Big busy chain hotels can often have long lines to check in – nothing like what you’ll find in Las Vegas, where guests can stand in line for hours – but interminable feeling after a long flight when you just want to get to your room.
Properties that are unwilling to fully staff their front desks have turned to technology. Years ago we started to see check-in kiosks. In 2004 I won a contest to name Sheraton’s kiosk (Sheraton SpeedCheck, and I believe the prize was 50,000 Starpoints – for which I receive a 1099). Yet I rarely ever used machines like these… outside of Las Vegas.
The chains often support mobile app check-in and rooms keys in your phones. That’s great as far as it goes, when the technology works, but it also means you are taking whatever room was pre-assigned to you or at least within that same room category (no asking the mobile app for an upgrade) and there’s no opportunity to get details about the hotel’s elite breakfast benefit, though you could follow up via text.
One of the better benefits that many of the big hotel programs offer is the elite check-in line. You just don’t wait as long for service. This was dramatized in 2009’s Up In The Air.
Ryan Bingham (George Clooney) skips the check-in line at a Hilton hotel due to his elite status. This shows his sense of comfort, control, and belonging in this world – and his status symbolizes the rewards and predictability of his detached, travel-driven existence (where efficiency and superficial perks substitute for genuine relationships and personal connections).
Checking into the Westin Denver Airport, there were only two people working the front desk. There was a line, though it wasn’t terribly long. I queued for the elite check-in line, which had the “Marriott Bonvoy Elite” sign up.
I walked up when the person ahead of me was done, and the agent called over the next person in the general queue instead. I asked, “isn’t this the elite check-in line?” And she replied, “we don’t have one of those, this sign just means that we have elite guests.” Baking powder?
Later in Up In The Air, Bingham attends his younger sister Julie’s wedding. Checking into that hotel, he lacks any special priority or recognition. That symbolizes his loss of control and security. It is then that he’s starting to be exposed to genuine human experiences—uncomfortable, messy, and unpredictable. Without his status, he’s forced into the uncomfortable anonymity and uncertainty of “real life.”
Elite status may be a metaphor for the emptiness of a life dependent on transactional relationships and external symbols of success. But it gets me to my room faster. It’s a promised benefit, and the response at the Westin Denver Airport was truly… absurd.
How do you feel about elite check-in lines? Hotels have them, airlines do too. They’re anti-democratic but that’s also the very premise of elite status. Too many hotels do a poor job of honoring them in my view – symbolizing the failure of the last mile. Hotels set up program requirements, but chains don’t own and usually no longer even manage hotels. So they’re dependent on third parties with little incentive to contribute to the progam to execute. And that’s where you so often get failure.
Yup, laws, contracts, etc. it is all a ‘human construct,’ unlike gravity, which requires a lot of effort (and jet-fuel, usually) to overcome. So, why not defy decency and just revert to ‘might makes right’ with such ‘benefits.’ Want ‘free’ breakfast? Just take it. As a ‘Platinum’ elite or higher, technically, you ‘earned’ it already anyway. Bah!
Also, instead it about time we ‘Bonvoy’d’ the ‘Bonvoy’ers’ at their own ‘Bonvoy’? Like, enough already.
Howard Beale in Network said it best: “I’m as mad as hell and I’m not going to take this anymore!”
Grrr… Sad to say, almost any company that is travel-related tells you to pound sand if you contact them directly, but all of a sudden is customer focused to the max if you relay the incident on X/Twitter. Westin has spent millions cultivating their luxury image, so I’m guessing that will be effective. Suffice to say, the desk clerk that you had encountered was dead wrong.
Rarely do I have to utilize them as hotel lines (save for Vegas as you mentioned) aren’t usually as bad as airport check-in counters. However, if a hotel has the sign displayed, they need to follow through.
While the piss-poor quality Globalist breakfast at Grand Hyatt Baha Mar was a letdown, being able to skip the Vegas-style check-in line was a dream!
Marriott is simply enforcing the belief that when everyone is elite, nobody is.
When are you all going to learn that ELITE, STATUS, POINTS, and MILES all mean nothing anymore? There is nothing anyone can do to force these corporations to honor guest benefits. By the time you walk up to the reservation desk, in most cases, you have already passed the point of free cancellations. It’s a take it or leave it situation, and you’re certainly not going to walk away from something you paid for. Bottom line profits are all these corporations and their shareholders give a damn about. And if more profit means you get fewer benefits and/or services, that is what you are going to get. You’ll just have be be hopeful and grateful that you get a clean room. Hotels, airlines, and travel credit cards all mean nothing when they can just change the game any time they want.
@Robert — Woah, woah… clean room? Mr. Bigshot, over here. I’m here for the bedbugs and head lice! Yum!
There is nothing undemocratic about status. I have no issue with them.
That sign is a perfect metaphor for the Bonvoy program in general.
Neither Hilton nor Marriott respect status. The is no point in elite status chasing. The hotel corporations enforce nothing. Try using a hotel gift card …. laughs on you.
@Ty — Most of us aren’t ‘chasing’ so much as wanting to receive the benefits we already ‘earned’ or ‘paid for’ through our credit card annual fees. With Marriott, the Amex Brilliant includes Platinum status with it’s $650 annual fee. For most brands within the Bonvoy portfolio, Marriott includes the option of ‘breakfast’ as a stated benefit (ok, fine, Ritz-Carlton doesn’t, boo). When a Sheraton has breakfast, but doesn’t ‘include’ it as a Platinium or higher benefit option, they’re breaking the promise of that status and the credit card. So, is it Marriott, Amex, or the particular location that’s getting sued here? Oh, none of them, because rules mean nothing without enforcement. See above.
The same thing happened to me at the Hyatt Milwaukee. They ignored the elite line. Kind of the same thing happened at Harrah’s AC. I was in the Diamond line with one person at the desk for Seven Stars/Diamond check-in and two for regular check-in. One of the the regular check-in people finished with the person that they were checking in and then checked-in someone else in the regular line that had gotten there after me, as I was already standing in the Diamond line when they arrived. Why did they not call me over instead of that person. They did apologize when I mentioned it and said that I should have been checked in first.
I have a different take. Status being earned by credit cards and NOT actual usage (stays and flown miles) is what has caused this problem. As someone above already said what I have been saying; “When everyone is special, no one is special”
“Later in Up In The Air, Bingham attends his younger sister Julie’s wedding. Checking into that hotel, he lacks any special priority or recognition”
He was not a member of the Matterhorn Rewards program. He should look into it. The rewards are great! (says of Hilton’s much earlier in movie)
Also, “we get turned by status, I think cheap is our starting point”)
@Randy – The Hyatt Milwaukee is a bit of an odd duck but the lines are usually quite short and the staff are normally very pleasant if a bit clueless about things at times.
As someone who has stayed at the Denver Airport Westin multiple times, I can honestly say that this is much more about this particular location. It is literally THE WORST customer service – and I think status is actually treated worse here. It’s a definitely a cultural management issue at this location!
@Rich McGrail — That might be the case for finite things, like upgrades, if there truly is a lack of availability (but usually there’s ample rooms, just they’re being cheap). But for things like complimentary breakfasts, the folks with credit card benefits are not ‘taking’ from those who ‘earned’ status by other means. Let’s not fight among ourselves when it’s the consumers verses the owners in this ‘war.’ Gary is right. Marriott should be enforcing these benefits if properties are in the program. It’s quite simple, really. The lack of consistency is ‘subverting expectations’ and upsetting folks.
When cards like the Bonvoy Brilliant and the Hilton Aspire justify their hefty annual fees by including high tiers of hotel status, the people who pay for them are not wrong to expect the promised benefits. They are no less entitled to them than people who “earn” their status through stays. Unfortunately, too many of Marriott’s true customers, hotel ownership groups, completely disregard those benefits and other brand standards. Kudos to Gary for calling them out on it.
Personally, it saddens me to hear about this at the Westin Denver Airport. I don’t want to be one of these posters who blathers on about their own experiences as proof of anything, but I’ve had some great stays and suite upgrades at that hotel. If any of you happen to need to overnight at DEN, it has fantastic views of the runways and great amenities. It’s worth putting up with a longer check in line to stay there.
Its only anti-democratic if obtaining the status is reserved for the few. Last I checked…anyone with the appropriate credit score and $550 can score an aspire card and be hilton diamond. I have tried to convince lots of family and friends to go for it. Haven’t convinced anyone. Freedom of choice.
The comment in the article about hotel apps doesn’t ring true for Hilton. I find in probably 70% of occasions as a Diamond I am automatically upgraded and rarely, unless late in checking in, am I unable to choose a floor and room. Also the chat function with the front desk is usually speedy and responsive. Getting the key electronically saves messing around with the front desk and breakfast and other benefits are all detailed in the app. I’m fed up with Hilton given their poor points promotions, but credit where credit is due I find the app great to use. Unfortunately, as the USA doesn’t have the benefits of UK/EU laws limiting the commissions of credit card companies it’s no wonder the benefits in the USA are watered down, giving away top tier status. Also it is contributing to the sky high consumer prices USA customers paying.
That’s it, I’m switching to Hyatt to see how it is. Just renewed to Gold on Bonvoy and probably won’t make it to the higher status.
There’s a status match type deal on the corporate portal so I will use it to get some minimal status on Hyatt and see how it goes.
They’re slightly less available around the US but there are just enough of them. Plus there’s a Grand Hyatt that’s supposedly nice that I want to stay near COK at some point.
In my world it is Delta and Marriott. Delta upholds most of their elite promises. Marriott ignores most of their elite promises. But with more than 4,000 Marriott nights I have little chance of climbing some other elite ladder.
I advise new people at the company that picking a hotel chain to be loyal too is no longer worth the effort.
“It’s just a sign”?
Yeah, and this is just a finger.