April 25, 2006
THE MIDDLE SEAT
By SCOTT MCCARTNEY
The Wall Street Journal

When a Fare Is Too Good to Be True

Whether Booking Errors
Will Be Honored Depends
On the Firm and Fine Print
April 25, 2006 Page D5

Earlier this month Alitalia sold business-class seats across the Atlantic for $66 round-trip, an incredible bargain compared with the regular fare of more than $5,000. Just last week, Marriott was offering a Times Square hotel for $24.90 a night, one decimal place off what was supposed to be a $249-a-night rate.

Alitalia honored 509 reservations to Cypress at the mistaken price via travel agents and online services; Marriott (which sold the rooms off its own site and elsewhere) reneged, upping the price even though it offers a "best rate guarantee" on "all guestroom reservations."

[snip]

Marriott International Inc. says its mistake of posting a $24.90 rate in reservation systems, including its own Web site, for the Residence Inn at Times Square was an obvious error, so the company corrected it.

[snip]

Once mistakes do happen, the track record of hotels is mixed. Last year, an Amerisuites hotel in Charlotte, N.C., offered rooms at a penny per night. A computer mistake allowed customers to book the hotel's internal "complimentary rate." Amerisuites, a unit of Hyatt Corp., honored the rate, including the free breakfast.

Expedia found itself mistakenly offering rooms at two Hilton hotels in Japan for $3 a night last November instead of $300 a night. Expedia said Hilton honored reservations made for stays in November but not in later months.

Earlier this month, Travelocity offered executive rooms at the Hilton Osaka in Japan for about $3 a night. The error resulted from incorrect currency conversion at Travelocity's Web site, a spokesman said. Customers pounced, some posting on FlyerTalk that they booked rooms for the rest of the year since the rate was far cheaper than rent in Osaka.

Travelocity did honor $51 airline tickets to Fiji last year and says in its guarantee that "in those rare cases that we make a mistake you can count on us to take responsibility for it." But Dan Toporek, a Travelocity spokesman, says its guarantee didn't apply in the Osaka case because that fare was displayed correctly to buyers twice and incorrectly once. "The policy really is on a case-by-case basis," said Mr. Toporek. "The spirit of the guarantee really has more to do with making sure people have a great travel experience."

Write to Scott McCartney at [email protected]

URL for this article: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB114591737970234543.html

I understood posting whole articles against FT TOS?

There is another discussion underway on said article on MR forum.

As it relates to the brief mention of Marriott, please note that the term OP used in thread title not mentioned in the article itself as far as I could see after several read throughs.

Actually, the discussion is underway in the hotel deals subforum http://www.flyertalk.com/forums/showthread.php?t=545937
SPECIFICALLY about Marriott and this property. It does relate to Marriott and not mentioned in the article, Travelocity is honoring the rate at the Residence Inn Times Square.

Take the title as tongue and cheek as the word honorable is in quotes.

This is why travel agencies and travel travel related companies purchase E&O insurance to cover errors and omissions. This does not sound characteristic of the Marriott I know, and it is really a mistake for the RI not to honor rates posted on their web site. Someone, and I would guess it is at the actual property level, is more worried about his/her E&O insurance premiums going up than honoring reservations made on their web site. A bad will move IMO.

any other complaints

Yeah, newbies.

There's an interplay of Interstate Hotel and Marriott's customer service policies and philosophies brought to light by this rate issue which may be of interest to Marriott customers. I know it got my interest, not by the decisions which were made, but how they were promulgated to the customers. It bears scrutiny, IMO.

Pat

I find these errors to be fascinating. The internet now makes typographical errors into very serious problems. And, while the companies have been less than adept at dealing with these issues, what about the lack of ethics among those who book these rates, knowing they are errors, and then whine and complain about how they are treated?

[HINT: When do you "know" it is an errror? When you book it and don't feel good about calling the hotel/airline at that instant to say "Hey, I just found an amazing rate. Would you please check for me to find out if that is a mistake or a real promotional rate?"]

From my reading of the thread, I can see both sides of the dispute as to the incorrect and very low room rate for the RI Times Square posted on marriott.com and other travel sites such as Travelocity. What is somewhat surprising and seemingly outside the Marriott culture is the response of some Marriott individuals to queries reported in the thread, assuming of course, that the reports are accurate. The cited rudeness and ridicule seems way beyond the pale, especially for a company most of us admire. Regardless of what the outcome of the dispute is, I hope and believe Marriott will take a close look at the way the affair was handled.

I have three re-confirmations from Travelocity at the IC Yokohama for 2.72/nt, including one from a CSR supervisor. I even specifically pointed out issues with both the rate and cancellation policy. Yet, they allowed this error to go on for three more months, including compensating a FT'er for traveling on it.

Marriott Shanghai had a similar rate issue a while back and most reservations ended up being cancelled, but not *until* after prompt and profuse apologies from both Marriott and the property, in marked contrast to how this situation is being handled. A company's mettle is tested when things don't go smoothly, and I'm seeing surprises here. I still think, based on my past experiences at Interstate owned/operated hotels across the brands, that they have something to do with it.

Pat

I've traveled on lots of amazing rates in the past, and I've never once thought about calling the airline or hotel. (Besides, if you don't have access to an elite-status line, what are the odds that you can even get an agent on the line without a long hold?)

The only one I think is unethical to pursue is the one about the internal rate. At least with Marriott, you can log in and few lots of zero-rated rooms. The rate rules always specify what the rate is for - usually some sort of certificate stay. It's clear that the guest isn't to book it and expect a free room.

But for a Travelocity hotel booking or any type of airline booking, if I see a rate there, I'm going to assume that it is there on purpose. After all, if the "mistake" happens once, they I might believe it's a mistake. Bad software testing or whatever. If it happens twice, then it's no longer a mistake. If I ever get lucky enough to find one of those Ryanair zero fares, why should the burden be on me to call them and double-check that their software is functioning correctly? (And if I do, will they even answer the phone?)

I believe that tcook052 referencing TOS is a valid comment.

Take it as a heads up observation

This is a sales manager at the hotel trying to save their job IMO. Plain and simple... they messed up and don't want to get fired. It's Times Square, sadly, the hotel will be able to resell the rooms we booked at a higher rate with little difficulty.

If I were the GM, I'd can that sales manager over the WSJ article and offer apologies to those whose reservations were cancelled and agree to honor them (if it doesn't create a gross overbooking).

No way to tell the errors apart. You have companies giving 99 cent promotions. So who knows which are promotions and which are errors. If they post it on their sites they should live up to it. If anything, take it out of the salary of the person responsible for making the updates. Things like a decimal point being off is due to carelessness. Someone has to pay the piper. After the first time they mess up and get there salary docked, I doubt you will ever seem them make another mistake in the future.

No way, Tfong007! People are human & should not be expected to forfeit years of salary.

I agree partly with Sbrower that it is unethical to exploit an obvious error & try to hold the company bound. However, if it is an error, the company has a duty to cancel fairly quickly, not months later, & to reimburse the customer for any expenses caused, such as airline penalties.
A few years ago I booked a rate of C$0 a night at the Delta of Whistler, BC, in April for July. I even got a confo e-mail! In June I checked my res & found that they had changed my rate to $179 a night without notifying me! So I called CS to let them know & to cancel, for I ended up not needing to go.