Greetings from SFO! I just arrived back from a weekend on the Big Island of Hawaii. While my brother and I had an awesome time, I can’t help but think about the bad taste that the hotel left me. The Sheraton Kona Resort is and was an overall fine place to stay; good location, killer views, and large rooms, but overall the property could use an update.
I may write a review of the property later, but I want to focus on a specific topic that really makes my blood boil: resort fees. These opaque fees typically include things like bottled water, local calls, WiFi, fitness center access, and maybe some activities that you may or may not want to use. Make no mistake, these fees are used by hotels to mask the total cost of a stay and typically range from $20-$50/night. These fees are used across hotel chains, so they’re equal opportunity offenders. The other thing about resort fees? They’re mandatory, meaning there is no employee or manager that can or will waive them.
The Sheraton Kona had a $30 a day fee, which included:
- Designer tote bag
- Complimentary Kona trolley rides
- Guided cultural and historical tour of Kiholo bay
- Hula lessons
- Lei making
- Ukulele lessons
- 2 bottles of water per day
- Mid-day refreshments by the pool
- Complementary access to hospitality room (if your room is not available for late check-out, they can check you into this room)
- Complimentary access to fitness center
- Unlimited use of lawn games
- Unlimited bicycle rental
- Unlimited local calls
- 30 min of long distance calls per day
- Complimentary use of binoculars
- Welcome lei and elixir
- Complimentary wifi
This list was not reviewed with us at check-in, probably because providing value in the fee isn’t important, but collecting revenue is. What that means is that I would need to know that midday refreshments were offered at the pool as part of the fee, then ask when, where, and what time. We were not offered the “designer tote bag” and the welcome elixir consisted of watered down juice served in cone-shaped paper cups (fancy!). This just screams we want to make this fee worthwhile, doesn’t it?
We were there for three nights, Thursday through Sunday, and many of the activities or lessons don’t happen on the weekends. The only thing on the list that was of any value is the trolly ride into town, saving us some money on an Uber/taxi. That said, it’s already free, the only thing the hotel did was arrange a stop on property. Looking further down the list, local and long distance calls is a laughable perk, wifi is already included for those with any Marriott status, and calling 2 bottles of water in a place that has excellent tap water is ridiculous. At $30/day, this might be the world’s most expensive water!
For our stay, I used points, and unlike Hyatt and Hilton, Marriott does not waive resort fees for award stays. So after three nights of resort and parking fees ($20 a night), our total bill came to $150 before taxes. Since I have to pay taxes on the resort fees, the actual out of pocket becomes about $38/night. So much for a “free stay”! Rates for this property typically go for somewhere between $139-189, making the resort fee a hidden 15-21% markup.
Even though Marriott is out of step compared to other programs, the fact that resort fees are even legal is something being challenged in court as I write this. Resort fees are becoming more prevalent, especially in the US, and as the lawsuit says that hotels collected about $3 billion dollars worth of fees in 2018.
There are some fees that can be worth it, but they’re few and far between. For instance, the St Regis New York has a $50 fee, but includes a $100 food and beverage credit and MoMa museum tickets. These kinds of inclusions are the exception.
My take
Resort fees assume that hotels know what customers want, using a one-size fits all approach. For me personally, even if the fees were clearly explained, I probably wouldn’t have used any of them because they don’t match my travel habits.
As I see it, the path forward on resort fees includes:
- Until (and if) resort fees are finally killed, Marriott needs to match their competitors and waive resort (and parking) fees for award stays. Nothing says thank you for your loyalty like a mandatory $150 hotel bill while still burning points.
- More broadly, the FTC needs to take a hard stance against resort fees and make hotels in include them in the rate they show. For a family staying for a week on their only vacation for the year, this amounts to hundreds of dollars of undisclosed fees that will likely alter their ability to pay for other things on their trip. Resort fees aren’t transparent and don’t show the full cost of a stay, which again, is the intent. The Department of Transportation did this several years ago with the airlines, which is why the price you see when searching is the price you pay (though with basic economy, it now includes less). Further, hotels like the Sheraton Kona are charging the fees and not providing additional service beyond what you would already expect at a resort in Hawaii. Resort fees cheapen the overall resort experience by nickel and diming customers with fees they didn’t know about.
