d probably send a firm e-mail that you have a valid booking and expect that booking to be honored as booked.

If you continue to have issues, you could escalate the issue and send the general manager an e-mail (don�t have it here right now, but I�m sure another FTer has it).

Alternatively you could just stay at the hotel and dispute the bill at the end, if the hotel doesn�t give in you could try to dispute the charge with your CC company. I wouldn�t necessarily recommend this approach, but if the issue doesn�t get resolved and you�re not overly risk averse, this may be an interesting experience.

nohbdy

You got it exactly right. Since I have a confirmation # complete with the terms (for 3rd night free) showing in the reservation, I am pretty bewildered by the whole thing.

Still waiting to hear back from Amex.

Jasper2009

Indeed, that�s somewhat disturbing, even before having Plat status the hotel always agreed to honor any rates and didn�t charge me for things that may have been interpreted either way.

If AMEX doesn�t resolve the issue, I�d probably send an e-mail to the GM with the original e-mail and the confirmation e-mail attached telling him that:

- you have a 3rd night free booking with a written confirmation
- the res. team contacted you to let you know they don�t want to honor the rate despite the written confirmation
- you find this very disturbing / unacceptable etc.
- you tried to resolve the issue yourself, but the res. team still refuses to honor the res.
- express your confidence that he�ll resolve the issue to your full satisfaction and you�re looking forward to a pleasant stay without any further incidents (ok, the last part could be a little less sarcastic)

KSA_USA

I had nothing but excellent experience at this hotel. they are very professional. i remember one time i had to cancel a prepaid reservation ( none refundable). no problem whatsoever. it was a $600/night for 2 or 3 nights ( cant remember). initially i thought i was out of luck. i am glad that i phoned them and in a very professional way they agreed to cancel my reservation and process full refund to my credit card.

i highly doubt that you are going to encounter problems with your reservation. just ask to speak to a supervisor or the GM and i am sure you are going to be a happy guest.

fantastic property. I loved it.

Ancien Maestro

Since this is a third party reservation.. its Amex FHR problem and its' up to them to fix it..

Seems that you're booked in already (even though BSH is overbooked).. but unfortunatley you've got to work it out with Amex.

If you have the evidence (3rd night free).. I suggest that you print it out and carry with you to the hotel.. work it out if they try to charge you the 3rd night..

epost77

Who sent you the email conformation? AMEX or Fairmont? If it was AMEX they are on the hook to work this out. If you have a standard email conformation from Fairmont then it is their issue to resolve.

As mentioned in earlier posts be firm but polite and I'm confident Fairmont will resolve the issue to your satisfaction.

Enjoy The Springs...amazing place!

nohbdy

The e-mail about the problem with the rate was from Fairmont - the confirmation and reservation were made through Amex FHR.

I'm just now getting around to updating the thread. I'm not entirely sure what went on behind the scenes, but Amex contacted the hotel and got them to honor the rate. Amex told me that the hotel originally didn't want to honor the rate because they were full, but since the hotel had not blacked out any dates, they were going to honor it.

I got the name of the reservations manager at Fairmont who resolved the issue, so hopefully everything will work out.

I'm still puzzled and fail to understand why two high end establishments (Amex and Fairmont) would involve a customer in a capacity/rate dispute.

Ancien Maestro

Glad it was resolved.^

Amex (like virtuoso, expedia, hotels.com, google.. etc) are a third party reservation agent.. Third party reservations tend to have a bit more trouble with reservation communications having to go through third party channels first.. and then filtering down to the hotel.

The main thing is that you had a reservation confirmation.. keep this with you on your travels to Banff Springs.. It is a legal document outlining your contract.. keep it handy in case there is any additional miscommunication.

ABG

That isn't even remotely how it works.... "3rd Parties" make bookings directly into the Fairmont System. That's why the conf# are the same length of digits regardless if you book with Fairmont or a TA. This whole situation has more to do with Amex FHR's poor Customer Service than anything else, but glad it worked out for OP.