My family and I stayed at the America’s Best Inn in Marion, IL last Thanksgiving during our visit to my parents for the holiday. We’ve stayed there the past three or four years for our Thanksgiving visits. This time, though, We had quite the run-around involving overcharging, additional charges, extremely poor customer service, and more. It’s a good soap opera story. Here it goes:
The total rate for the three nights was $113.43. Got the receipt here in front of me. When we entered our room, we discovered that it was a smoking room so I had to go back to the front desk to get a different room. The next room only had one double bed for the four of us, so back to the front desk I went. The third room was sufficient…except for a lack of towels.
In the morning, I went down to the front office to get some towels. The young girl at the desk was very tiny, but TNT comes in a small package too. I couldn’t believe the girl’s extreme attitude and rudeness. Later, when Brad and I went down for the free continental breakfast, we experienced more of her fury. Yikes! Hope she at least likes living with herself.
Here’s the kicker. I just received my credit card statement. We were charged $151.24 (not $113.43) on November 26, then another two charges from Best Inn of $133.43 on December 2 and $151.24 on December 3. We were back in Rochelle on those days. So I called the hotel on Tuesday of this week and left a message for the manager to call me back. When I didn’t get a call, I called again twice on Wednesday, twice on Thursday, and once this morning (Friday). When I still didn’t get a call back, I called my dad and asked him for some help.
Now Dad is a very distinguished man, well educated, former federal government employee, and well-known in the community. He’s travelled the world speaking and teaching. Dad put together a little presentation of what all has occured up to this point. At 1:30 this afternoon, Dad met with Jim Baker at the hotel. Here’s Dad’s email to me about how it went:
I met with Jim Baker, General Manager, at 1:30 this afternoon (your dear friend the petite girl was there during my entire visit.) Here is a summary of my visit:
Our computers are down and I can’t do anything about it until the computers come back up.
I don’t even have his phone number (which he eventually found).
I have to go through several boxes manually until I find the right records. (He finally admitted that he hasn’t even started on that.)
I have other things to do.
Then I reviewed the phone calls you made and the responses you received. In answer to my question as to why he didn’t even return a call, his response to me was, “This is private property and I want you to get off it right now.” This came with his curse. My comment, “Maybe I’ll stay here until this is resolved.” Jim’s response, “If you don’t leave immediately, I’ll call the police and have you evicted.” (Dad is good friends with the Marion Chief of Police :))
During our entire visit, he left the room twice, but came back to share his friendly attitude with me again.
Another bit of advice from Jim - If he wants he can write a letter to his credit card company. Then they will send me a letter to which I will not respond.
My parting comments - I will copy you on the letter I write to the corporate office in Atlanta which will also go to the Marion Chamber of Commerce and the Williamson County Tourism Bureau. Jim’s response - Fine, there’s my card.
I called the corporate headquarters this afternoon and what do you know? A couple hours later, manager Jim is calling to get my records to get the problem fixed.
I’ve also called my credit card company and opened cases on all three charges. As a last action, I cancelled my credit cards and will have them issue new ones.
Interesting day. I’ll repost if and when it all gets resolved.
