View from the Wing reports that Marriott has instituted a new brand standard banning credit card surcharges at all of its properties in the US and Canada. While I don’t think that the practice of adding surcharges to pay by credit card was a widespread issue, this is nonetheless a very positive change. Keep in mind that this development only concerns properties in the US and Canada (in countries like Australia this will likely continue due to local laws).
View from the Wing had previously highlighted a property in Florida that was charging guests more than 2% to pay by credit card. As Gary points out, that type of practice would seem to run counter to the business interests of Marriott’s partnerships with Chase and American Express. How can you sell a guest a credit card and then tell them that they will need to pay more to use it at your property?
I share in Gary’s perturbation over credit card surcharges. Yes, businesses have to pay credit card processing fees. There are costs of accepting every type of payment method (which Gary argues in more detail). In my opinion, credit card processing fees are part of the cost of doing business. Guests who don’t need to carry cash or think about writing a check and instead pay with credit spend more (isn’t the whole premise of credit predicated on the fact that it encourages people to spend more?). If a hotel isn’t operating at a margin of better than the 2 or 3 percent credit card processing fee, there are issues more pressing than how they accept payment from guests (2020 pandemic times being a notable exception). I’m glad to see Marriott do the right thing and tell its hotels to cut the garbage fee here and charge a price for the room that covers the cost of doing business and necessary profits and stop trying to tack on hidden “gotcha” fees.
Now about those resort fees, Marriott . . . anybody want to bet on how long it is before we see at least a 2% increase in the resort fee at that Westin Fort Lauderdale?
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What is the cost to the hotel if they only use cash? Counting the dirty bills/checks at the hotel, packaging it up, getting the cash to the bank via an armor truck or someone brave enough to carry that much $$$. There is is a fee in using cash too. Lot easier, cleaner and safer to use credit cards.
We’ve been so conditioned to be Bonvoyed that Marriott actually comes off reasonable here even though this should have been obvious from the start. It’s kind of like if Marriott had said “we have a new Brand standard where nobody gets punched in the face by the front desk employee.” Hooray! My credit card nights early next year are going to push me to lifetime platinum with Marriott and the sad part is that I don’t even care.
If the CC surcharges get rolled into a resort fee, how will we know? I mean it’s either one thing or the other. The resort fee is paid by all guests regardless of payment method.
Whatever the case, cash buyers will continue to subsidize those of us who never pay cash for anything. Cash may be King, but credit has the key to the King’s treasury.
If you look at it in a slightly different way, when Discover pays the cardholder 1% to chose the payment method that will cost the merchant 3%, that seems like a clear conflict of interest, and allowing a card surcharge is the only economically efficient solution.
I love miles and points as much as the next guy but “we’re going to cut you in on our take while forbidding the merchant from doing anything to give you a counter incentive” is pretty monopolistic.
They could increase the room rate by 3% and no one would care.