When it comes to hotel cancelation policies, this is one of the most outrageous things I’ve ever seen.
Continue reading: The St. Regis Aspen’s Unconscionable Cancelation Policy
Share your questions, experiences, and thoughts below.
Good hotels go bad, and bad hotels go out of business or change their policies.
Don't patronize them. I wouldn't.
For me this is one of these cases where government regulation should exist: you bought a product (X number of nights in an hotel), whether you decide to use it's up to you. The cost to the hotel for you not using the rooms is negative, i.e. they save money, so there is no reason why they should be allowed to charge you anything extra besides what you've already paid.
I believe that all Bonvoy properties have a cash penalty in case of late cancellation of a reward reservation and at many of them the cash rate is equal to the rack rate which can be absurdly high. It is not limited to just this hotel.
All the complaining about Marriott is getting really old. The new Marriott sucks big time. The travel blogosphere has provided a ton of data points to demonstrate just how terrible it is. We all get it.
Rather than constantly complain, just vote with your wallet, stop patronizing them, and leave it at that.
That really makes no sense. You've already paid for the room with your points. How can they justify charging you on top of that? I'd say a boycott is in order. Contact Chris Elliott (the travel consumer advocate). This seems like the sort of case he'd love to take on.
Whitest post I've read in awhile... Bravo!
#FirstWorldProblems and frankly, the whiny, elitist tone of this post makes me not really care.
What’s the logic behind charging someone more money (in addition to the agreed rate) when they don’t use the room?
As mentioned above, it seems like it costs them nothing (maybe minor admin inconvenience?) but at least saves some on usage expenses? Is it purely punitive? why?
@ Benjamin @ Jack -- I'm curious if you'd feel differently if we were talking about a hotel that cost 10,000 points or $70 per night. Would you be okay with them double charging?
Below I’m paying the cancellation policy I revived for my reservation this summer. The second paragraph implies that if you are charged this, you can email them and have the cash refunded and only forfeit the points.
Cancellation Details
If you cancel before 04:00 PM hotel time on Tuesday, 04 June 2019 there will be no forfeiture amount.
If you cancel after 04:00 PM hotel time on Tuesday, 04 June 2019 the forfeiture amount will be USD 7,798.50.
There may be additional applicable charges and taxes.
If a no-show / cancel charge is incurred, SPG members may request to switch the charge to a forfeiture of applicable Starpoints by e-mailing their request to [email protected] no later than 60 days from the reservation arrival date.
If the $1,000 cancellation penalty isn’t disclosed at the time you make the reservation either on screen or through the link to the hotel website, the hotel can’t legally charge the penalty. I would file a complaint with the FTC about this unfair trade practice.
I agree this policy sucks but from what I understand they return the points from the canceled night.
So, old SPG hotels would take the points as payment for a missed/canceled night like this .I assume SPG would pay the hotel the contracted amount ; I think Bonvoy returns the points and the hotel receives zero compensation
So once more a customer unfriendly Bonvoy policy
@ Mattt -- Unfortunately I think the logic is simply "because they can." On some level I think they think they're missing out on ancillary revenue if you're not actually there, though I question to what extent that's true in Aspen, given how many great restaurants and bars there are nearby.
@ Flyingdoctorwu -- What makes you think they return points for the canceled night? That's not something I've seen anywhere.
So are you putting your money where your mouth is on this, Lucky? Did you cancel your reservation for next winter?
$1,000 is probably a compensation figure they came up with for you not being there to spend money on various hotel amenities/restaurants (baseline assumption that you buy 10 drinks per person, 4 meals and 3 hours of spa activities per day). They lose on ancillary revenue here. Airlines are much more regulated in this space but would probably charge a similar fee if they could, especially ULCC’s that rely on ancillary fees.
This is something that needs to be addressed before it gets out of hand and turns into resort fees.
I had my flight to nyc cancelled last year - booked two nights at the park Hyatt using points.
The front desk manager simply had me email a screenshot of the flight cancellation and my boarding pass. Refunded the entire amount of points immediately and I made a new one night booking.
What a difference between management companies!
OH come on, people. This isn't just a first world problem - this is about outrageous, unethical, possibly illegal price gouging of consumers who have paid for something at one price and then get hit up with a change in the T&C's that effectively changes the price.
ALL businesses, whomever their customer base, should be called out for this kind of crap.
My understanding if you cancel is you get the points back. So you pay $5000 for a 5 night stay and get the points back. I’d recommending emailing the GM / Revenue manager to confirm this.
Of course this 1 night late situation is crazy and I wonder if it is allowed per Marriott policy. Additionally a one night no show is different from cancellation and therefore that was never communicated
@lucky i think you are incorrect in that the hotel would actually refund you the points. Its something that happens a lot in the bonvoy program. Had this happen to me at edition miami
@Lucky - agree this policy is outrageous. Staying there next week and was even sent an email a week after booking (months ago) warning me of the cancellation policy.
They’re not the only ones - St Regis Deer Valley does the same damn thing. Unbelievable.
@lucky so just to be clear they would only penalize you at the $ amount. There is no double penalty. Still outrageous obvioussly
I'd contest the charge on my credit card and let the hotel fight with my card issuer, especially given the 12:30pm arrival the next day.
As a hotelier myself, this policy makes absolutely no sense. The hotel has already received the revenue for the no show night in points. The double charge is absolutely unnecessary. My hotel will charge for a no-show (ie the rate agreed in the confirmation if not already prepaid) but certainly don’t penalize guests for not showing up with extra fees.
I can’t imagine how many potential guests they lose with this policy. As I am sure anyone it happened to would never return.
I would also argue that the fact that the don’t mention the charge until the pre-stay email would be against the relevant fair trading legislation. All terms and conditions of booking (especially ones with a financial implication) need to be disclosed prior to reservation in the terms and conditions.
I’ve got 120k Marriott points. I’m seriously thinking about transferring them to AA to top off an Ethiad redemption I’m looking at for next year. I’ve got one Marriott stay later this month and I’m done. I will be voting with my wallet for sure moving foward. Bonvoy(age) Marriott!
You guys realize that practically every problem in a first world country is a first world problem, right? Even poverty in the U.S looks privlaged in comparison with 3rd world.
You could've skipped the pretended and clearly fake moral high-ground and said what you really meant, which was "STFU".
Or you yourself could just "STFU".
The policy is clearly B.S, and clearly unjustifiable. Not to mention in the points world, someone who is not significantly well off could end up on the short end and charged 5K they can't handle. Tell to that persons face what a first world problem that is.
"@ Flyingdoctorwu — What makes you think they return points for the canceled night? That’s not something I’ve seen anywhere."
I can't speak for Marriott, but that was the case when I no-showed a points reservation at an IHG hotel. The cancellation policy stated something along the lines of "First night's charge in case of no show." My points were refunded, and then a modest cash amount ended up being charged to my card on file (it was less than the value of the points, so I didn't really complain).
@Jennifer I think you're 100 percent right here and a nice certified letter stating this with the threat of legal action should be enough to get the money refunded. Otherwise a nice call to Mr. Sorenson's office and getting his office to deal with the property to help might be in order.
Would a credit card trip interruption coverage come into play in this example???
Bonvoid of value should be the new moniker for this program which seems intent on tarnishing loyalty. Ridiculous cancellation policies that threaten to punish points users with long cancellation times and cash penalties.
The hotel is very lovely however... I guess just book eyes wide open about this crazy policy.
Isn’t $5k the limit on most CC travel interruption insurance policies?
Smells like the hotel is trying to scam the insurance companies through their guests. They’re even recommending you buy insurance in their fine print.
Virtually ALL high-end Bonvoy hotels are doing a similar thing with cancellations. And on FlyerTalk the lurkers have confirmed that unlike in the old SPG program there's no option to just pay the points in lieu of any further cancellation fees.
If they are refunding the points I understand charging some cash fee, but $1k/night seems outrageous. I'd imagine Marriott is complicit because if you're booking a points stay at St. Regis Aspen you've probably also got the Marriott card, so guess who's taking a cut of that $5k they're going to bill you?
@ Bgriff -- Even beyond the policy as such, though, is the way it's being implemented. It's one thing to charge something if someone actually no shows, it's another when they show up less than 24 hours late due to a canceled flight. There is *zero* reason this person should have been charged cash.
@Lucky - I don’t understand why you keep making bookings with Marriott. Please explain yourself.
LOL, 6 month cancel and charging people $1,000/night. What a joke. No one stay there.
I recently received a similar email from St. Regis Deer Valley ... they are charging a cancellation free of $2,500 / night + tax if cancelled after 90 days prior to arrival for a points redemption. This is a $14,177.50 cancellation fee. Insane.
@ tda -- Because they're the world's largest hotel group and they're hard to avoid. It's the same reason I fly American out of Miami. I'm not going out of my way to be loyal to Marriott, but there are many former Starwood hotels I really like. Furthermore, I also have a lot of Marriott points, so it still makes sense for me to redeem them.
@ Jack -- Can you forward me that email? If I write about it I'll of course take out all personal info (or you can just remove it). lucky@onemileatatime.com
The outrageous part is that this does not seem to be mentioned in the cancellation policy site when booking the room.
While it’s not a great policy, the hotel can decide however it wants. But. It. Has. To. Be. Mentioned. While. Booking!
Hence why Airbnb is a million times better. I wouldn't stay at that greedy dumpster fire even at a good price.
The Aspen airport is oh-so-convenient when weather is good and a giant pain when it's not. It's worth the 1.5 hour drive from Vail/Eagle (EGE) IMO. Plus, EGE can handle large planes whereas ASE can only handle RJs. That being said, with the recent weather it wouldn't shock me to learn there were cancelled flights to EGE this week.
But what the St. Regis is doing here is ridiculous. The 60 cancellation policy is awful - but at least it's disclosed. The punitive cancellation fee is robbery.
I agree with @Corey Sacken. Wherever possible, I only stay with AirBnB these days. The quality, space, luxury and comfort is just unmatched. Some of my favorite stays have been in Air BnBs, even when compared to hotels I consider towards the top - the Oberoi Amarvillas in Agra or the Taj Lake Palace for example. Certainly they are not the same experience, but in my opinion, nothing beats the luxury of a home away from home.
For me, I'll just be avoiding Marriott properties from now on. I have almost 600K Marriott Rewards points, and I'll just move them over to an airline partner when I'm ready.
From a practical standpoint, there have been too many negative changes to the Marriott program (including that they sucked SPG hotels into it), and with this one, well, I just don't have the time to tweeze out all the different penalties (and the exorbitant charges associated with them), along with the excessive number of cancellation days, and the penalty differences between this brand and that brand, and then between this and that property within a certain brand.
Basically, I need to be able to book hotels confident that I know the (very limited) cancellation rules* without needing to earn a PhD in Marriott Rewards.
If they fix this, then I'll reconsider Marriott. In the meantime, nope.
*(number of days prior across the mothership's properties, what the (reasonable) penalty is, knowing that there is a reasonability tests (e.g., forgiveness for a cancelled flight, etc.).
Without having done any research on this issue under Colorado law, this policy strikes me at first blush as an unenforceable liquidated damages clause in the "contract" to lease the room, at least as applied to the traveler who arrived less than 24 hours late. A liquidated damages clause sets a monetary amount for one party's failure to perform under a contract; to be generally enforceable, (1) the other party's damages from the breach must be difficult to determine and (2) the amount of money assessed must be a reasonable estimate of the innocent party's damages and cannot be so large to be deemed a penalty.
For the guy who arrived a day late, the policy absolutely violates these general tenets of contract law, in my mind. The hotel sustained no damage for his "breach" of the contract and he already paid for the product (the rooms) and had the right to use them as he pleased for the duration of the time for which he had already paid. If I were he, I would threaten some sort of legal action against the hotel and Marriott (although there likely is some sort of clause in the terms and conditions limiting how he can prosecute his legal rights).
You've been Bonvoyed. I encourage those affected by this to share their experience at
https://www.bonvoyed.com
I also have a points stay booked at the STR Aspen at New Years for 5 nights. The email from the hotel states the no-show fee to be $15,000.
Similar here. I booked St Regis Aspen and in my confirmation email it says “the time for cancellation has passed” and that, if I cancel the fee is ~$13,000. For a five night reservation. I about a month after booking to cancel and she confirmed that I would have to pay $13,000. So I guess I’m going to Aspen!
@lucky I think I've spent £125 odd on an hotel per night and would be annoyed if I got charged / double charged for cancelling.
I've never been in a position to collect points and I doubt I ever will. I always use a site like booking.com where you can pay slightly more but cancel a week or more before arrival for no fee.
@ Jack -- For what it's worth, this is the most flexible cancelation policy at the hotel. 60 days is the flexible rate, while there's a pre-paid rate that's non-refundable beyond that.
st regis deer valley is the same, if not worse... cash penalty around 2800 per night for points reservation during xmas time... who in the right mind would go there on a cash rate
@lucky if you look at post #5 in the link you posted from FT; it talks about recieving points back.
“As a further data point on this, I have reviewed my "Latest Activity" for my Marriott account. It shows 4 new transactions on all the same day (my actual day of check-in): +360,000 points; -340,000 points; +360,000 points and -340,000 points.
So in exchange for a $2,226.00 no show fee plus taxes, I was given back 40K points (about $300 or so in points value).”
I had a recent stay where I called the Platinum line and requested to shift my stay by one day (in/out 1 day later). Reservations were available with points for the old and new sets of dates. The phone agent made the change and I saw the confirmation on the app. Crucially, I never received an email, though I was naive and didn't think much of that.
When I arrived for check-in I was told I had missed the first night of my stay. The app showed the "old" dates, not the new ones I had changed over the phone or had seen in the app directly after my phone call. At first the manager was irresolute and said there was nothing that could be done.
It took a 48 minute call to Marriott to resolve the situation (confirm a 5 night stay starting that day, and not the previous day). The nice agent said there was nothing that could be done about the no-show fee until they pulled the tape ("in about 7 business days") to confirm my previous phone conversation. Since I didn't have email proof of the "new" dates, I believe that's reasonable.
My main issue though is how Marriott's IT system apparently "lost" the changes that were made by the phone agent. The manager, while professional, was not interested in helping or being flexible until after I spent a long time on the phone. In the end he apologized and proactively sent an amenity to the room. It definitely wasn't the type of check-in experience we were expecting after a 7 hour drive in from Denver (because of road closures).
Overall the stay at the hotel was really wonderful. However, between the IT issues and the inflexibility on the part of the hotel, my interest in re-qualifying for Platinum this year is almost gone.
Thanks for publicizing what i consider to be an unfair and extremely shady practice. I too booked a couple nights at the St. Regis Deer Valley and a couple weeks later received the email. My "penalty" amount was disclosed as a set amount (not per night) and is lower than what a single night would have been (weekend, peak winter season). It almost seems like there's no standardized penalty...they are just pulling random amounts out of the air...ugh!
It's also rather suspect that they waited weeks after the reservation was made (until after the new award chart kicked in) to disclose this.
I'm booked next year at St. Regis Deer Valley and they also have 60 day cancellation with $800/night fee for canceled points bookings. Insane.
To add to mine above. My $13k cancellation policy is for a stay in September. Not ski season. Rates start at $740/night, way under the $2600/ night they want to charge to cancel. Agent I spoke to was surprised to see the charges but said there was nothing she could do. Definitely leaves a bad taste in one’s mouth. Given other StR experiences, this will be my last stay with them.
personal experience (though there was only point penalty, no cash charges): point advance cancellation = never booked, rather than cancellation. so cancellation penalty does not apply.
Just pick somewhere better. Aspen is so far from anything, unless you're flying small planes into the local airport or nearly as bad flying into Grand Junction. Why put yourself through that when you can fly to Jackson easily. Or even better, fly into SLC and take your 40 min drive up to Park City.
I've skied in out of the way places...Angelfire is pretty awesome...but in the end it's not much different from my backyard in Park City. Even midmountain Sundance is good(took my son there yesterday, epic 104" base!) and only about 45 min from SLC airport.
Why go to the middle of nowhere just to endure a crappy hotel stay?
Hypothetically, couldn’t one simply reserve the room with a Citi Prestige and “lock” their card from their Citi mobile app at the last minute to thwart the no-show charges?
Couldn't the person just check-in remotely on the Marriott app for the first night if/when they're delayed?
On the same boat here... Though I booked 3 rooms for a 5 night stay and my email says "Please note that a monetary fee will be assessed in the event of a cancelation within 60 days prior to arrival in the amount of $33,000."
Not sure if I should laugh or cry! lol
Is there any explanation of WHY the penalty is so large? My guess is that there must have been a time when wealthy folks with tons of points would book the hotel and then no show if the desired snow conditions were good enough and simply eat the points...I mean, that must have been how this terrible policy came into being, right?
AndrewOnTheRoad asked the pertinent question:
Why not just check into your points-booked room on the Marriott App? You don't have to be physically at the hotel to check in (unless they have some specific prohibition to using the App?)
If you're checked in then you've upheld your part of the contract. There is no obligation to be IN the room or use any of the hotel services on your stay. How would this differ from checking in in person and then walking out the door until the next day at 12:30?
@Lucky - I’ll accept the argument that you have points to burn.
However, “they’re hard to avoid” is nonsense. It’s not like you’re road tripping across the country and the only hotel for miles around is a Courtyard by Marriott. You have many, many options.
Sounds like this is going to be a class action pretty soon lol. Completely unenforceable since it's not agreed to on the booking screen. UDAAP claim and accompanying lawsuit would be easy if you have time for all that crap
@AndrewOnTheRoad is on the right track for the first night no show conundrum. The rest of you burn your points at another property and take your future dollar anywhere else.
I can’t believe this is legally enforceable. You pay for a room, it’s none refundable or cancellable. You don’t show up, you get charged what you paid (be it points or cash). How they can charge you any more than that for not showing up is crazy!
My guess would be that this is all about disincentivising people from using their points whilst still remaining within the Bonvoy policies of technically allowing redemptions. Essentially they want to sell rooms for cash and only have points bookings for last minute availability they wouldn’t have sold.
I’m curious, does the hotel just happen to offer to sell you the travel insurance they so kindly recommend you purchase?
Because the terms when not communicated during booking, I'd assume a small claims court filing should fix should other complaints fail.
A lot of people have had success in small claims court when dealing with shady practices (e.g. I've read dozens of stories on slickdeals.net)
This is not the first or even second time issue like this has happened at this hotel. Below is a review I saw on yelp:
We missed our first 2 nights due to cancelled flights. We called the St.Regis and explained that there we're no flights going into Colorado. They responded with we have a 60 day cancellation policy. We received no compensation for our missed nights. Just remember The St. Regis has a 60 day cancellation policy. And Acts of Gods are not acceptable for cancellations. There were no flights for the entire east coast of the of United States. They were kind enough to give us one extra hour for a late checkout.
If I understand you correctly, they are not charging twice. They refund the full points and are charging roughly 50% of the room rate for a no-show. You can like or dislike the cancellation policy, but there are plenty of other hotels that have similar policies, and it is disclosed that fee-free cancellations are possible up to 60 days prior arrival.
You just don't like to pay hard cash for something you got for "free". That's all. If you would have paid 2k+ for the night and they would "refund" you half of it for a no-show instead of charging full, would you still complain?
It is just administrative easier to refund the full charge (in this case in points) and charge the cancellation fee separately. It's a common pattern to charge fees separately.
@Rene -the point is to use points in lieu of cash. At worst, I'd expect to lose my points, but to instead be charged obscenely inflated room rates is beyond scummy, and surely illegal if not disclosed prior to booking.
People who book at these shitty places need to used emptied gift cards to hold the reservation.
I would question the legal validity of this. You agree to the shown terms at booking. An email after the fact and you ‘agreeing’ based on not taking any action is not a legal agreement to those terms. I would go after them on the no-show madness, they called, and checked in, technically before the new days stay would begin. This truly just looks like a way to
Rip-off customers using points to gain additional revenue. As if they don’t want your non-revenue business at their location. SMH
I have a couple of issues with this post. FIRST, I HATE it when any business states that this is their "policy". Normally, the person stating this has no input on this "policy" and cannot change it or make a decision based on the issues. They just have to enforce the companies "policy". We almost NEVER get to speak with someone empowered to reverse the decision or "policy" based on the facts. Now for the part that many of you will not like. WHO should be responsible because you had an airline reservation cancelled? The Hotel? Many will say they are in better financial shape to absorb the loss than the customer. Didn't the Hotel let you know IN ADVANCE what their "policy" was? Didn't they state that you have an option to secure travel insurance in case the worst happens? If you don't want to pay for travel insurance that is your business then don't make the Hotel the heavy because you do not want to purchase the insurance. This happens on cruises frequently. The cruise line makes travel insurance available for a fee. The cruiser chooses not to make the travel insurance premium and then someone gets sick and has to be evacuated by helicopter or at the next port and the traveler wants to get mad at the cruise line for not flying them (at the cruise lines expense) to any major city they want to fly to, and reimburse them for the price of their cruise. If they had purchased the recommended insurance everything would have been covered to the extent that the insurance policy agreed to. The policy at this Aspen St. Regis is not "customer friendly" but it is there for a reason. It is printed out for all to see (or you can ask to speak to a reservation MANAGER for clarification. Also get a follow up email to show the details discussed on the phone. no cooperation? Then just go someplace else.) Buy the travel insurance. Being a Colorado resident I would NEVER travel to Aspen to a property that has this policy in place without having a travel insurance policy. The weather is no ones fault and the hotel should not be made responsible for your mistakes. People need to quit passing on responsibility for their inactions to someone with deeper pockets. Or get the policy changed. Or better yet stay at a different property.
I am coming in from SPG, and have never heard of such a ridiculous "policy." This seems like a way to lose all potential customers. Some responsible person must have the wisdom and authority to reverse this aberration at all Bonvoy facilities. There is a lot of discussion here (All negative) that should give Bonvoy a clear perspective that this is greatly to their disadvantage. However, who among all the comments has challenged Bonvoy to defend this policy and revealed to them the wisdom of a customer-friendly policy? I read them all, thinking I would see something indicating that top-level authority at Bonvoy is even aware of this issue and apparently the legal risk of even a class-action suit against them. I would hope that the monitor of this blog would correspond with Bonvoy and post the result.
Is the “top management” aware of this? Who do you think would establish this “policy” in the first place? Secondly, a class action lawsuit? On what grounds? Because many don’t like the “policy”? They ADVISE potential guests of their “policies”. People have the option to book someplace else, buy the suggested travel insurance, or choose another destination altogether. Where would the merits of a “class action” lawsuit prevail? Just do not go to the St.Regis ANYWHERE if you do not like their policies. The pocket veto always speaks the loudest. If you want to use points to pay for your stay then you earned them and that is your right. The property also can set up whatever reasonable policies they deem necessary. “Reasonable” is, for the most part, up to them. Again, if you feel their judgement is faulty book someplace else.
> Whitest post I’ve read in awhile… Bravo!
> #FirstWorldProblems and frankly, the whiny, elitist tone of this post makes me not really care.
Good to see racism is alive and well.
This thread has been dead for a little while, but I have an interesting data point worth sharing on the off chance people see this.
I recently cancelled a 2-night points reservation here for early August and was charged $2,000. My points were refunded.
Best I can tell I never received an email specifically citing the enhanced cancellation policy like many mention in the thread above. I only have what was listed in my confirmation email and what was disclosed when I booked through the app. Both make mention of a 30-day cancellation policy but none mention a dollar penalty.
Curious how to proceed from here. I’ve tried disputing through my credit card company but to no avail. Seems like the remaining options are: (1) Small claims court, (2) Trying and negotiate to forfeit the points instead of the $2k, or (3) throw the social media Hail Mary.
Thoughts?