I’ve stayed in many, many Marriott hotels. The world’s largest hotel chain doesn’t always offer the most exciting lodging experiences, and its loyalty program could use some serious improvements, but it’s impossible to compete with Marriott for pure volume. The number of hotels it has in the United States and throughout the world is remarkable. As someone who travels for business to cities that sometimes don’t offer many other options, Marriott’s reliability is hugely reassuring. For the most part, my experiences at Marriott hotels have been good to excellent. But during the summer of 2020, Marriott provided one of the worst experiences I’ve ever had with any travel company.
The first COVID peak of the spring had subsided, but the global pandemic was still a threat. So we planned a road trip through the Pacific Northwest. We mostly avoided hotels, but for one night in Portland, Oregon, the AC Marriott was our best option. We generally love Marriott’s AC brand—they’re comfortable and in great locations without breaking the bank. As a Marriott Bonvoy Boundless credit cardholder, I get a free night at a Marriott property every year (up to a maximum value of 35,000 Bonvoy points). The AC Hotel Portland Downtown fit the bill perfectly; it’s only two blocks from the city’s beautiful Willamette River waterfront, and I could book it with my free night.
We’d booked the hotel for a Friday night. At 5pm on the Tuesday before our booking—less than 72 hours before we were due to check in—I got an email from the hotel’s Director of Operations. The email was a masterpiece of corporate-speak; it explained that the hotel “had to make some difficult decisions over the past few weeks” and that one of those difficult decisions was “to continue to suspend operations at the AC Hotel Portland.”
Let’s pause a moment and note the language used here. The hotel would “continue to suspend operations.” In other words, the hotel was closed and would remain closed. So not only had Marriott let me book the hotel when it was closed, but they’d known it was closed, and they’d only told me it was closed three days before I was due to check in.
Rather than leave me without a place to stay, Marriott explained that the AC Hotel’s sister property, the Courtyard Downtown, was still open and that we could transfer our reservation there. The email explained that they couldn’t automatically rebook me because I’d booked using my credit card certificate, so I’d need to cancel my reservation and rebook at the Courtyard. There was so much wrong with this proposed solution that it’s hard to know where to begin.
First, Marriott’s AC Hotel brand is significantly nicer than its Courtyard brand. Marriott acknowledges this—the Courtyard hotel in Portland is a Category 4 hotel, while the AC Hotel is a Category 5 (the higher the category, the more Marriott Bonvoy rewards points required to book it). By forcing me to rebook at the Courtyard, I’d be staying at a worse hotel and get significantly worse value out of my free night certificate. Second, the AC Hotel is in a better location, much closer to the water. But most importantly, we were traveling with companions who had booked the same hotel, for the same night, with cash.
Third, staying at the Courtyard would be much less convenient. Like me, our traveling companions had mid-tier elite status with Marriott. But Marriott hadn’t even told them that the hotel they’d booked was closed, so they called Marriott to ask about the situation. The representative they spoke to confirmed that the AC Hotel was closed and that their reservation had been transferred to the Courtyard. The representative also confirmed that, appallingly, Marriott had no plans to let them know that their reservation had been changed. Fortunately, the Portland Marriott Waterfront Downtown was available at the same price they’d paid for the AC Hotel. The representative was easily able to transfer their reservation to the Marriott Waterfront Downtown.
Then I called Marriott. I explained the situation, including how Marriott had canceled my reservation and tried to downgrade me to an inferior hotel, and that my traveling companions were able to rebook at the Marriott Waterfront Downtown at the same price (and that we were sharing a rental car, so staying at separate hotels would be inconvenient).
The customer service rep said she wouldn’t be able to help me. My free night certificate was only worth 35,000 points, she explained, and a night at the Marriott Waterfront Downtown (which is a Category 6 hotel), required 50,000 points to book. I understood, so I asked to speak to a supervisor, confident that the supervisor would easily be able to remedy the situation.
We should pause here to note that I’m unfailingly polite with customer service representatives, no matter how frustrated I am. I understand that their jobs are often unpleasant, and that they’re bound by weird corporate policies, and so I always go out of my way to be courteous, even when I’m being firm and expressing frustration. My wife thinks it’s a fault.
I spoke with the supervisor for a long time, explaining the situation to my best ability: that the Courtyard was a downgrade, that my traveling companions were staying at the Marriott Waterfront Downtown (which was a mile from the Courtyard), that Marriott had canceled my reservation on short notice, that they hadn’t even planned to let my traveling companions (also Marriott elites) know about the cancellation at all.
After arguing with the supervisor for about half an hour, we were at an impasse. She insisted that my free night certificate was insufficient to book the Marriott Waterfront Downtown. I asked why she didn’t just take my free night certificate and transfer me the 50,000 points required for the booking. Ludicrously, she asked me where the 50,000 points would come from, at one point even suggesting that the only option was to take them out of someone else’s rewards account. To be clear: Marriott’s Bonvoy points are a fake currency that the company can create and destroy at will. But the truly absurd part of all this was that the hotel was basically empty due to COVID.
Then the supervisor hung up on me.
It’s the only time in my life that a customer service representative has hung up on me, and I’ve argued with a lot of them.
My wife called Marriott back (she’s not nearly as nice to customer service reps as I am). I called back, too. I also wrote emails to the relevant Marriott corporate officers.
Something worked. The next day, now with less than 48 hours to check-in, I got a phone call from someone in Marriott’s corporate office. She offered to convert my 35,000-point free night certificate to Bonvoy points, transfer an additional 10,000 points to my account, and book a night at the Marriott Waterfront Downtown for me with Bonvoy points.
The astute reader will note that the 35,000 points from the certificate plus the 10,000 points they offered added up to 45,000, and I said earlier that a night at the Marriott Waterfront Downtown cost 50,000 points. I had about 6,000 points in my account at the time, so Marriott expected me to make up the difference with my own points. At this point, I was so tired of arguing with Marriott reps that I simply agreed.
It worked out. Our trip was fine, and we had an enjoyable stay at the Marriott Waterfront Downtown. We were confident that Marriott’s COVID precautions kept us safe. But this was nonetheless one of the worst experiences we’ve ever had with a travel company.
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