Hotel Resort Fees Insulting

Hotel Resort Fess are perhaps one of the most annoying (and expensive) things in travel these days. Many big hotels, resorts and corporations insist on upsetting their own guests for profit.

Resort fees were popular just before 9/11/2001 and then most of the fees disappeared when business went down. Years later, the hotels are busy again and fees are popping up all over. Not mentioning the ridiculous parking fees, resort fees are those annoying little charges, sometimes as much as $25 a night, that they tack on to your rate upon checkout. They are for things that used to be for free: the pool, the "free" newspaper, maid service, tips, in room coffee, fitness facilities, the ability to make a toll free phone call or use your calling card and maybe internet access. Although many places still charge an additional fee for the internet access. We know of some popular hotels that add as much as $50 a day between parking and resort fees.

Hotels like to charge extra whenever they can and the customer allows it. Instead of letting you optionally pay for something that you use, they just charge everyone for it. Imagine a restaurant charging everyone for drinks and desert whether you wanted it or not. Or maybe charge for silverware to eat your food. Sounds pretty outrageous doesn't it? In recent years, we've even seen hotels charge extra fees for water and electricity. Could we have a room without water and electricity please? Oh wait, that would be a tent and we can get that cheaper at K-Mart.

AllStays.com asks, isn't that what the hotel rate is for? If someone owns a hotel and it's parking lot, can't we just get one rate for the entire stay at the property? Can we get ask for a room without towels, maid service, coffee, newspaper for less? No. The resort fees are usually required and they are not mentioned upfront.

The fact is that taxes are different on the room rate than on the surcharges. The tax collector is taking a hit. You might say 'who care's about that' but we should care in the way it is handled. When you compare room rates, online or over the phone, the fees are not mentioned. Or they are in fine print buried on a web page you don't see. You may think you are getting a deal by $20 a night and wind up paying $50 more for your stay. It's a way for hotels to act competitive when they are not. Some bargain travel website are also dealing with problem. You accept the risk to take the lowest rate, find out the name of the hotel and you are happy until checkout. Sometimes it's included in your end rate and sometimes guests are rudely surprised. It's also a way to insult a customer they paid to get in the door and to make sure they never come back.

Starwood Hotels has already settled a class action lawsuit on this matter. Starwood, along with Hilton and Marriott now have policies against resort fees. We agree. A hotel should just raise their room rate if they need more money. They can also proudly state what they include in their new rate if they did so.

Consumers need to complain about these charges or they'll charge you $3 a night for using a pillow. Make your voice loud and clear that you don't like it and they are losing a customer. Fees should be optional. If didn't want the plasma television and entertainment center in your room at the Las Vegas Hard Rock Hotel, you shouldn't have to pay $5 for it. But it's in every room, so you have no choice. In the early days, many places would remove these fees when you complain. Like testing the waters to see how much they could get you for and how much they would have to give back. Tack on fees to see if you were paying attention or if you would complain. Most people do not complain. They take it and then complain to everyone they know. The hotel loses potential customers and gets a bad reputation in numerous small circles.

AllStays.com is now going to try to out these resort fee ridden hotels every chance we get. We will be adding a note about this on our city page summaries wherever we can. It still won't be included in the quoted rates or online booking because we can't do it. The hotels control those rates and do not include or disclose it to us. If this really bugs you, try to inspect their website, which we link to directly (no other travel website does this). They may or may not bury the fees on their website. Keep this in mind when comparing rates between hotels as well. Many places never mention it anywhere until you are checking out and paying your bill. Some places even try to hide it when asked directly about it over the phone. One place told us they didn't have a "resort fee" at all. No, we found out they wound up having a "facilities fee."

Complain now and complain loudly before they start charging for bed sheets. They may not give you a discount for bringing your own.