ikwia

Recently, on 2 occasions at 2 separate hotels, I was erroneously charged a cancellation fee, despite cancelling before the cancellation cutoff. One of the hotels was focused on the fact that I was a frequent guest, and would waive the fee "as a courtesy" (which annoyed me because I was "entitled" to it being waived, having cancelled before the deadline). The other kept saying it was a "same day cancellation", which is true, but it was > 4 hours before the 6pm cancellation cutoff.

I haven't noted these issues with past cancellations. Is this a new trend? Or just bad luck?

3Cforme

It seems wise to save a PDF of confirmation with cancellation terms at time of booking.

One can imagine that different rate plans have different cancellation terms - corp codes with 6PM same-day, for example. Let's hope these are just innocent mistakes you experienced.

njcommodore

I was charged one erroneously about 2 months ago. Called the plat res line and they called the hotel to take care of it.

aaupgrade

Nor have I encountered issues with cancellations. Since you are LTP and PP the following probably couple paragraphs do not apply here, but I couldn't tell from the info you provided.

There is no 6 PM cancellation cutoff unless your reservation specifically states so as it did. I currently have 51 reservations, yet only two reservations, both African Pride 15 on Orange, say I may cancel until 6 PM on day of arrival. All the others say "You may cancel your reservation for no charge until 1 day before arrival" which is left open to interpretation IMO. I always cancel no later than the day before the cancellation date listed in my reservation confirmation.

See previous discussion on New Cancellation Policy.

If the hotel does not correct the situation to your satisfaction, call PP reservation phone number and if they can't help you have them connect you with Marriott Guest services; while they should have all of the reservation information, but be ready to email/fax them the reservation and cancellation email showing the cancellation terms and date and time the reservation was cancelled. Also, if these reservations were outside of your time zone, then the terms are dictated by the local time zone of the hotel where the reservations were made; but you undoubtedly know this.

Even with extensive travel we all screw up from time to time. I return from Vail to Fairfax over President's weekend most years and rent a weekend car at Enterprise. This past February I walked into Enterprise and to my surprise they did not have my reservation; after searching on my name they came discovered a reservation for March 17-20. Oops. I can travel the world without incident, but can't even rent a car correctly in my own neighborhood.

OU812

Glad OP got both No-Show charges resolved in their favor. Very few Marriotts still have a same day cancellation policy. As other posters mentioned, the timing of Marriott's one day prior to arrival cancellation policy is vague at best (is it prior to 11:59pm hotel time on Saturday for a Monday reservation, 4:00pm hotel time on Sunday for a Monday reservation, or some other arbitrary time picked by the hotel). Other chains spell out what time cancellation must occur one day prior to arrival in order to avoid no-show fees, not so with Marriott. As a platinum, I have cancelled a reservation as late as 5:30pm hotel time one day prior online, and while I have received the pop-up notification that cancellation may result in a fee being charged to my card, no such fee has ever appeared.

As Marriott's cancellation policies continue to slide further out (2 - 3 days in major cities, 7 - 14+ days at resorts), I wonder if Marriott will better define the time by which cancellation must occur.

Regards,

RIP...

Mr. Vker

I wish Marriott's website would "tighten up" the cancellation fee warning. There are times that I get the warning even though I am cancelling in time. I will then call to make sure I am not in error. In my mind, that warning should only appear if I will be assessed a penalty.

Kacee

+1
It's almost like they're trying to scare you into not canceling

No such issue with either Hyatt or Hilton, both of which are extremely clear on the time by which you must cancel.

joshua362

Absolutely. As with Marriott's T&C's for EVERYTHING from breakfast inclusion to late checkout and everything in between like cancellation policies. It's clear to me now that a single person with a legal & english degree is in charge of purposely writing vague T&C's in every corner of Marriott's website for maximum interpretation & flexibility. There can be no other reasonable explanation.

The smallest state

I got burnt with this once too. As was explained to me, it is 24 hours (or 72 hours, or whatever) before 3pm local time. I tried with the hotel and Marriott to wave it and no luck.

ikwia

Thanks for all of the comments. In my case, the reservations specified cancellation was allowed until 6pm day of arrival, so my > 4 hour cancellation had me cancelling around 130pm.

I was actually not aware that when it said cancellation was allowed until 1 day before arrival that you couldn't cancel ON the day before arrival. I will keep that in mind!

Hopefully these were just anomalies close in time, and not a trend. I'm optimistic I just had bad luck.

epi231

Last December, I cancelled an award reservation a couple hours after making it and well within the penalty-free cancellation period. I was charged one night's rate. I had to make three calls to the property (a JW Marriott) to sort it out, but they did not ask for any documentation other than the confirmation and cancellation numbers. Eventually, the charge was refunded. Still, very frustrating.

clarkef

I very confused. I have an upcoming reservation for July 6. The cancellation terms say the following

----------

Cancelling Your Reservation

You may cancel your reservation for no charge until July 4, 2017 (2 day[s] before arrival).

--------

Are you saying that the last day to cancel is July 3, 2017, three days before the trip?

aaupgrade

OK, I may have been wrong in my previous post, but for me I would rather not go through the hassle and err on the side of caution so I would personally cancel no later than the day before the cancellation date stated in my reservation confirmation.

My apologies for the inaccuracy of my previous post. I will go back and update my previous post to change my statement and provide a link to the previous discussion where others can make their own conclusions.

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/marri...on-policy.html

sig05

Just change the date of the reservation, then cancel for no penalty. I've done this a few times.

Often1

Keep the email confirmation which will show the cancellation policy and then keep any cancellation or modiification emails.

If the property does not make it right with one call, I simply initiate a chargeback and provide both documents. I have never experienced an unfair denial.