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digitalmars.D - DConf hotel poor QoS

reply =?UTF-8?B?THXDrXM=?= Marques <luis luismarques.eu> writes:
I'm not impressed with the conference hotel so far. Here's a 
summary of my interactions with them:

Feb-6: I send an email to reservierungen nh-hotels.com with the 
keyword D-Conf in the subject line, as indicated in the 
conference page. I ask for a reservation between 30-04-2018 and 
6-05-2018 (6 nights), since it was cheaper to stay an extra 
night, as the plane ticket that day was less expensive.

Feb-9: I get an email asking to which hotel I would like to 
reserve. I hadn't notice it was a chain of hotels, but I'm 
surprised the special keyword didn't let them determine that 
automatically. I reply that I want a reservation for the NH 
München Messe, with the DConf conference special rate.

Feb-13: I send them an email saying I continue to await their 
reply.

Feb-14: They reply with a proposal. They have a different rate 
for 30.04.2018, because that's not included in the conference 
special. Fine. Here I had some other expenses on my credit card, 
so I decide to wait some days for that to sort out.

Feb-20: They reply again with a seemingly similar email (not 
really! more on that later).

Feb-21: I reply to confirm that I want to book. I send them my CC 
number and name, and ask if they need the CVV too.

Feb-23: They say they need the expiry date. (why didn't they just 
say what CC details they needed in the original email?...). I 
reply with the needed data.

Mar-1: I ask if my reservation has been made

Mar-2: They confirm my reservation. Unfortunately, it seems that 
on the Feb-20 email they had changed the reservation dates to 
"From 01.05.2018 to 05.05.2018 and from 05.05.2018 to 
06.05.2018". I hadn't noticed that. So one night is missing. I 
reply to them explaining the situation and asking for a change.

Mar-9: I send them an email saying I continue to await a 
correction to my reservation.
Mar 09 2018
next sibling parent reply Jonathan M Davis <newsgroup.d jmdavisprog.com> writes:
On Friday, March 09, 2018 15:26:24 Luís Marques via Digitalmars-d wrote:

 I'm not impressed with the conference hotel so far. Here's a
 summary of my interactions with them:

 Feb-6: I send an email to reservierungen nh-hotels.com with the
 keyword D-Conf in the subject line, as indicated in the
 conference page. I ask for a reservation between 30-04-2018 and
 6-05-2018 (6 nights), since it was cheaper to stay an extra
 night, as the plane ticket that day was less expensive.

 Feb-9: I get an email asking to which hotel I would like to
 reserve. I hadn't notice it was a chain of hotels, but I'm
 surprised the special keyword didn't let them determine that
 automatically. I reply that I want a reservation for the NH
 München Messe, with the DConf conference special rate.

 Feb-13: I send them an email saying I continue to await their
 reply.

 Feb-14: They reply with a proposal. They have a different rate
 for 30.04.2018, because that's not included in the conference
 special. Fine. Here I had some other expenses on my credit card,
 so I decide to wait some days for that to sort out.

 Feb-20: They reply again with a seemingly similar email (not
 really! more on that later).

 Feb-21: I reply to confirm that I want to book. I send them my CC
 number and name, and ask if they need the CVV too.

 Feb-23: They say they need the expiry date. (why didn't they just
 say what CC details they needed in the original email?...). I
 reply with the needed data.

 Mar-1: I ask if my reservation has been made

 Mar-2: They confirm my reservation. Unfortunately, it seems that
 on the Feb-20 email they had changed the reservation dates to
 "From 01.05.2018 to 05.05.2018 and from 05.05.2018 to
 06.05.2018". I hadn't noticed that. So one night is missing. I
 reply to them explaining the situation and asking for a change.

 Mar-9: I send them an email saying I continue to await a
 correction to my reservation.


I had similar problems (though they never asked for my CC number via e-mail,
and I don't know what I would have done if they had, since I won't give that
via e-mail). After I _finally_ got an e-mail with a reservation number, and
they'd screwed up the dates, rather than play more e-mail tag, I called one
of the numbers listed in that e-mail and (after getting passed around a fair
bit) managed to talk to someone who could speak and English and fix my
reservation - and who I could ask how I was supposed to pay, since they'd
never asked for any form of money in any of the e-mails i got sent (so I
gave my CC number over the phone). I don't know what their normal rates are,
so I don't know how much money going through this process saved me, but I
suspect that it would have been far easier to just book the room through
their website and pay the extra money than deal with playing e-mail tag and
then getting passed around on the phone until I managed to get to the right
person to fix my reservation. I did finally get it all sorted out though.

- Jonathan M Davis
Mar 09 2018
next sibling parent reply =?UTF-8?B?THXDrXM=?= Marques <luis luismarques.eu> writes:
On Friday, 9 March 2018 at 17:07:50 UTC, Jonathan M Davis wrote:

 I had similar problems


How do these people stay in business??
Mar 09 2018
next sibling parent Jonathan M Davis <newsgroup.d jmdavisprog.com> writes:
On Friday, March 09, 2018 17:12:31 Luís Marques via Digitalmars-d wrote:

 On Friday, 9 March 2018 at 17:07:50 UTC, Jonathan M Davis wrote:

 I had similar problems


 How do these people stay in business??


Probably by normally having folks use their website rather than e-mail them,
and if it's rare enough for folks to e-mail in like this, they don't have to
actually handle it well to stay in business. Personally, I think that it's
quite weird to be e-mailing in to make reservations. My guess is that we
were told to e-mail in, because their website probably doesn't have a way to
indicate that you want a special rate like this. Still, I was quite
surprised at how slow they were in responding to e-mails, and I was just
about to give up on getting a reservation that way when I finally got the
e-mail saying that they'd made one (with the wrong dates though).

I was also surprised that I had as much trouble getting to someone on the
phone who could help me as I did. Given that they're an international hotel
chain, I would have expected more of their folks on the phone to speak
English. That problem would be more understandable if they were just in
Germany, but they're not.

- Jonathan M Davis
Mar 09 2018
prev sibling parent Walter Bright <newshound2 digitalmars.com> writes:
On 3/9/2018 9:12 AM, Luís Marques wrote:

 On Friday, 9 March 2018 at 17:07:50 UTC, Jonathan M Davis wrote:

 I had similar problems


 
 How do these people stay in business??


I wonder that every time I deal with a business that makes it hard to send them 
my money.
Mar 09 2018
prev sibling parent Walter Bright <newshound2 digitalmars.com> writes:
I just now booked it through Expedia. Didn't have any problems.
Mar 09 2018
prev sibling next sibling parent reply =?UTF-8?Q?Ali_=c3=87ehreli?= <acehreli yahoo.com> writes:
On 03/09/2018 07:26 AM, Luís Marques wrote:

 conference hotel


Somewhat related, I booked my room at the same hotel through Expedia for 
a cheaper price than DConf price. I'm sure it could go lower if I 
seached on other booking sites. (Expedia did increase the price about $3 
while I was clicking through with the BS "the fare has just went up; 
this happens sometimes". :) )

Off topic, booking all legs of your flight individually may be much much 
cheaper at least on Expedia. They first quoted I think $1800 for the 
multi-city San Francisco - Istanbul - Munich and back. The same trip was 
about $1100 when I booked everything individually, still on Expedia. (I 
am being approximate on the prices but the difference was very large 
like that.)

Ali
Mar 09 2018
next sibling parent Jonathan M Davis <newsgroup.d jmdavisprog.com> writes:
On Friday, March 09, 2018 10:08:58 Ali Çehreli via Digitalmars-d wrote:

 On 03/09/2018 07:26 AM, Luís Marques wrote:
  > conference hotel

 Somewhat related, I booked my room at the same hotel through Expedia for
 a cheaper price than DConf price. I'm sure it could go lower if I
 seached on other booking sites. (Expedia did increase the price about $3
 while I was clicking through with the BS "the fare has just went up;
 this happens sometimes". :) )


If that's the case, I'd suggest not even bothering with e-mailing the hotel,
since it clearly doesn't work very well.

- Jonathan M Davis
Mar 09 2018
prev sibling parent reply Mike Parker <aldacron gmail.com> writes:
On Friday, 9 March 2018 at 18:08:58 UTC, Ali Çehreli wrote:


 Off topic, booking all legs of your flight individually may be 
 much much cheaper at least on Expedia. They first quoted I 
 think $1800 for the multi-city San Francisco - Istanbul - 
 Munich and back. The same trip was about $1100 when I booked 
 everything individually, still on Expedia. (I am being 
 approximate on the prices but the difference was very large 
 like that.)


I booked both legs directly through Lufthansa and decided to fly 
into Frankfurt since it's cheaper than the direct flight to 
Munich. The flight there is costing us about $450 ea. for Basic 
Economy, non-stop. The BE seats on the way back are $600+, so we 
booked premium economy for a little over $800 ea. instead. For my 
wife and I together, $2700 round trip. Then I planned our trip 
around that: 5 nights in Frankfurt, 7 in Munich, and 3 in Berlin, 
with two Deutsche Bahn rides and an EasyJet flight in between.
Mar 09 2018
parent reply Martin Tschierschke <mt smartdolphin.de> writes:
On Saturday, 10 March 2018 at 04:55:02 UTC, Mike Parker wrote:

 On Friday, 9 March 2018 at 18:08:58 UTC, Ali Çehreli wrote:


[...]

 I booked both legs directly through Lufthansa and decided to 
 fly into Frankfurt since it's cheaper than the direct flight to 
 Munich. The flight there is costing us about $450 ea. for Basic 
 Economy, non-stop. The BE seats on the way back are $600+, so 
 we booked premium economy for a little over $800 ea. instead. 
 For my wife and I together, $2700 round trip. Then I planned 
 our trip around that: 5 nights in Frankfurt, 7 in Munich, and 3 
 in Berlin, with two Deutsche Bahn rides and an EasyJet flight 
 in between.


Sorry to say this, but you are missing the most beautiful German 
city: Hamburg :-)
Have a got journey!
p.s. I am dreaming of the day DConf being in Hamburg...
This is the location of our annual event:
http://www.hotel-hafen-hamburg.de/uploads/pics/hhh_tagungsraeume_elbkuppel_visual_03.jpg
Mar 12 2018
parent Chris <wendlec tcd.ie> writes:
On Monday, 12 March 2018 at 10:31:36 UTC, Martin Tschierschke 
wrote:

 On Saturday, 10 March 2018 at 04:55:02 UTC, Mike Parker wrote:



 Sorry to say this, but you are missing the most beautiful 
 German city: Hamburg :-)
 Have a got journey!
 p.s. I am dreaming of the day DConf being in Hamburg...
 This is the location of our annual event:
 http://www.hotel-hafen-hamburg.de/uploads/pics/hhh_tagungsraeume_elbkuppel_visual_03.jpg


1. Step: Propose Hamburg the next time
2. Step: See if there is a company that is willing to sponsor the 
event

If it were for the beauty of a city or town alone we might as 
well have DConf in Rothenburg ob der Tauber [1] or in Görlitz 
[2]. Sure Munich ain't too bad when it comes to architecture, the 
nightlife is just a bit boring ;)

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rothenburg_ob_der_Tauber
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6rlitz
Mar 13 2018
prev sibling next sibling parent reply Adam Wilson <flyboynw gmail.com> writes:
I booked online. I need a different room than the Conference Rate. But 
while I was there I did notice that the online rate for the conference 
room was the same as quoted on the conference site (89EUR).

-- 
Adam Wilson
IRC: LightBender
import quiet.dlang.dev;
Mar 09 2018
parent Mike Parker <aldacron gmail.com> writes:
On Saturday, 10 March 2018 at 04:24:49 UTC, Adam Wilson wrote:

 I booked online. I need a different room than the Conference 
 Rate. But while I was there I did notice that the online rate 
 for the conference room was the same as quoted on the 
 conference site (89EUR).


I booked via nh-hotels.com, signed up for a membership, and paid 
in advance for 2 adults in a standard room (no breakfast) at 
~69EUR.
Mar 09 2018
prev sibling next sibling parent aberba <karabutaworld gmail.com> writes:
On Friday, 9 March 2018 at 15:26:24 UTC, Luís Marques wrote:

 I'm not impressed with the conference hotel so far. Here's a 
 summary of my interactions with them:

 [...]


It might as well be your are talking with different employees 
changing shift. "The nightmare in customer support"... and they 
don't have a system to track previous discussions easily.
Mar 11 2018
prev sibling parent reply =?UTF-8?B?THXDrXM=?= Marques <luis luismarques.eu> writes:
On Friday, 9 March 2018 at 15:26:24 UTC, Luís Marques wrote:

 Mar-9: I send them an email saying I continue to await a 
 correction to my reservation.


Mar-12: I get an email saying that "the event is fully booked for 
the dates requested" and they suggest an alternative rate of 93€. 
I follow Mike's lead and book it using Expedia for less than 64€.
Mar 12 2018
parent reply Mengu <mengukagan gmail.com> writes:
On Monday, 12 March 2018 at 19:30:06 UTC, Luís Marques wrote:

 On Friday, 9 March 2018 at 15:26:24 UTC, Luís Marques wrote:

 Mar-9: I send them an email saying I continue to await a 
 correction to my reservation.


 Mar-12: I get an email saying that "the event is fully booked 
 for the dates requested" and they suggest an alternative rate 
 of 93€. I follow Mike's lead and book it using Expedia for less 
 than 64€.


have they refunded you for the previous booking?
Mar 12 2018
parent =?UTF-8?B?THXDrXM=?= Marques <luis luismarques.eu> writes:
On Tuesday, 13 March 2018 at 06:41:03 UTC, Mengu wrote:

 On Monday, 12 March 2018 at 19:30:06 UTC, Luís Marques wrote:

 On Friday, 9 March 2018 at 15:26:24 UTC, Luís Marques wrote:

 Mar-9: I send them an email saying I continue to await a 
 correction to my reservation.


 Mar-12: I get an email saying that "the event is fully booked 
 for the dates requested" and they suggest an alternative rate 
 of 93€. I follow Mike's lead and book it using Expedia for 
 less than 64€.


 have they refunded you for the previous booking?


I only booked through Expedia the extra day that they forgot to 
book.
Mar 13 2018