Most planners would agree that the practice of adding extra fees to hotel room rates has gotten out of hand. While some hotels are able to negotiate lower or eliminate these fees, many won’t budge.
Just do the math, says Shontae White, senior manager of global event operations for the Association of Certified Anti-Money Laundering Professionals. He gave the example of a hotel in the Bahamas. “They added a 21% fee, which includes VAT and local taxes, a $65 resort fee plus 10% of the room rate, and a $21.78 service fee (which includes housekeeping and porters). When you add the $239 price to When you put all that on, it becomes a very expensive room.
Here are a few other examples of unexpected hotel and vendor surcharges that planners shared with Skift Meetings.
AV equipment transportation
Diana Bryant, director of meetings, events and education for the Tennessee Valley Public Power Association, was shocked when an audiovisual company charged her hundreds of dollars to ship equipment from other parts of the country.
“This is a large, well-known AV company,” she said. “The equipment was digital floor signage, which seems to be standard at many events today, but it was not available in the area. We could have purchased it ourselves for the same price they charged us to rent it.
There is a fee for switching
Kerry Leigh Kerr, senior director of global accounts at HelmsBriscoe, said: “There are a lot of fees added to hotel contracts now, and you really have to be careful.” What’s her latest experience? Electricity charges/charges charged by hotels for turning on switches or using electrical sockets.
Sustainable development costs
A growing number of hotels and destinations are charging fees to cover the costs of protecting the environment, with Mexico leading the way. There are actually four separate taxes – Mexico’s tourist tax, Quintana Roo’s alternative tourist tax (Visitax), airport tax and environmental/sanitation tax.
For example, Kyra Canty, event coordinator at Paragon Events, reports: “When hosting an event at a resort in Mexico, there is an environmental tax of $1.56 per room per day.”
Refrigeration fee
Kelly Fuller, senior event experience manager at Meetings & Incentives Worldwide, Inc., said just when she thought she had seen it all, “I hosted a large event at a hotel for about 800 people. Incentives, if you happen to put anything in, there’s a fee. The price is about $20, and that’s definitely the most frustrating charge I’ve ever come across.
union dues
Make a Statement Events President Lauren Halpern’s least favorite thing about fees is that they are absolutely non-negotiable. “I really hate paying union fees to have someone supervise our team setting up or running loading lifts.”
Bed linen fee
“One of the things I’m seeing happening is that hotels are moving away from linens as a sustainability measure,” said Jill Roth, owner and event architect of Jill Roth Events. “Now you have to pay to rent them that were previously included in the sheets inside.”
minimum double
Tracy Breithaupt, director of events at Evergreen Education Group, has twice received new dining-related accusations: “Both hotels gave us a room area but then said, in addition to meeting the following conditions, This room area also requires a minimum catering requirement: Convention Center. We cannot meet both minimum requirements; therefore, we may not be able to bring events to the city because we need rooms to fill our block.
