FORGET HILTON. CALL FOUR SEASONS!

A FOLLOW-UP FROM DONNIE

"The poor customer service I told you about yesterday only got worse today.

Suspicious that yesterday's operator got my two room reservations all screwed up, I called the motel in Maryland, today, to check, and was immediately connected back to the same 800 number.  There, another woman operator, also with a difficult to understand accent, searched the confirmation number her colleague had given me yesterday and announced that she had no record of any reservation.  "We don't even use numbers like that", she said.

So I called the motel again and this time asked the actual desk clerk not to transfer me, but to check her terminal, at the hotel, to see if I had a reservation for two rooms.

"Not quite", she said.  "We have you down for one room."

So, I got one person telling me I have two rooms, another telling me I have one and a third telling me I have none.  So, I say to the hotel clerk, "Just cancel that one room."  "Can't do that," she says.  "You have to go back to the original agent."

So tonight I will be calling the original 800 number and trying to resolve this.  I will be canceling (I hope) and will never stay at any Hilton hotel or motel again.

In the meantime, I also looked at my credit card account, on line, to be sure that the data I foolishly surrendered to the first poor woman is not being misused.  So far it is not.

Now, as a hotel veteran yourself, you may tell me I went about it all wrong.  Or you may tell me just to stay home."

As a hotel veteran, here's my advice.  If you want no hassle service, as I alluded to yesterday, you will have to pay for it.  It's NOT free anymore.

I don't know where, in Maryland, you're going but it it's anywhere near Baltimore go to this website: http://www.fourseasons.com/baltimore/

If you call a hotel and the person at the front desk is trying to help you with your reservation hang up immediately.  Chances are someone who has already booked a room, at the hotel, and paid on their credit card, is standing in front of the clerk trying to check in or out.  They are in no mood to stand there and wait while the clerk is on the phone, talking to someone WHO MIGHT OR MIGHT NOT book a room in the future.  The clerk is having a melt down because she's trying to deal with you while she's staring at the glare on the guests face in front of her/him.

Any hotel/motel that has a front desk clerk answering the phones or trying to take reservations doesn't know or care about customer service.

Pay the extra bucks and call FOUR SEASONS.  No one at the desk will answer the phones.  There are no phones at the front desk.  The front desk is there for people already staying at the hotel or are just checking in or out.  They are an IN HOUSE service and if the hotel has 100 rooms or more the front desk has all they can do to take care of the guests already in the building.

If the hotel is not willing to pay people to handle phones and reservations...THE BACKBONE OF THEIR BUSINESS...you can rest assured they're cutting corners everywhere else too and your experience, when you get there, will not be any  better than the experience you've been having on the phone.

Check the rates on the website above.  If you see something that looks good, and are not comfortable booking on line, call FOUR SEASONS and talk to a reservations agent who will be in house (but not at the front desk) and know what he/she is talking about.

If you're not interested in paying a little more then my next suggestion would be the alternative you suggested.  Stay home.  You don't have to travel all over the country to pinch pennys and be frustrated.  You can do that right where you are.

People who travel are not always aware of how much tension can build up while they're "on the road".  You're in unfamiliar surroundings, the food is different, the bed is different, all the noises and smells, around you, are strange.  A good customer service person understands that and takes that into consideration when you're trying to get them to help you.  If they DON'T understand that, whatever you pay is far too much.