
Sean of New York, NY on Oct. 20, 2010
Over the summer, my girlfriend and I made reservations to stay at this hotel in Point Pleasant. She explained to a member of the hotel staff, a gentleman named Parts, that we would be taking the train from New York and would not have personal transportation. After explaining to Parts that we wanted to be able to easily walk everywhere once we were down there, she was assured that the train station, boardwalk, and beach were all a half mile away and completely and easily accessible via foot.
My girlfriend called twice to ensure this accessibility as we both live in Manhattan and didn't want to rely on cab companies for transportation. After being reassured twice, she made the reservations the night before we arrived. When we arrived in Point Pleasant, after being directed to Ocean Road, we walked for approximately 30 minutes in the direction of the hotel with luggage in hand. After 30 minutes had gone by and there was no hotel in sight, we called a cab company to come pick us up.
Once the cab company arrived, they informed us that we were still approximately 5 to 10 minutes away from the hotel by car. We arrived at the hotel and found that it was at an intersection of two major roads/small highways with no sidewalks and we also found out the hotel was over a mile from Jenkinsons Beach which we had specified we would be going to, a mile from the boardwalk, and a mile from the train station. We informed the front desk clerk that we had been told on the phone all these were within close and easy walking distance and that we didn't want to stay there since we were misled.
The desk clerk, Parts, told us that it wouldn't be an issue and we could leave without being charged. We took the time while we were in the lobby to call around and find a hotel that wasn't booked and then we called the cab company to take us to the new location. While waiting for the cab to take us to the new hotel, Parts came outside with his manager Amit on the phone. Amit was exceedingly rude and told us he didn't care what we were told and that we were going to be charged for the night due to their 72-hour cancellation policy, despite the fact we had only made the reservations the night before, based on the assurances they gave us.
Now, we were being told that Quality Inn was going to charge us, after being told they wouldn't charge us, and after we had made reservations at another hotel which they were aware of. As Amit was out with friends (which is what we were told by the hotel employees). Amit told us over the phone, he was going to charge us for at least one out of the two night stay. We explained to him we didn't think that was fair, he literally told us he didn't care what we thought.
After making a reservation based on false pretenses, we were lucky enough to find another hotel that had an opening, but would cost us more and now we were being told we have to pay for both locations. Once we reached the new hotel, we reached out to Choice Hotels, the corporation to which Quality Inn belongs. The only way to get in touch with Quality Inn at that time was to send an email as no one was available.
My girlfriend called back to let Quality Inn know we would be disputing the charges with the credit card company and that we had contacted Corporate. Amit then offered to take off 70 dollars from the 170 dollar charge for the night. My girlfriend told him to take all the money off based on the circumstances, but again he refused. Choice Hotels responded to my girlfriend and said that there was nothing they could do and the hotel was already attempting to rectify the situation by crediting 70 dollars to the charge and that was the limit they were willing to go to.
At this point, we hoped the credit card company would deny the charge as we requested, but we just received a letter from them stating, they don't have the authority to refuse payment and Amit won't refund the money. Attached to the letter from the credit card company was a letter from Amit. In this letter, he clearly contradicts himself and talks about using map quest, which is driving directions, to determine the hotels accessibility via walking.
Walking distance to the hotel is just short of a mile from both train stations located closest to it and the train station we said we were coming from would require us to walk on a major road with no sidewalks. Also, the other amenities such as the board walk and beach were also not readily accessible via foot, despite what we had been told. In short, we made a reservation at this location based on the information they gave us, then when we showed up and refused to stay because we felt we were misled, we were told we would not be charged. After making a new reservation, we were then told we were going to be charged and now they will not refund us back our money.