I’ve written before that time and service may be the ultimate reward. You could interpret this as an explicit option in a rewards catalog, i.e. special customer care phone number or exclusive life-hack, or as the quality of execution within a loyalty program that creates this value for a program member.
Today Marriott Rewards had its chance to demonstrate how it could deliver time and service to me, but was trumped soundly by Hotels.com. Let me explain.
I had meetings in Orlando today and needed to find a hotel room on short notice. I happened to have a complimentary room night certificate from a Marriott property resulting from a less than perfect stay last fall. Through the Marriott Rewards member site, I found a hotel convenient to my meetings and called them directly to see if I could book a room and use my certificate. The manager was pleasant but could not help me. Unable to book my room, he offered a toll-free number as rooms reserved with this type of certificate had to be booked via “corporate”.
A brief call with the corporate office left me feeling like an interpreter at the UN. I’m bilingual, but still prefer to be able to receive service in my home country in my home language. Persecute me if you wish, but I think most of us understand that native language customer care reps are preferable for most people. Dell now offers a premium service package that is highlighted by “US based customer service”. Enough said on that.
Lacking resolution, I called the Marriott property again and ,after having no luck, gave a try to a second toll-free number. At a certain point, I realized I was running up against deadlines and simply could not spare any more time just to take advantage of a free night.
Then I remembered that I had 2 free nights with Welcome Rewards, the frequent stay program sponsored by Hotels.com. I went to the Hotels.com website, found the same hotel, booked my room using the free night and was all wrapped up in less than five minutes.
E-commerce sites like Hotels.com, its parent Expedia, Travelocity and Orbitz aggregate travel inventory for resale. They also qualify as disinter-mediators of the hospitality business. It’s one thing for the big hotel chains to allow an intermediary to become a go-to site for consumers, but quite another when the intermediary’s loyalty brand delivers a better customer experience.
Lots of big words here, but the important message is that Marriott should have found a way to deliver time, service, and value to me today. Hotels.com sure did.