With an ever-increasing number of Marriott properties finding excuses to not honor the company’s breakfast benefit for elites, is there any recourse? I’d like to address this, based on my the latest message from an OMAAT reader.
How Marriott hotels are playing games with elite breakfast
Marriott Bonvoy’s elite breakfast policy is ridiculously complicated, even if all hotels are following the rules. Whether or not elite members receive complimentary breakfast varies based on the brand, the part of the world you’re in, and potentially, even the day of the week.
As if that wasn’t complicated enough, many Marriott properties aren’t playing by the rules, and are avoiding honoring elite breakfast promises. This wasn’t really a thing up until a couple of years ago, but it seems that a small but ever-increasing number of properties keep pushing their luck, given how so many brand standards have slipped post-pandemic.
The most common trend that we’re seeing is that some hotels claim that their restaurants are run by third parties, and therefore they don’t offer elite breakfast. That’s a convenient excuse, given that these same hotels are happy to sell guests room rate packages that include breakfast, and heavily market those restaurants as being part of the hotel when it’s convenient. That’s BS.
Arguably what’s even worse is the trend that we’ve seen lately, whereby hotels simply refuse to honor elite breakfast benefits, even if they admit that their restaurant is part of the hotel:
- The St. Regis Macao has simply stopped offering elite members breakfast, and instead, elite members just receive a discount on breakfast
- The Aloft Dublin has replaced complimentary breakfast (which retails for €20 per person) with a €10 credit per night, all the while gaslighting guests, claiming this change was due to customer feedback
Do Marriott Bonvoy members have any recourse?
I just received an email from an OMAAT reader who has an extended stay at Gymnasia Isrotel Tel Aviv, which is a new Marriott Tribute Portfolio property. However, he has discovered that the hotel doesn’t offer Marriott Platinum members and above complimentary breakfast, but instead just gives them the option of points as a welcome amenity.
He said he called Marriott customer service, and they said that there’s nothing they can do to force the hotel to give him breakfast. So he’s really frustrated, and emailed me, in hopes that I can help. Pulling up rates at this hotel, you’ll see that they’re more than happy to sell you a rate that includes breakfast.
But as soon as an elite member wants breakfast as their welcome amenity, in line with the terms, the hotel is like “we actually don’t have a restaurant.” Look, the specific type of relationship between a hotel and its restaurant shouldn’t be of any concern to guests. Obviously the issue here isn’t a lack of a restaurant, but rather, the hotel not wanting to spend the money to offer elite breakfast.
This hotel has newly joined Marriott. Obviously it wants to be part of Marriott for its massive distribution power, which is specifically thanks to the Marriott Bonvoy program. But when it comes to actually honoring one of the reasons that people search hotels through Marriott, it doesn’t want to honor those benefits.
I have to give this hotel credit for being extra sneaky with its restaurant. The restaurant specifically isn’t listed on Marriott’s website, but when you go to the hotel’s independent website, you’ll see it says that “breakfast at the Gymnasia is served in the hotel lobby’s Shila Restaurant.”
With that in mind, what can we do here? The truth is that Marriott corporate obviously doesn’t care to enforce its rules, or else we wouldn’t see this over and over. In the past, I’ve pinged contacts at Marriott regarding these issues, and basically got a shoulder shrug.
Realistically, the only thing that’s going to cause hotels to change their policies is to publicly shame them, leave a negative review, or best of all, vote with your wallet and stay elsewhere.
I understand that ultimately Marriott views its customers as being the hotel owners, and not the guests. But I also think that Marriott is making a strategic mistake here, and this is going to backfire. The more widespread Marriott allows this issue to become, the more hotels are going to try to push their luck.
As of now, it’s still a pretty limited number of properties that do this. But you can bet that over time, this will spread like wildfire, as greedy hotel owners identify an easy opportunity to cut costs. What was once known as the hospitality industry is increasingly just becoming the lodging industry.
Bottom line
An increasing number of Marriott properties are choosing not to honor the breakfast benefit that elite members are supposed to receive. Unfortunately as Bonvoy members, we don’t really have much recourse, since Marriott seemingly isn’t forcing hotels to honor published benefits. All we can do is shame hotels, in hopes that bad publicity and negative reviews will lead to change, but that’s not exactly foolproof.
I can’t help but think that Marriott needs to take a stance here, since you can bet that more and more hotels will try to play these games, when they realize they can get away with it.
What do you make of this Marriott elite breakfast situation?
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