simpleflyer

I think you (the OP, i.e. the hotel reviewer) may have used terms that didn't actually apply to your case. This may be part of your misunderstanding of the situation and your subsequent frustration.

First, although you speak of 'extending your stay' you didn't actually 'extend your stay', since that would involve changing the dates of your original reservation - say from one night in duration to two or whatever number of nights - and that can only be done prior to check in for that reservation. Had that been the situation, you might have a case for expecting a consistent room type throughout. However, there is no 'throughout'. Rather, you had three separate reservations, as in, three separate contracts. That you made them consecutively without physically removing your bags from the hotel in between each one, is irrelevant.

Again, contrary to what the Saturday morning desk clerk implied or what you understood, you had three different contracts. The terms in force for a given contract don't automatically follow for the next one, be it the terms you accept by virtue of your keying in your credit card number, or such optional freebies as may be your happy fortune to get when you actually check in. And notwithstanding what the Saturday morning desk clerk may have led you to believe, a reservation that begins Sunday night, does not start at breakfast Saturday morning, or even at breakfast Sunday morning, but at check in time for the Sunday night (14:00 or 15:00 or whatever is the hotel's policy for check in time, unless at their discretion they let one check in earlier than this.)

I agree that it would be better if desk clerks were consistent in what they relate to customers, and if it should happen that they contradict each other, the 'last one' in the line of clerks should note the fact and attempt to convey regret if somehow one of their colleagues confused you about hotel policy. That said, notwithstanding the Sunday clerk's apparent brusqueness in conveying to you the situation, you were not in a position to make demands as to why an optional, discretionary upgrade to contract terms that are awarded only at check in, should be awarded on the basis of a verbal 'contract' that you apparently came to think would somehow override, as a matter of customer right, what you agreed to when you keyed in your CC number for the third reservation.

The customer isn't always right, but they are ideally due politeness even and perhaps especially when they are being informed that someone at the hotel raised unrealistic expectations.

sonixgirl77

I've had to connect two consecutive stays before at HGI and other hilton properties and they should be treated as separate contracts and if they are down graded rooms, they should be grateful for the hotel to extend their stay echoing Simpleflyer's comment.

I am also a Diamond member and ran into a situation only once where the hilton corporate didn't show on at property. Although, at first, both the front desk and the hhonors customer service line didn't show the add-on day reservation, it eventually did and the whole thing was instantly resolved. I also experience consistent service and believe remaining calm and knowing that customer service (at any membership level) is good.

I also note that hilton is the most lgbt friendly of any hotel chain, however individuals are not and certain parts of the US should still be navigated with caution. I conduct a quick search of friendly neighborhoods, hotels, and activities and these results do factor into how we travel.

LondonElite

Lakeviewsteve

Why didn't the very very long post not mention the location of the hotel?

zombietooth

So this is what it has come to in this over-entitled country, when failure to get an upgrade constitutes a nightmare?

I remember a stay in an Indonesian hotel that had holes in the door so the mosquitos were after me all night (I bought some duct tape for my succeeding nights), and where prostitutes were knocking on the door until very late, and when I opened my door first thing in the morning, hawkers were on me like locusts, and they knew my name and lots of other personal information. Yes, that stay was a nightmare.

I suspect that there may have been some system gaming going on here that the front desk agent sussed-out. This could have led to acrimony, since gamers rarely go quietly when caught.

pinniped

HGI Iowa City is a good hotel. It's in a college town...a major university town, specifically...so if it has a pattern of LBGTQ-unfriendly behavior, that would get noticed fast. Not that I'd find this acceptable even at a Hampton Inn in rural Alabama, but I'd find it highly unlikely at a new, upscale (for its setting) hotel in a big college town.

I think there's more to this story than what the OP is providing. HGI's don't typically have a lot of suites, and stay patterns in college towns don't necessarily follow the norms of a city business hotel. Sounds to me like somebody booked the suite for the night they wanted to extend to, and Vickie got mad when they asked her to move.

InkUnderNails

All of management was at a funeral? One or two things that first came to my mind. If all management was at a funeral, it was probably someone everyone knew and the one at the desk was also grieving. Second, the person on the desk may have wanted to go to the funeral and drew short straw. The attitude may not have been the result of something the OP did but may have already been there and the OP brought it to the front.

It is still not an excuse, but sometimes grieving people are not rational.

simpleflyer

I went back and read this story one more time.

Although I have indicated I don't agree that the OP was due an upgrade on the third reservation despite a verbal assurance from an earlier clerk that this was a likely possibility, I do see that the third reservation clerk over reacted to the challenge to her authority. Dealing with frustrated or disappointed customers does not and should not normally involve a threat to have the customer forceably removed. It is part of the job. A threat to have someone removed should be made only for not just disappointed customers but ones who are abusive and threatening, especially if physically threatening which doesn't seem to be the case here.

In any event, the clerk was clearly very agitated, for reasons that are impossible to discern from the information given, although InkUnderNails has postulated an interesting theory. She could not seem to de-escalate the situation and calm down even after the OP and her partner indicated they would, in fact, be leaving.

Thinking about it, when one indicates one is going to speak to the manager, it is likely best to do so in a spirit of "since we cannot agree, let us see if your manager can help" rather than intimate the manager is going to be a means of punishment for a lapse in decorum. As I said earlier, staff ideally owe politeness even and perhaps especially when a customer is frustrated, but one way or another, someone needed to try and calm things down a bit.

darthbimmer

Perhaps 365RoadWarrior slipped when writing that phrase, but I read it to mean that s/he has never been upgraded to a suite at an HGI. That matches my own experience with HGIs.

scooternva

I'm going out on a limb here and am guessing most of the FT members participating in this thread are straight.

I'm not. And I almost immediately caught the gist of what (I think) Vickie was elliptically getting at--that the escalation of the desk clerk's behavior was rooted in homophobia. I may be jumping to conclusions here but I don't think so, because the scenario she describes is all too sickeningly familiar to me, because not only have I experienced it before myself, but I've also experienced it at an Iowa hotel (not this one, though... a property in Sioux City).

I wish Vickie would step in here and clarify some points in her story, but I'm inclined to believe what I've read here--especially if it's the story I think she's trying to tell.

zombietooth

Same here. I have over 1,500 lifetime nights with Hilton, the last 15 years as a Diamond, and I have never once been upgraded to a suite at a HGI. I am very suspicious how they got the first two nights upgraded-something smells here.

jeanie

Homophobia is very serious. But I think many of the responses here surround the word nightmare in the description. In my mind, a nightmare is an extremely negative major life event like the death of a family member, losing your home in a hurricane, extreme physical injuries, etc.

An argument with a desk clerk is really a first world problem. Calling it a nightmare seems a bit melodramatic. By being this bitter for so long, Vickie voluntarily gave that desk agent too much power.

Since the OP has not commented on this thread in a while, she probably won't now.

sstcobra

Bingo

sstcobra

Bingo

ozztraveller

To me a nightmare is a bad experience over a short period of time. Bit like peak hour traffic. What you describe would be more a tragedy.