dcchi

Thinking about booking a room for the first time in a long time (for a room in Iowa, if that matters), and there is this banner warning:

Customers should review government guidance to confirm eligibility to travel & stay at hotel. See travelguidance.marriott.com. Reservations will not be honored where prohibited.

Is this a stock warning for all reservations now? Has anyone actually been denied a room based on this? Or, is it just Marriott's CYA standard banner warning these days?

I clicked through to the underlying website(s) and can't see anything seemingly clear/useful (or, more importantly, that seems to prohibit things).

Any experiences/thoughts?
Thanks.
Customer

Mr. Vker

It is a stock warning on every reservation. No idea if anyone has been denied check in.

aaupgrade

In most cases if there are state, county or country restrictions and as a result hotels in the respective area may well be closed or may be closed due to not enough business due to those restrictions. This being the case for all but two hotels in Vail/Beaver Creek Colorado for the next couple weeks. On May 25 Eagle county went to their current Transition Trail Map “Blue” phase (ski trail designation for their Covid phase - how cute <sarcasm> yet doesn't anticipate many visitors as their summer season really doesn't get into full swing in a normal year until the end of June and ALSO they have cancelled many of the events that bring visitors in for June like Lacrosse Shoot Out, GoPro Games and other events. They are hoping to go to "Black Diamond" phase on June 25. But still large events like the Bravo Vail concert series, Ride the Rockies bike race, and others have been canceled this year. Vail has not yet posted a summer schedule for the gondolas or Adventure Ridge.

Probably more information than you needed but it gives you a good idea what any tourist spot is probably dealing with. Hotels in cities around the world are experiencing closures too. See this thread for discussion and more info: Temporary closure of HOTELS due to Covid-19

Keep in mind if you're traveling internationally that Americans are the coronavirus pariah right now. Hopefully that may change once we get our infection rates down. So some countries will ban US travelers, similar to what Japan and Canada (non-essential) are right now. Needless to say knowing what's happening in your planned destination is a given and what all experienced FTers would do even without a pandemic. This is just another checklist item.

BmanCCP

I have been in S. Florida since March and have had to produce a letter to enable check in in Broward County. They would not honor my reservation if I did not produce a letter. Verified "essential" workers only. During my 3 month stay so far I have only seen Southwest Airlines Flight crews.

mpw81

I got this while booking a reservation in Aspen this weekend as well even though Aspen essentially re-opened today. I feel like I clicked through and it sent me to the CO state Covid website, but can't remember.

While it's mud season, as aaupgrade mentioned upthread, I'm curious what Aspen will be like this weekend. It's a notoriously dead couple of weeks in the mountains, but I could see a ton of people getting out of the city. Nothing about my interaction with the W so far leads me to believe it's going to be anything but a slower than normal late spring weekend in Aspen or Vail. Looking forward to reporting back. We are only staying at the W because all the options we'd usually pick for our anniversary weekend are closed or don't seem enjoyable with restrictions. We had a Broadmoor Cloud camp reservation from 8 months ago, that got cancelled, looked at Dunton Hot Springs (open but too far from DEN for a short weekend), Four Seasons Vail, LIttle Nell, StR.... all closed for a few more weeks.

Dublin_rfk

I would call this a simple CYA especially how local fiefdoms tend to change their requirements more than their undergarments.
I've seen the warning and asked at each place I've stayed. Residence Inns, Courtyards, Fairfield Inns, Autographs, Full Marriotts in 9 different states, Early on none of the hotel staff knew anything about the caution note now they mostly just shrug and say that they don't require them. I do have and carry certifications when traveling on business and I have yet to be asked for them.

aaupgrade

I'll be curious to hear your feedback. While I'm in DC right now I talk to a Vail neighbor regularly and did so last Saturday. He splits his time between Denver and Vail, and had driven up from Denver on Friday and said traffic was heavy with front range folks heading to the mountains. FWIW, I head back to Vail at the beginning of July to escape the mid-Atlantic heat and humidity until the end of August. I did read Vail Resorts notice this morning which said they are taking reservations for stays starting June 19 for their managed properties which include the Vail Marriott, but they also said that the June 19 date was subject to change.

cmculp

What would be helpful is some mention on the hotel site of what was available and what was not. It’s a given that the gym is closed. restaurant open? Lounge?

instead just an unhelpful boilerplate.

Kacee

Marriott is also especially bad about providing updated information on property websites. Basically they don't. You have to contact each property individually to find out what's available. Overall, I've found the independents are handling this best.

knownothing

Hilton Head Bonvoy's did for people from "high risk" area (eg NYC) per Governor's orders

knownothing

a. I think if changes day to day
b. I believe ALL gyms are closed (at least they were at various high > low end hotels)
c. All buffets are closed
d Some restaurants are opening based on state requirements

miloworld

I think the banner sets to remind you to check if you're able to travel to the city under travel restrictions. Many countries are still denying entry to visitors or require a mandatory quarantine at designated hotels/campus/hospital. Meaning your reservation may be useless even if you are able to fly there.

MSPeconomist

OP seems to be a Chicago, Illinois resident going to Iowa. AFAIK Iowa is open but there might be restrictions on people coming from Chicago as it's currently somewhat of a hot spot.

In the coronavirus travel forum, there's a thread on restrictions on travel within the USA, but I'm not convinced that there's any complete and current list of such restrictions, either on FT or in a USAToday article that some people are citing. In particular, ND/SD don't seem to be listed, yet at east one of these states did have restrictions and also further restricted access by checkpoints on the road to even drive through certain Indian reservations on state/federal highways, but the governor claimed that the checkpoints were illegal; I don't know the outcome of this dispute. [AZ and NM would have similar/stronger restrictions for Navaho reservation land, where there have been reports of 57 hour weekend curfews allowing no movement whatsoever except for medical emergencies.]

365RoadWarrior

I'm curious about any other experiences. I completely understand following the rules in the destination - masks, businesses closed and so forth. It seems unlikely that a hotel in New York would care whether you were supposed to be sheltered in place at your home, say in Arkansas. My situation - no home - would make this complicated. I'm an independent contractor in an essential industry, heading to a locale where I have many contacts where I hope to find work. That locale does permit gatherings up to 10 people and the things I need are available, business-wise. But what might a hotel ask me for?

writerguyfl

Independent hotels directly control their own websites. Hotels that belong to hotel groups like Marriott do not have the ability to change their websites without doing it through the chain.

Here's an explanation I gave in the Hilton forum on how the process works and why it isn't easy to change:
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Granted I never worked at a Hilton, but where I did work the announcement banner thing that you mention here isn't something handled by the individual hotels. When needed, the hotel would submit the information to a specific department at Corporate and those people would handle setting up the banner.

It's a perfect system for things like renovations. By funneling it through Corporate, the language used between different properties gets standardized. Plus, clear communication via written text isn't a skill that all hotel employees posses.

In my former hotel group, all changes to the text of the hotel's web page were also handled by Corporate. Although, major changes also had to be approved by the Marketing Department. Those folks would go through the text and add the current advertising catch phrase (or ensure the competitor's phrase isn't being used).

Hotel chains also use this system to ensure that a single hotel employee can't publish something on the hotel web page that might go viral (for the wrong reason). It also stops a rogue employee from defacing the web page if she or he believes that a pink slip is coming.

Basically, that's a long-winded explanation of why individual hotels can't use their own web pages to quickly update fast-changing information. It's a system that works exceptionally well during "normal" times. During a pandemic...not so much.

TL;DR: Call the hotel if you want accurate information about amenities/services during a pandemic.