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In 2007, we took our first major trip away from western New York in 20 years and spent two weeks an hour away from Calgary, Alberta.
After two weeks in Kananaskis Country, Banff, Calgary, and other spots all over southern Alberta, we came away with the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly:
The Good
- Alberta is like Texas, only without the anger: Friendly people everywhere
- Amazing Canadian Rockies contrasting with vast flat prairies and never-ending views of canola, buckwheat, and other crops
- The only place that could convince me to purchase and wear a cowboy hat (they are functional after all)
The Bad
- A Dodge Charger is considered a “small” rental car on Alberta’s vast paved (and frequently unpaved) roadways
- Calgary’s love of photo radar and red light cameras, which must sustain the city’s revenue base
- You’re in “pop” country, and you’d better like Pepsi because Coca-Cola is hard to find. A “can of pop” on a menu means exactly that. Ask for ice.
- There are no bumper stickers in Alberta — there are “deckles.” I contemplated phoning the CBC to find out what a deckle was until I realized they meant “decal.”
The Ugly
- Internet access in hotels we stayed at was either non-existent, slow, or erratic.
Now before you say vacations should mean a break from the Internet, know that for those of us who spend a lot of free time taking care of websites like this, that is the equivalent of asking someone to take a vacation from electricity. I don’t do camping.
It turns out my experience is becoming less common, as hotels realize sharing a DSL line among 50+ guests on a Linksys wireless router stuck on a shelf in the lobby is just not going to cut it. Instead, hotels and motels not only in Canada but across the United States have beefed up their broadband… and discovered they could make a killing by overcharging guests to access it.
Now consumers in growing numbers are deciding the “daily fee” for broadband common on hotel bills, often ranging from $10-15 a day, is a dealbreaker. They are taking their business elsewhere, even if it means foregoing a luxury hotel to stay in a middle-of-the-road chain with the screaming kids in the pool downstairs, as long as the Internet is free.
USA Today reports that for some consumers, charging any fee for Internet access at a hotel is unacceptable.
Frequent business traveler Randall Blinn refuses to stay at hotels that charge for Internet access.“It really irritates me that the more expensive hotels charge for Internet access when the inexpensive hotels provide it for free,” says Blinn, a computer consultant in Louisville.
Blinn is one of many travelers disturbed by hotels that charge a daily fee for Internet access. He says he books less-expensive hotels with free Internet access, even if his company will pay for a more expensive hotel that charges for online access.
Some 40 percent of hotel chains in the United States have a daily fee for Internet access. For the hotels that charge, it’s just another source of revenue, just like charging for in-room telephone calls that consumers learned to avoid by using their cell phones.
For Blinn, who has spent about 50 nights in hotels this year, any charge is unacceptable. If he must stay at a hotel that charges, he says, he leaves the hotel for a fast-food restaurant or a coffee shop that provides free Internet access.
A few weeks ago, Blinn says, he spent a lot of time in the concierge lounge of the Marriott hotel in Salt Lake City, because the hotel was charging for Internet access in rooms but not in the lounge.
Some consumers have found methods to avoid the daily fee, ranging from arguments with hotel personnel demanding that daily fees be waived (one went as far as to turn in all of the personal care items left in his room, which he argued cost more than Internet access did anyway), to strategically choosing to stay adjacent to lobbies or other public areas where free Wi-Fi was available, hoping to jump on the wireless signal from their rooms. Others bring wireless data plans from their cell phone provider, and use those networks for wireless access, bypassing the hotel altogether.
Some hotels automatically waive fees for their most frequent guests, typically enrolled in premium guest club memberships. But for people like Blinn, having to pay for Internet access for 10-14 days of hotel stays isn’t worth it to “earn” free Internet. He simply avoids any hotel that charges for access, and let’s them know why.
Jeff Weinstein, editor in chief of Hotels magazine, a trade publication, suggests that kind of complaining will probably put an end to the “daily Internet access fee.”
“I think the message from consumers about this is getting louder, and you will continue to see more (hotel) brands move toward free access over the next year or two,” he told the newspaper.
Below the jump, learn which hotel chains charge guests for Internet access, and which do not.
| Some of the nation’s biggest hotel groups charge guests for Internet service in their rooms. Here, by brand, are the policies¹ and number of U.S. hotels of 40 chains. Some may not equip all rooms with Internet service, or may not charge frequent or higher-paying guests. | |||
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| Fee | No fee | ||
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| Clarion² | 163 | Aloft | 27 |
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| Conrad | 3 | Andaz | 1 |
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| Crowne Plaza | 159 | Ascend Collection³ | 22 |
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| Doubletree | 200 | Baymont Inn & Suites | 233 |
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| Embassy Suites | 192 | Best Western | 2,078 |
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| Four Seasons | 28 | Cambria Suites | 14 |
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| Gaylord | 4 | Candlewood Suites | 228 |
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| Grand Hyatt | 11 | Comfort Inn | 1,461 |
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| Hilton² | 254 | Comfort Suites | 576 |
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| Hyatt Regency | 100 | Country Inns & Suites | 460 |
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| InterContinental | 23 | Courtyard by Marriott | 747 |
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| JW Marriott | 22 | Days Inn | 1,681 |
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| Kimpton | 46 | Econo Lodge | 796 |
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| Le Meridien | 10 | Element | 4 |
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| Marriott | 327 | Fairfield Inn | 589 |
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| Morgans | 10 | Four Points by Sheraton | 95 |
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| Motel 6² | 948 | Hampton Inn | 1,640 |
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| Novotel | 1 | Hawthorn Suites | 87 |
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| Omni | 36 | Hilton Garden Inn | 431 |
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| Park Hyatt | 4 | Holiday Inn Express | 1,690 |
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| Red Roof² | 344 | Holiday Inn | 758 |
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| Renaissance | 77 | Homewood Suites | 263 |
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| Ritz-Carlton | 60 | Hotel Indigo | 23 |
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| Sheraton | 203 | Howard Johnson | 348 |
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| Sofitel | 9 | Hyatt Summerfield Suites | 30 |
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| Hyatt Place | 138 | ||
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| St. Regis | 8 | Knights Inn | 299 |
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| Studio 6 | 51 | La Quinta | 738 |
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| The Luxury Collection | 14 | Luxe Worldwide³ | 56 |
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| W | 25 | MainStay Suites | 37 |
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| Waldorf Astoria Collection | 13 | Microtel Inns & Suites | 299 |
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| Westin | 111 | Quality Inn | 942 |
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| Radisson | 141 | ||
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| Ramada | 547 | ||
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| Red Lion | 45 | ||
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| Residence Inn | 567 | ||
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| Rodeway Inn³ | 362 | ||
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| Shilo Inns | 52 | ||
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| Sleep Inn | 386 | ||
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| Sonesta Collection³ | 3 | ||
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| SpringHill Suites | 226 | ||
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| Staybridge Suites | 154 | ||
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| Suburban Extended Stay | 64 | ||
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| Super 8 | 1,889 | ||
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| TownePlace Suites | 173 | ||
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| Travelodge | 365 | ||
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| Wingate by Wyndham | 161 | ||
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| Wyndham Hotels and Resorts³ | 59 | ||
| 1 = fee may also provide guests with other services; 2 = no charge at some hotels; 3 = some hotels charge (one in Sonesta chain charges) Source: Compiled by USA TODAY from information provided by hotels |
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I recently stayed at the Hampton Manhattan Times Square North, which I picked for location, price, free breakfast and free internet. In the end, I didn’t take the laptop but it turned out I was able to access the internet at a couple of free terminals near the breakfast room (excellent for short-term access like checking e-mail but don’t expect to spend more time than you would in a phone booth because you can’t sit down). If you’re thinking of staying in NY City this place is excellent value. It’s interesting that different brands of the same parent company have… Read more »
It may not seem like a big deal to the hotels, but for frequent travelers those hotels can lose a fair amount of business just because of a simple stupid policy that probably doesn’t “net” them all that much more money. If I were to stay at a hotel that charged for wi-fi access (and I actually wanted to use it), I would probably tell them at the end of my stay that I won’t be returning because of their policy, petty though it may seem. Hotels (unlike motels) are about services and convenience. Many services are free (such as… Read more »
Seems like every time I stay in a hotel, they want you to pay for internet access. I stayed at one that wanted $10/day! I said no thanks!
This article does bring up a few comments that I have myself. 1: My last trip to Canada, I was staying in a Hotel. They provided everyone with free Wi-Fi, however the Wi-Fi was running off of Linksys routers (one per every 3 rooms), had a lack of DHCP space every night which meant everyone had to get on as soon as possible or leave their PCs on to get an IP address, and the entire place was running off of a single Bell T1 line, which meant that despite fighting for DHCP space on the network, we were fighting… Read more »
Howdy! Not everyone in Texas is “angry”! We may have a different way of doing things out here, but I don’t know very many people that express a lot of anger, in fact a whole bunch more will go out of their way to help. (The media tends to highlight the more angry folk but it really is rare.) And don’t forget we are in this fight with you, don’t put us down! Back to topic: When I was in San Francisco a few months ago, I think I remember the hotel I stayed at charging around $10 a day… Read more »
I would classify us Texans and more feisty than angry. We’re polite and chivalrous, but we don’t take to kindly to being pushed around. 😉
I know we have a ton of readers in Texas… it was a joke. 🙂
Besides, you guys got summer this year and we didn’t, so you owe us.
Holy cow, you are from Texas? Only steers and …. are from Texas… 🙂 Just joking, gotta love Full Metal Jacket and the Gunny, lol.
People from the South are very nice and courteous for the most part. Northerners, well, it is hard to tell especially in the cities. 🙂
“Besides, you guys got summer this year and we didn’t, so you owe us.”
You flipped? I don’t call massive 100 degree days in a row as summer or
nice. I have been to Texas more times then Phil can count and the people
are very nice…So are their beef steaks. It just don’t get any better! Phil look
at your calendar…. 90 days or less we can have 3 feet of snow on the
ground. 🙂
What’s wrong with snow? 😀 Sure it’s a pain to drive in and shovel (yes I don’t use a snow blower/plowing service), I find it relaxing when it isn’t windy like it is 90% of the time here during the winter. I wonder how many wind storms I’ll get here this year, and how many times the lights will start to flicker as well. The blizzard that came through last year was nasty besides nearly knocking out power. Fall and Winter are the windy seasons here. Spring and summer are generally quite calm and normally steaming hot, though this summer… Read more »
Mr. Smith nothing wrong with some winter. Our growing season will be
over in less then 30 days. This year it was a joke….That weird mold we
get from time to time. Nuked the tomatoes, cucumbers, and potatoes.
Storms we had plenty of wind. I just thought I would remind Phil just
how close winter is. He loves walking in cold slush. His idea of summer
and mine differ somewhat but it is all fun
Heh, speaking of mold I did have a bit of food spoil due to the humidity (a few weeks ago the humidity got to my refrigerator. I had to use a mini fridge and a 16 year old freezer in my garage with tons of ice to save my food). When that happened I wound up setting my programmable thermostat keep the air conditioner running for most of the day, cooling the house to 72-74 degrees. Sure, the electric bill did go up a little bit, but doing that did repair my refrigerator from the iced up coils in the… Read more »
Mr. Smith I just thought I would to try to lighten things up
a bit. The ISP’s said fall and they meant it. These people
are going to do it and nobody is going to stop them.
Can you refresh me on what this is again? Is this about the Time Warner caps that they’re working on or is this something else?
Mr. Smith my fault. I had to say something a little on topic so phil does not get mad.
The ISP”S said they would do the cap and tier in the fall and it is now fall.
They found out meters are not and were never needed and actually a mistake.
TOS= We can change anything we want anytime we want to.
Just what I thought. Of course a lot of companies love to hide behind their “wall of text” that I’m sure hardly anyone reads as it contains the same language to get changes done. I’m personally starting to hate such a practice considering how overused it is now. Personally, I believe that people will be more likely to read the TOS as well as follow it if they remove 90% of what is in there (the legal crap) and make it more straight forward and direct to the users. Heck I actually use a TOS analyzing program to pick out… Read more »