MSPeconomist

$500 would be a lot to pay for smoking in a single n nonsmoking hotel room. At hotels that post their fees, I tend to see penalties in the $200-300 range.

TheChallenge

Accused of emptying a minibar, damage to a bathroom, and damage to a television. The damage to the television was preexisting when I entered the room.

I also take videos on arrival as well. However, I also use the arrival room videos for work as a comparison shop since I do hotel consulting so it isn't really isn't difficult for me to do an exit video as well on my iPhone.

ckendall

http://www.starwoodhotels.com/westin...language=en_US

Please note that, in keeping with our Breathe Westin™ initiative, a $250 cleaning fee will be applied to any guest room folio if smoking takes place in a guest room.

Dr. HFH

Did you report the TV damage when you discovered it? That would take care of that part of the problem.

Does the door closing mechanism work properly? If not, then obviously that opens up other possibilities. Emptying minibar? Damage to bathroom? I wouldn't rule out a disgruntled employee. Are there surveillance cameras in the hallway? Emptying the minibar would take some type of container to carry the stuff.

Triley

Stayed at a Radisson in Canada that posted their fee at $600.

Sam P. Goodman

Smoked two cigarettes?

If a hotel charged me $500 for damage I didn't cause, I'd at least want to go back and cause $500 in damage so I could get my money's worth.

RogerD408

I once got a followup billing for movies after I left the hotel. The GM was on vacation and it took over a week to reach someone that could do something about it. Fortunately I had a gas station receipt out of town shortly after I checked out and before the movies were ordered.

I suggested that maybe someone entered as housekeeping was cleaning rooms on the floor. They had a habit of using the flip lock to prop open doors for rooms they were in the process of cleaning but not always in the room. My guess was the supervisor would check the rooms and those that were vacant would be propped open. The GM said they never do that... But he did reverse the charge since I could prove I wasn't at the property.

My next stop at that property I noticed the doors propped open. When I got to the front desk and asked for the GM, introduced myself, and asked if he would take a walk with me. Surprise!!! Several rooms were propped open and no staff anywhere to be found, not even a cart. My guess is procedures changed that day! Haven't seen it since.

Good luck getting this resolved.

iflyjetz

Three times? I've stayed in hotels at least 2000 nights over the last 15 years and the only false charges I've had is food once or twice, and that was quickly traced to another guest. I've never been billed for room damages.

david55

Well it's been almost 24 hours w/o a reply from the OP in follow-up to our queries. Which makes me think there is something not quite right about the story.

TheChallenge

I did report television damage, however it was never fixed during my stay. After checkout, everybody seemed to forget that I had reported the damage until I forwarded the before and after videos.

The empty minibar ended up being employee theft. The minibar employee was stealing, and billing it to individual rooms to cover it up.

The bathroom damage I never ended up finding out, but there basically was significant damage to some of the shower tiles.

I guess it's just bad luck then on my part.

Dr. HFH

Interesting. How did they find out?

Rock72

seems awfully stupid for the employee to do that. i suppose if he/she was stealing a few dollars here and there it would take a long time to get caught but emptying out the entire minibar?

iflyjetz

I'd go with bad luck on your part. I don't recall reading many previous posts here about being falsely charged for room charges - it's a rarity. Or perhaps something that most don't notice.

The minbar thefts are bizarre because the retail value of that stuff is much less than a guest is charged. And will eventually get noticed.

Flews

Two pages into this and the OP seems to have left us wanting for details.

I'd like to know what the damages were, what the property/corporate are saying to back up digging in their heals, and who/how many were in the room in addition to the OP?

Hard to give the OP feedback when we really don't know the whole story.

Cheers,

sbtinme

I dare say you are quite possibly the only human on the planet who can make this claim. Like the gentleman above me, I've been at this game for decades and can only remember two significant billing issues (one very much not in my favor, the other very much in my favor. Both took numerous conversations, but both resolved in the end). 2 issues over about 30 years doesn't keep me awake nights.