I would think that this depends on the rate and the rules of usage for that rate that Marriott and the company negotiated. If the hotel negotiates a rate and agrees that it will be only for its own employees, then that is the rules. If the company, its employees, its vendors, or customers have issues, then shouldn't they be talking to the company to negotiate a rate that all could use? (BTW, I have no idea what, if any, the difference in price, # of beds/nights, etc would be by negotiating employees only, versus others using a rate.)

Most of the time, prior to going to a customer site, the customer will volunteer what hotel(s) are nearby and at which of those the company has a rate.

I always make it clear at check-in. If I'm asked what company I'm with, I say, "I am with XYZ, which used to be part of LMN, but am here doing work with ABC." (Our travel and credit cards are still done by LMN's Travel and Credit office and we have permission to use their rates.) Usually, the only response I get is, "Do you need directions to ABC?" Nobody has ever questioned my use of their rate. My corporate credit card clearly says ABC on the front and LMN in small letters on the back.

Again, it would be in the company's best interest to have customers included, as more beds filled per year is more likely going to fulfill the contract quota and allow for as lower or lower rate next year. It is in the interest of the Marriott property to guard against more beds being filled so as to earn more money. Given that, though, I cannot see any company negotiating for only its own employees and not its customers, too.

Actually, per some past threads/posts by socrates, he mentioned that it can hurt the company's rate negotiations if they use up too many or too few rooms. If I remember his posts correctly he mentioned that since hotels have a fixed number of rooms, they don't want one company monopolizing too many of their rooms/night. Since I'm not an insider in this industry, I couldn't tell you which tends to be more limiting to companies, using too few a number of rooms or too many when they are re-negotiating rates. Maybe socrates can give us a hint on that.

The main point, though, is that hotels and companies negotiate those rates based on an estimated low end and high end usage number. If either of those turn out to be a bad estimate, then when re-negotiations occur, the rate will probably change as well. So its not always in the company's best interest to allow everyone to use their rates.

Or maybe interested parties can just search for the thread rather than re-hash it again in here....^

It actually depends on each specific hotel and how the agreement was negotiated

that is an assumption and more often than not an incorrect one

correct, having too many and too few rooms can cause a rate to increase because there is a fix amount of inventory available for sale each day

Not in the case of all corporate rates, for example my company (in Fortune 20) makes it a part of their negotiations that employees can use their corporate codes for leisure and business (applies to all the hotel chains, not just Marriott). Having said that, in the UK when travelling for leisure it is predictably cheaper not using the code at weekends, but during the week it is almost always cheaper.

lv

PS: In answer to the topic - I've never heard of anyone been busted (a few contractors I know have more 'flexibility' than me) - but I think I'd be a bit miffed if I had to pay a higher rate as my company rate code was full due to someone gaming the system - to be fair I'd be happy for Marriott to enforce this by making you use a validated company email address for any bookings, or else show ID at check-in every time.

Not all employees have company email addresses (company pays for every one you have and when they have employees assigned permanently to customer sites, they may not have an email address)

what do you do when you are making the reservation off site and can't get through on VPN?

what about contractors?

what about leisure?

what about going through a company travel agent?

I see you are all for slowing down the check in process. How often do you see people fumbling around for their license, wait till they have to have their company ID on them.

what about when you go offsite for training say and you don't carry your ID because you don't need it?

I think there is a happy medium between the two extreme. At any given hotel, certain codes produce substantial savings others do not. I suspect that codes belong to companies in which id is more likely to be the norm.

For example, asking to see a AAA card is pointless. Everyone has one and usually the savings isn't that great. I suspect relatively little abuse.

But if the hotel is near a major University or major corporation, that entity is more likely to have negotiated a substantial savings. As such, it is likely that their codes are more likely to be abused. Fortunately, those entities are also the most likely to issue identification, travel orders or have a travel office.

Therefore someone using that rate code should be more likely to be asked for identification that someone using a ubiquitious code like AAA.

Just my $0.02

This often times would not cover clients, vendors, and contractors, etc. that may be eligible to use the rate.

Sure it would. If the large entity has a travel office, it would book the travel on behalf of the clients, vendors, and contractors, etc. Alternatively, it could provide the clients, vendors, and contractors, etc. with documentation that would be acceptable to the hotel that you are eligible for the rate.

Wow. I deal with five clients a week in different cities through the country; three weeks each month. Under your scenario, I'd need to track down and call fifteen different travel departments a month, or 150+ per year. Plus I still have to go through my travel department to see if we have a better rate. Let's figure it takes me fifteen minutes to track down, stay on hold, complete each reservation with the customer's travel department and check my company's rate. You've just made hotel reservations into a 36 hour a year - or one complete work week - endeavor! About 2% of my time is now devoted to making hotel reservations. And that doesn't even include flight and car.

I'll stick with going to my company's travel tool, booking hotel, airline, and rental car in a three minute clip, then calling the Marriott reservation line once per month and, in a 20 minute call, going through all the reservations looking for client rates. If the hotel asks for proof - which they never have - I'll gladly pay the higher rate and follow up with a letter from the customer indicating I've been in the city on behalf of the customer.

I'd just drop this idea, its just not feasable in the least bit

look at the prior posters response and multiply that by thousands

most people (not FT'ers) don't want to go thru any more hassles than they already do, they are not going to do what you propose without a huge fight

back to the drawing board

You're both putting words in my mouth. If you check my posts, my point was that I would expect a hotel to check ID only when the corporate rate is substantially lower than the rate that everyone else is paying. So to suggest that you would have to go through these hoops for every or even most clients is simply not true.

In fact, Marriott has adopted a variant of my proposal with regards to the government rate. As that rate can be substantially cheaper than other rates, ID is often required. By comparison, I've been asked for my AAA card exactly once as far as I can remember, and I have yet to be asked for my ABA card at any hotel.

It is very reasonable that if a given rate code, such as the govt rate, is prone to abuse, then the guest should expect to provide proof of eligibility. However, if the rate code is not prone to abuse, the hotel should not make a big deal about it, particularly if the rate code permits contractors and other non-employees to use it.