Furious with the Artmore

[Bamafan]

Just confirmed my reservation. The reservation lady was amazingly pleasant and efficient.

 

[BABS]

Babs, ever since the Artmore started doing the year-in-advance reservations for ProgPower, the policy has always been to charge the full amount to your credit card a month in advance. I know it has been mentioned here on the board, and the staff at the hotel have always made a point to reiterate this to me every time I made my advance reservation. That sucks if no one ever told you about this.

I know, and I had even asked about that and was told I didn't need to do that. What I really think happened is when I was finally able to get booked, they entered me as a regular person and not a Progpower attendee.

I asked my bank about the small amount charged and they said that hotels will do something called a "differential" charge or something, and then charge the full amount upon arrival. So to me, that is another tip off that maybe they had initially booked me as a regular person and not part of the festival.

Anyways, it's over with and maybe next year they will have their scheduling system in order. I've been to the Courtyard Marriott before and they were awesome and as long as I get my Heavy Metal Cupcakes life in Atlanta will be good

 

[BABS]

Just confirmed my reservation. The reservation lady was amazingly pleasant and efficient.

Oh you are just saying that to get my goat - ha ha! Actually though, I'm glad that it is working out for you guys. It will be ok. I've got cool people to chill with at the Courtyard and I'm not as raging angry as yesterday. So I can prolly safely walk by the place and not spit at it (giggle).

 

[ThXinc]

Odd. I spoke with them today to confirm my reservation, room configuration and rate and there was no mention of my credit card or any charges.... she even said, 'you're with Progpower, right?'

I'll call back to see what the dealio is.

Actually I'd rather not, because I'm not charging the room but paying with my bank account from a paycheck being received on Friday the 15th...lol. It's THAT tight for me this year.

 

[BABS]

this after my calling them the other day about that small "mystery charge" and CANCELING MY RESERVATION.

I am so f@cking angry with these people it's not even funny. What a bunch of f@cking morons!

 

[BABS]

Just got off the phone with them and they are saying it was a non-refundable fee! I am waiting for some other manager by the name of Cartwright to call me back.

This is horrible. If I can't get this charge reversed all my other automatic payments for this paycheck are screwed and I won't have the money to go to Progpower. This is a fucking disaster!

When I cancelled on the phone the other day they never said the charge would still be there. I'm so sick to my stomach over this...

 

[AMBR]

Wow, that's shocking! I hope you get it resolved. Don't understand how they can do that.

 

[Bear]

Call your bank and have them reverse the charges. Explain what happened (calmly) and if you used a VISA/MASTER Card or something else they should give you a full credit. They is one of the luxury's of having these new debit/charge cards. I had an $1100.00 charge reversed before and that was years ago, you should be able to have that taken care of within the day.

Bear

 

[BABS]

I spoke with Cartwright a couple hours ago. He is truly apologetic and when I went through the whole story from start to finish he was even more understanding when I explained to him that all of this began right after last year's fest, and on and on and on he was even more apologetic!

The are currently trying to make this right and they even want to honor the original reservation. I told him I am terrified to do this because I have had nothing, but chaos from them this year and am afraid if I show up at their hotel on the 12th that it will be some other story. So I am giving it a day or two to think it over...

 

[ThXinc]

Hmm. I can see how the pre-reservations made last year could have caused a problem. First, it was th 1.5 hour wait on a Saturday morning saying how SLOW their system was...then when it was FINALLY my turn to make a reservation...it finally BROKE DOWN... I was pretty at the time.

Then, when I got back home, I called them about a couple weeks later and made a normal reservation over the phone. No 'pre-charge' has occurred and I have confirmed my reservation several times since last year.

Also want to thank Jen for going to bat for a couple of us who got hosed out of making our GB pre-reservations. I got an email from her about 6 months ago saying 'your room is confirmed'. At the time, I didn't know it wasn't. Special stuff right there!

Agreed. Management team changeover can equal chaos when they don't know about the special things management had done in the past. This new management is in for a 'wake up' call this year and I'm just hoping they're not jerks about 3am courtyard parties and guitar clinics at 8am. LOL.

They're mistaken if they think they OWN their hotel on Sept 14 and 15th. LOL.

Hope it works out BABS...breathe!

 

[freakchylde]

I hope it works out, too. But there should be no reason why they can't reverse the charges since you did cancel your reservation before they charged you. And since you didn't get any confirmation in the first place, that stated the charge would be non-refundable, guess what? It's refundable. And if they try to pull anything, take Bear's suggestion and call your bank. There really is no excuse for this.

 

[ThXinc]

Well, I guess Karma has arrived. Now they're trying to charge my card. Of course had I known about this, I would have made arrangements to have the money ready, but as it were, I was planning on using money from my paycheck which is Friday the 14th. So now I'm in a non-sufficient funds situation for my Artmore reservation. I"m talking to a manager tomorrow to try to salvage my reservation..But this is BS...NO HOTEL charges the full amount prior to a reservation unless they're up to something else

 

[Harvester]

..But this is BS...NO HOTEL charges the full amount prior to a reservation unless they're up to something else

I am not going to go into each individual situation as I have no dog in this hunt. I am not going to defend the Artmore entirely because management turnover has indeed led to miscommunication between the hotel and the public this past year.

However, I will point out that the Artmore has been charging the full amount normally 4 weeks in advance ever since we took over the entire hotel.
If they did not, then people could cancel at the last minute and they would potentially lose out on a room sale, especially since the hotel is blocked to the general public. If that happens, you can say goodbye to our exclusive takeover and the end of the parties, etc.

 

[freakchylde]

I would also point out, that most hotels do charge in full, if you're paying with a debit/bank card. It's a hold, but that pulls the money out of your account and sets it aside. The same thing happens with credit cards, but you don't see it (since it's credit). Different hotels have different rules for how they handle them, so some will pull the full amount out when you check in.

 

[ThXinc]

I am not going to go into each individual situation as I have no dog in this hunt. I am not going to defend the Artmore entirely because management turnover has indeed led to miscommunication between the hotel and the public this past year.

However, I will point out that the Artmore has been charging the full amount normally 4 weeks in advance ever since we took over the entire hotel.
If they did not, then people could cancel at the last minute and they would potentially lose out on a room sale, especially since the hotel is blocked to the general public. If that happens, you can say goodbye to our exclusive takeover and the end of the parties, etc.

Hmmm. Good to know. But the last few years, I paid at checkout. Will be prepared in 2013...providing the world doesn't blow up or anything.