Episode 12: Hilton Horrors!
Show Highlights
Rob Cairns talks about why the Hilton Hotel should be avoided especially the one in Niagara On The Lake Canada. They just do not care about their customers.
Show Notes
Rob Cairns, I’m the founder, CEO and chief creator of amazing ideas at stunning digital marketing. I haven’t done one of these Canadian rants in a while. And I thought. I should actually do one because I need to share some experiences. I titled this podcast. And what it has to do with is to take off of Hilton honors, which is the Hiltons. Honor system for frequent travelers to Hilton Hotels, and I called this episode Hilton Horse for Big Reason. At the end of April, we stayed at the Hilton in Niagara-on-the-lake, checked in on the 29th of April, checked out on the 30th. The in hotel experience was actually really good to give them credit. But the billing experience was an absolute disaster. They put through my deposit. Which cleared back because there was nothing wrong with the. They charged me the appropriate amount to my credit card for the hotel. And then on May the 1st, the day after we checked out, they charged, they charged my credit card again for the cost. So that means when it’s couple things here, either their automated system screwed up or their nighttime audit person screwed up. Or and this is, in my personal opinion, there was fraud involved and somebody tried to defraud me. And I’m a little ticked off because I reached out to Hilton and their accounting person. They told me there was nothing wrong. And then when I called them back four days later to find out why this extra charge incurred, they ignored my phone call. They didn’t return it. Assistant general manager only called me back after I jumped on social and screamed at Hilton Hotels Twitter. Yeah, by the way, I should tell you corporate in the hotel industry is not any good because the customer service reps don’t have access to the billing system, nor did the Twitter accounts, nor do they really care what their franchisees do. That is a problem. Could you imagine McDonald’s not caring how the franchise E representative, the brand or Coca-Cola or Pizza Hut or Domino’s? And so on and so on. But the whole hotel industry seems to take a hands off approach and say. They’re all individually operating. It’s not our problem. This is the. Wrong way to manage a franchise in the brand. Anyway, the assistant general manager, who I’m not going to name by names at the Niagara-on-the-lake Hilton Garden, give me good service. She proceeded to tell me how I was wrong and how the hotel was right and it was my bank’s fault and Bah Bah Bah Bah Bah. That’s really sweet and nice. By the time I was done, I ended up getting my bank MasterCard to reverse the charge, but I invested over 20 hours into this because Hilton. Screwed up. Very simple. And they still don’t take responsibility and all their Twitter account offered me was 10,000 Hilton points. What’s applied to my account? What a joke that gets me nothing. Not even a cup of coffee. If you’re gonna say you’re sorry, first of all, own it. Say you’re sorry. And give me something of value like based on what happened A1 night stay would have been probably appropriate based on the amount of time I put in this solving this, but they don’t. See it that way. So what I would encourage people is, first of all, the billing experience is part of the entire stay experience. And the other thing I would encourage people is never to stay in a Hilton Hotel. Again, because they. Obviously don’t care about the customers, even from a corporate level. It’s a big problem. And if you don’t care about your. Customers, why am I? Gonna give you my business. There’s other change. Marriotts and Wyndhams and so on. So find one of those, even IHG. Had a problem with them some time ago and their general manager of the hotel took responsibility. And solved the problem. Hilton, they don’t even care if I come back. They don’t even. Care that they. They left a one star Google review. They didn’t even answer the review. They don’t know how to manage customer expectations and they have no clue. Somebody needs to give their head a shake. Stay out of Hilton. Certainly out the Hilton Garden in Niagara on the lake and find another hotel chain. Hilton Horrors, I say. Rob Cairns CEO and founder and chief creator of amazing ideas sharing my personal opinion about Hilton Horse, I should say Hilton hotels have a great night. Bye for now.
