Do I have any recourse if I booked a hotel because it claims to serve free breakfast, and then actually doesn't?

Question

I recently stayed at "Days Inn by Wyndham Columbus Airport", which on the Booking.com booking page (archived), in the Booking.com search results (archived), and the Wyndham website (archived) mention it serving free breakfast in one way or another:

• Booking.com: ("Breakfast" and "Breakfast included")

• Wyndham website: ("Breakfast Item" and "Free light breakfast")

However, when actually getting there, I was told that no breakfast is served and they simply offer coffee and tea — I would be hard-pressed to find someone who considers that breakfast. I asked if I could be compensated for this, and the employee told me that they couldn't offer me any compensation. If it weren't for that the hotel's page on the aforementioned websites claims that they serve free breakfast, I would not have booked this stay, so I feel like I was falsely advertised to.

Do I have any recourse in this situation, either legally, through Booking.com policies, or Wyndham policies? The hotel is located in Columbus, Ohio, USA.

Answer 1

Since it's a Wyndham chain property and the supposed benefit is advertised on the official Wyndham site, your best bet is to reach out to "corporate", meaning Wyndham itself, through their About Your Stay feedback form. It's their job to enforce brand standards and they will almost certainly compensate you, although they will likely do so in Wyndham Rewards points which may or may not be useful.

Before doing this, you'll want to sign up for Wyndham Rewards, with a status match if you have elite status elsewhere. Your complaint should provide some evidence that you raised this issue during your stay: for example, "at check-in, I asked Mr XXX/the agent checking me in about the free breakfast, he told me it was not available and did not offer any alternatives". Also mention the actual cost of your breakfast and the inconvenience of having to find it off site.

In most countries you could also raise this kind of thing with local government Fair Trading authorities, but in the US this isn't really a thing: the Better Business Bureau is a private company and completely toothless.

Answer 2

For what it is worth, I've been in a similar situation a few years ago.

The hotel's actual website did not mention breakfast, but I think their parent company's website did and the hotel had been trying to get them to remove the "breakfast included" part of the listing for a year or two. This was during Covid, but the breakfast part had closed down some time before Covid apparently.

The hotel's room-only price was cheaper than the with breakfast price, so the hotel refunded the difference and gave some small concessions (vouchers or something similar) for a local restaurant.

Answer 3

In the end, I contacted Booking.com's (through which I originally booked the hotel stay) support about this. They messaged me back saying that they contacted the hotel, but that they couldn't find any solution that me and the hotel could agree upon — not sure what this meant given that they didn't propose anything. However, they also wrote that Booking.com's customer support would look into it instead as such. A few days later I got a message saying that I had received 40,37 USD in Booking.com Wallet credit, around 25% of what I paid for the stay.

Despite this, they still advertise breakfast as being included for this hotel on Booking.com at the time of writing.

Answer 4

You can call and email corporate and explain that you intend on disputing the transaction because of "false advertisement". Ask for a partial refund and proceed to contact your bank if they do not cooperate. Explain to your bank that the product you paid for was not what you received and the company did not cooperate with your wishes. The bank will dispute the entirevcharge on your behalf. Email these photos and your receipt as evidence.