I just stayed at the Marriott Marina in San Diego. $268 a night for a business trip. The reservation was for 3 nights but I finished up my business on the 2nd day and presented myself for checkout bright and early on the third day (6:30am) and was hit with the "Extra night room and tax and energy surcharge" for early departure. I was livid, but they would not relent. They complained about losing the revenue on the room while I was listening to the girl at the next space on the counter on the phone telling someone that "we are all sold out tonight"! As a business traveller, my plans are always changing and the Marriott will no longer be an option for me. I will attempt to get American Express One, our travel booking company, to drop Marriott.
The thing that is annoying about this is that on the front end of your stay, with a gauranteed reservation, you have until 4pm to call and cancel without getting charged. Why is 6am not enough notice for a checkout?
Also, why an energy surcharge on the extra night if the room will be empty of me.
I have no doubt that in busy San Diego, that room will be booked again tonight with double revenue for the hotel. This sucks.

Carefully and clearly explain this in a letter to marriott.... in the meantime a notice to AMEX, Protest the amount on your bill, if nothing else, you will have the satisfaction of tying up the money for around sixty days.

I will bet that Marriott comes through....

Clearly, the answer is to split your bookings in future into single nights so that any future ones can be cancelled at short notice. If enough people did this, I suspect they'd drop the stupid charges, or drown under their own paperwork.

This seems to be now typical policy at most Marriotts. It's a good way for them to piss off the few business traveller's they have left during this economic slowdown.

I know that my corporate travel dept says they only use hotels that DON'T charge an early departure fee. Correspondingly, the list of Marriotts has dropped.. tho one I went to, still on the list, told me there was still an early departure fee. Didn't have to leave early, so don't know what would have happened when my travel dept clashed with that hotel and they lost a very lucrative $200/night contract which I'm sure is used for at least several dozen rooms a night..

I knew that resorts sometimes charge for early departures because it is less likely that they will fill a last minute vacancy but have never experienced a city hotel doing this...not a good trend.

Yeah, anytime a hotel that has a same day cancel policy tries this on me I tell them to revise my reservation into three seperate one night stays. They try telling me I'll need to check out, and back in, and I just say "fine" - but never do. Sometimes they leave me a message asking if I'm checking out - and I'll call them back and say no - I have a reservation for another night!

Glasair: I had a similar experience at the Miami airport Marriott about 2 years ago. I did not argue with the agent. I simply took her name etc., and upon my return to Toronto, wrote marriott a letter and in about 1 week I received credit for the etra day charge.

Who's charging the early cancellation fee and who isn't?

Ii don't understand the following logic: you can cancel your entire room w/o penalty by 6 pm on the day of arrival, but check and and decide to leave a day early and you are charged?

I had this happen to me at the Biscayne Bay Marriott recently. It was 9 pm and too late to go elsewhere, so I relented. But this is the exact reason I stopped staying at Hilton way back in 1996 and I will not hesitate to drop Marriott as well. Plus the annoying energy surcharge, the charge for 800 calls, and it's time for a change.
Paul

I too had to break my 3-day reservation into 3 single night reservations. When the hotel questioned me, I explained that I wasn't sure if I would need the final night and wasn't going to give in to their penalty. I also casually mentioned that better they deal with paperwork than me.
Interesting though that the reservation confirmation I received via email (I booked online) never mentions any indication of early departure or energy surcharge (San Diego hotel). Wondering if I could use that confirmation as validation of they did not inform me of their penalty fees?

I think (by memory) that this policy is disclosed at check-in. At that time you can still tell them you will take less nights than you have reserved. But not, supposedly, after you check in.

Unfortunately, Starwood seems to have started using this practice in the past week or so. They are beginning with their corporate owned hotels and suggesting the franchisees follow along. It really seems the best way to avoid this is to make reservations for each day of your potential stay. This strategy appears to be driving the Starwood properties crazy.

Evenn that may not help. I once made two consecutive reservations at the Westin Edmonton (by mistake), and they combined them without telling me!

In most hotels where I've seen the policy in effect, once you give them 24 hours notice they will not charge you. There is usually no need to tell them at check-in.