Consumer Safety & Awareness Part 9

Bait & Switch: Hospitality Industry

Be careful whom you give your business card to. Several business people have reported this situation: You go out to eat at a fine restaurant, probably not too far from your place of business. Someone enters soon after you and takes a seat He orders a meal and, upon leaving, stops off to say something to you like, “Nice to see you,” or “That looks good, I think I’ll order it next time.” He smiles and waves, then disappears from your life. When you go to pay your bill, his charges have been added to yours. He presented your business card and told the cashier that you said you’d pay.

All hospitality businesses are subject to this scam. You order tickets, get a hotel room, have a meal, or book a flight. When you get your credit card bill the charge is twice or more than what you expected. The company you dealt with quoted you one price and charged you another. Be sure to see the price in writing before agreeing to any offer, and keep the written receipt.

Travel Industry wire reports that online booking companies use this ploy frequently. “I called Expedia and a very polite, helpful agent apologized for the problem and found my $400 fare,” says Daniel, a microchip designer from Palo Alto, California. “She tried to book it for me - and then informed me that the fare had changed to $900 because fares can change in seconds as tickets are purchased.''

MSNBC followed through on this, speaking to an Expedia spokesperson. “While uncommon, the the two-system format we use will rarely return disparate fares,” says Expedia spokeswoman Katie Deines. “It speaks to the highly dynamic nature of pricing and availability. Expedia works throughout the booking process to verify pricing and availability so we are showing customers the latest information.” But travelers don’t care about the highly dynamic nature of pricing and availability. When they see a low fare one minute and a higher price the next, they call it a bait-and-switch. The price you’re quoted should be the price you pay. Every time.”

Global Travel News remarks, “The sad news is, travelers have to contend with this practice. Airlines and online travel agencies protect their claim by using words such as “for as low as” or “travel with rates as low as…” These are gray phrases wherein they only claim that they MIGHT give you the fare they advertise but they can’t really guarantee them.”

Hotels often offer low prices, but hide the bait-and-switch in the fine print. You may arrive at your destination to find that you have been placed in a small or poorly situated room (such as next to a busy restaurant or near the elevator), or one with a single bed. Services promised are often not applicable to your room, such as free breakfast or Internet service. The hotel has a room available that provides all you want, but it will be considerably more expensive.

MSNBC also reports this scam, “The California Department of Justice recently announced the arrest of Orange County travel agent Ralph Rendon. “The suspect allegedly ripped off dozens of senior citizens who wanted to travel to Cuba for religious and cultural purposes,” says the California Attorney General. The scam targeted Jewish and Greek Orthodox seniors trying to congregate with people of their own faith on the Caribbean island. After the 34 victims forked out five-figure deposits, Rendon announced their trips were being blocked by the Treasury Department and refused to refund their money. According to state investigators, he used the money to lease a brand new Mercedes, pay his rent and hire a divorce attorney.”

When you go to a fine hotel, you would think that the stores in its lobby offered only the finest merchandise. Experienced travelers have been finding knock-off items, such as watches, jewelry, handbags, luggage, electronics, and pirated CDs and DVDs, in many hotels in Europe and Asia. They are advertised as the real thing and offered at “discount” prices that are far more than the counterfeits usually sell for.

Hotels.com has been advertising that they will find exactly what you are looking for, exactly where you want it. There’s a good reason they include that in the ads. Many Caribbean Island hotels have been advertising that they are “on the beach,” or “in the center of the action,” when they are actually quite far away. Joe Yogerst of Forbes Traveler Magazine reports, “Unsuspecting travelers can get scammed into rooms only a few notches above a pig sty, places like the Hotel Carter in New York, which recently topped TripAdvisor’s list of the Top 10 Dirtiest Hotels in America. A manager at the Hotel Carter — who requested anonymity — said, “We know about the list. We’re doing OK. We’re still busy.” Then there’s the centrally located Park Hotel in London, which one TripAdvisor reviewer dubbed a “typhoid cubicle.””

Christopher Elliott another travel columnist, collects experiences reported by frequent travelers. The most common is charging for items that were not used. Many hotel rooms come with a self-service refrigerator and snack items, with outlandish prices, such as $5 for a Snicker’s Bar. If you simply accept the room as is, you may find that you are billed for items not used, although they truly are now missing from your room. Most likely they were never stocked to begin with. The bill for these items probably will not appear on your hotel charges but be placed directly onto your credit card. Your “use” of the hospitality items was not discovered until after you checked out. By the time you get the bill it’s too late to disprove it.