hotturnip

This is ridiculous. The manner of booking should not affect this at all. I have many times had separate bookings like this, booked all different kinds of ways, and hotels simply checked me out and checked me right back in. There are actually two separate complaints here.

First, however, was there anything special about your original room? Was it a suite? A connector? Hotels rarely book specific room numbers, so "my same room is booked" makes no sense. It would have been booked the day before, when the clerk told you it was OK. Are you sure when you "chatted through the app" that you were actually talking to the hotel, and not Hilton.com?

The first complaint is that Hilton and/or the hotel went back on their promise to keep you in the same room, and gave you a completely bogus reason for doing so. The second complaint is that the manager had you store your belongings IN AN UNCLEANED GUEST ROOM! That is absurd. If he was concerned about security, he would have stored them at the bellstand or behind the desk.

I absolutely WOULD complain about this. The fact that the second night was booked through Priceline is irrelevant. None of this has anything to do with your Hilton status, which is all that is affected by the means of booking.

SfoNick

YES. Here is the screenshot. It’s very clean cut. The room was just a normal king room. The manager said that it was selected by a Diamond member during online check in. And that the incoming Diamond member had paid the Hilton rate, which is why I was booted.

notquiteaff

Ask Hilton to compensate you for the loss of your bottle of Zolgensma.

https://www.goodrx.com/healthcare-ac...e-drugs-period

Serviously, if stuff is missing, I would definitely ask the manager where that is, since it was removed for security reasons.

Centurion

You should of just asked for a price match with the front desk. Put yourself in their shoes and try and relate.

twitch76

Yeah… IMO, the manager is out of line. There is no guarantee that OLCI gives a guest their selected room, and the app makes that quite clear. I’ve been on the other side of this plenty (meaning that I’ve been the guestwho got reassigned to a different room, presumably because someone extended their stay in the room I selected. It stinks, but the incoming Diamond has no guarantee of that room.)

In your case, the hotel told you in writing that you could keep the room. They told the incoming guest that their room number is subject to change, They should have reassigned the incoming guest. It doesn’t matter what rate you booked. The added complexity of the dirty room and moving your personal stuff is just icing on the cake.

I’d ask for an apology from the manager, a one-night refund, and the cost of any product you can document that went missing. I’d push that with both Priceline and Hilton until you felt satisfied or that you’ve hit a brick wall.

Freetotravel

Yeah I think this was handled very badly by the hotel as well. Definitely your unpacked possessions should not be repacked without you being present - and the manager told you you would keep the room that’s why you were out late.

I tend to use the in-room safe for iPad, headset and passport or money if I have it. Not for going down to breakfast for 30 mins or so but for everything else. Thank you for posting because it will ensure I continue to do this.

Danny Martello

Please do complain! This was handled so badly, they need to learn a lesson. Thanks.

hotturnip

Thanks for answering my questions so quickly. This gives some extra background; the situation makes more sense now. This hotel manager just had a bad attitude. It's as if he wanted you to suffer. Power trip, and all that.

What time of day did this transpire? Unless it was in the afternoon, there's no reason not to move the incoming guest. Basically, you're a "stayover." In some states, it's illegal to make you get out of the room. The manager's comment about booking with Priceline is ridiculous. Sounds as if he is harking back to the early days of Priceline bidding, when many hotels would go out of their way to give Priceline guests the worst rooms. The New York Hilton was one of the worst offenders in this regard.

So your complaint should be something like: "I extended my stay by one day and was assured by the hotel staff that I could remain in the same room after coming to the desk to check out and check back in. When I did so, the hotel manager, [insert name], insisted that he would not, saying that an incoming guest had requested the room via online checkin, and that I would have to move simply because my extension was booked via an online travel agency. When I asked where to put my things during the day, he supposedly checked me in to another guest room, but the room, while unoccupied, had not been cleaned. I did as he asked, but upon returning to the room that evening, all my things had been removed from the room. The manager then said my belongings were removed "for my protection." [insert where your items were held] Upon recovering my belongings, several items were missing."

You might be able to edit that down further. Be as concise and specific as possible. Did you ask the manager to pay for the missing items?

mikebor

Put himself in their shoes? Are you serious? He has documented proof in a chat log that he would be able to keep his room! Then this manager ignores all of that so he can make a few extra dollars and then totally disrespects him by what he did to his belongings.

And you have the gall to tell this customer to put himself in their shoes?!?!?!

Right up there with one of the worst replies on Flyer Talk I've ever read and I've been a member since 2006. Just wow.

SfoNick

If I look it it from their perspective, I see unnecessarily inconveniencing one individual with no outright benefit given to another. It seemed punitive, like I was being punished for picking a cheaper rate. I just didn’t see the logic for paying $50 more per night to book through the Hilton app and get my Diamond benefits. Which at a garden inn, mostly consist of a $10 F&B credit. Even if I did book through the Hilton app, the reservation still would have been split, as work didn’t necessitate adding a second night until after I had booked the first night.

yeah so I came back from an appointment at around 10:00AM and thought it would be a good time to get the keys refreshed as I knew I would be gone for the rest of the day. Then, later when I came back and my stuff was gone was around 10:30 PM.

Thanks for all the great responses guys!!

I do have a new question though, if I had just not gone to get my keys refreshed, and left my stuff in the original room, would they just have figured out I had a reservation for the second night, or would they have similarly packed my things for me and removed them from the first room for this oh so important incoming Diamond?

dmarge18

Man, the amount of times I've not gotten the room I've checked into on the mobile app as a Diamond member...

twitch76

That’s a good question. I think any of us could only speculate at what this particular manager *would* have done… distinct from what we think he *should* have done.

I had a different question… what if you had not voluntarily gone back and packed/moved your things? What if you had simply said, “I’m sorry, but you told me I could keep this room and now I have planned my day around that promise. I don’t have time to go pack right now, and I’m not going to. You will have to figure out where to put that guest without my assistance, and I expect my room to be available when I return.”

I don’t know that I would have done that unless I really *did* have to be somewhere. And I’m not suggesting that it’s what you should have done. But you provided the path of least resistance by being a nice guest who was trying to be helpful. Instead of problem-solving, the manager took that path.

hotturnip

I was always told when I worked for Hyatt in Texas that state law prohibited throwing someone out of a hotel room. But in other states the hotel might very well have the right to toss the stuff.

:You do need to make an inventory of the missing items and formally request replacement/reimbursement from the hotel.

1mileman

I'd absolutely complain. Unless the guest specifically requests a specific room, you can certainly move whomever selected the room. As others have mentioned, online check in doesn't guarantee a specific room number. I'm not sure the manager handled it well. Either store your luggage and check you in when you get back or keep you in the same room. Either way, your luggage shouldn't be touched without your consent.

The Road Goes On Forever

IMHO, a property in a case like this (where a blatant mistake has been made) is usually going to bunker down and not respond to any calls, emails, etc. regarding the matter. Reaching out to Hilton is also likely to come to an instant dead end since from their point of view, this has nothing to do with them and they will route all inquiries back to the property. To them, this is between the individual and franchisee company XYZ.

Making an inventory of things is also probably not going to be good enough. Unless there is proof that said items are in your room with you, a property can just as easily say items ABC "weren't found" or "were never there" as you'll say they were there. A lot of properties have non-existent, non-recording or poor camera systems that would potentially never catch anything being moved or thrown away from a room.

I would imagine all states have an innkeeper law that dictates a set schedule for how long guests items must be kept for (i.e. 30, 60 or 90 days). After that time a property can throw things away or raffle them off to the staff without issue. Before that time, things are supposed to be logged and kept locked in a centralized area that has limited staff access. Does that always happen? Of course not, which if it doesn't, goes back to what I mentioned about the lack of quality on property recording equipment. As an example, at the HIS where I currently work, the entire building has three cameras. You can only see the front desk and maybe half-way down the two first floor hallways. None of the other four exterior entrances or other floors have anything on them. In an instance like the OP is describing, it's potentially beyond easy to throw away anything and then claim it was never there.

Also note that in some states, innkeeper laws (most of which are very pro-hotel and in some cases are very, very old as in over a century) limit a property's liability to laughably low amounts like $500 even if thousands of dollars of items go "missing". While anything is possible, I think the OP is going to have a tough road to get some kind of satisfaction/quality resolution from this situation.