Insiders

I was on chat for 3 years. They never refilled ranks and let us go to 17 people handling the entire website. With a broken system that doesn't work. Then they kill chat and tell us that we will be going back to the phone since cases were too low. Apparently not, Marriott never cared about chat. I was fired for being late due to a medical condition. Take your business elsewhere, Marriott is not worth your money.

Keeping up with a comment I posted several months ago. Marriott has kept up the steady pace of 10 mil cases a month. They have blown past the 200 mil case mark in 20 months. Extra people are being pulled from other departments just to handle cases. This chicky left the nest at just the right time.

i just resigned from marriott. i can no longer work for a company who tells me that i cannot call a guest back, or a hotel to help a guest. or how i am always doing it wrong, yet my guests are completely satisfied. bonus, omg, so funny, since the merger, nope, maybe once, maybe.
i take way too long to take care of my guests, i have had to reopen cases and argue and fight with everyone, to get the right thing done. have gone to oca on more than one occasion.
funny thing is, the guests that i had to take there, the resolution was exactly, or more than what i thought it should have been.
but not being able to call out, nope, done.
our guests are rarely taken care of, told that they cannot be helped, hung up on, cases closed , no resolution, and leaving for hyatt and hilton some of them.

i would also have loved a direct line.

the best i am going to do now, is send a 7 page letter to mr marriott and arne, with 2 pages of guests that they can call and talk to , sad to say, i honestly doubt anything will be resoved .

https://www.gofundme.com/lawsuit-against-marriott

Hi XXXX,

As you have informed us that you are represented by an attorney, we are unable to discuss this matter further with you. Please advise your attorney to contact Marriott at the following address:

Marriott International, Inc.
10400 Fernwood Road, Dept. 52/923.27
Bethesda, MD 20817
USA

Best,
Beth

Joined Marriott insiders (https://insiders.marriott.com) as that was supposed to get you insiders information and faster problem resolution. All I got was faster response that I am wrong and that I have been downgraded after 11 years at the highest level and a lifetime promise from Bill Marriott broken. #Bonvoyed ! Same garbage different channel - PS thanks for the matching program rewards will now try that !

Many customers are upset with our services and so are the employees. To the point we monitor this website and document all complaints. After leaving Marriott after 12 years I can tell you no one has a clue what they are doing in the last two years trainings are now just power points with poor explaontion or interaction supervisors have little to no clue or power to helping just advise policies and knowledge articales Most people who take calls are back to back and so stressed about being on the phone to the point we are leaving for other jobs because there is no way to make bonus without killing your self or screwing guest into reservations for stats. Marriott is so obessed with what employees wear in a call center and abessent policies that there is no time to fix the real issue the program we use it is always having issues because corners cut to save money. I would advise to not work or stay at marriotts as it's nothing more then a monopoly game for corporate rats. You've lost your customers and employees loyalty.

Starwood amazed me. How well they treated there employors and guests. I worked there for over 2 years under the starwood terms. SINCE MARRIOTT AUG 9TH? 18' Marriott just completely ruined everything. The employees aren't shit and the guests arnt shit. all they care about is getting people in and out of the hotel and on and off the phone.

See the discussions section. I'm a Marriott CEC associate (<1year). AMA.

I was a Marriott International employee for 7+ years. I loved my job, loved helping guest as much as we could. I say we, due to my former colleagues going above and beyond for our guest how we were so accustomed to do. Once I heard Marriott & Starwood were going to merge I thought to myself oh that's awesome! More hotel options to provide our guest. This was back in October 2016 when we heard about about this great change and opportunity. Few months later we get training on the new system we're supposed to acquire. Training used to be held in meeting rooms in the past and lasted anywhere from 3days to 4weeks depending on the new system or department. This new system training was held remotely, at our desk from someone in a different location and lasted about 2 days. I understand with new software there has to be glitches. You'd think it'd be all ironed out before letting us use it on live calls. Nope! Definitely wasn't the case, whenever we needed assistance we were told to use our online sources and to figure it out. Before switching over to our old system to complete a booking or transfer points that used to take less than 10 minutes. So now our call volume is high, wait time has turned into hours. It was too stressful for me, to top it off with this new merger. We weren't allowed to used our vacation days for Summer. Vacation days were frozen, we weren't able to get a schedule change if we didn't get a schedule that'd would work with our home life. We would have to bid for a schedule every 3 months. Our stats determined your rank in bidding but with long holding time, and on the phone time you're stuck with a low number. I was lucky enough to get okay schedules due to my seniority but a lot of employees left Marriott. The change and not being able to help guest was what pushed me to leave and never return to Marriott, I don't mind the pay cut at all.

Having read the comments from Bonvoyed members, I totally agree with everything. 1/3 of the problems I could solve on the first phone call.

"Reservation reinstated after cancellation" - I would go and send a very clear email to the hotel and to Program Services, give the guest points for the hassle and make sure it gets taken care of.

Unfortunately there is no direct line to me, and most of the agents either don't want to deal with issues, or are afraid to loose their AHT (Average Handle Time) bonus if they stay on a call too long. I don't care about my AHT because I rather have the guest happy with the solution. (Not that the bonus is worth beans anyways. I was able to make some serious money with Starwood bonuses, now it it just a tiny percentage of my hourly wage.)

"Marriott.com is a third party booking?" There most often is a charge for more than 2 adults in the room. However, the system has recently returned extra charges for kids in the room. We know it is a system issue. Unless you have an inclusive property booked, there should be no charge for kids under 12 (in Europe) or under 18 (in North America) sharing the room with their parents. The way I get around the extra person charge for the kids: I take the kids out of the reservation and make a note on the reservation stating that there will be 2 kids in the room, but because of system issues I wasn't able to add them to the proper spot.
If you book Marriott Vacations, it is actually booked with Expedia and we cannot modify anything on the reservation. It has to be done online. (Good luck with that)

"Downgrade for no reason and no explanation" Depending on your nights spent between 01/01/2018 and 12/31/2018 you have a certain status. That status will start the beginning of March the next year (In this case March 2019) That status will stay active until the end of February the following year and all your travel until the end of February will have that status. You should not have a new Bonvoy number, I suspect you might have 2 accounts. The old SPG numbers were switched to a new 9-digit number in August (which was not well communicated!!!! No surprise there), but there is no reason to be given a new number since August.

"Green choice" ... without points ... Please call back and get your Green Choice points added. Some of the properties have system issues and don't allow us to post them ("This property does not participate in the Make a Green Choice Program" is the error message. But when I call out to the property (not all of us have call-out privileges) they do MAGC. So I just add up the points manually and post them manually with a note that they are really missing MAGC points. And if the guest is really polite I usually throw in another 1000 or 2000 points for the frustration.

"Lifetime second class" Not sure why you think you will never be Titanium. You stay between 75 and 99 nights/year and you are Titanium.

"No upgrades for Ambassador elite..?" Ambassador is higher than Platinum and Titanium. Yes you should have gotten upgraded. Unfortunately you got an ASSociate that doesn't have any common sense and likes to tout their own rules. This is very common at the moment. I cannot tell you how often I reached out to someone above me and was given a totally stupid explanation why and why not certain things happen.

Remember: It is not Marriott that pays your paycheck, your paycheck comes from the guest who decides to stay with Marriott rather than another hotel.

I have worked at a Starwood/Marriott Call Center for the past 3 years. I really used to enjoy my job until the merger in August.
The frustration in both guests and employees is extremely high. We get emails from head office almost every day touting how well things are going, how Marriott is the best, how we are so awesome..... Does anybody ever go and listen to the frustrated guests or to the suggestions the employees have?
"Take care of your employees and they will take care of you" - that went out the window a long time ago.
I worked with people that had been at Starwood for over 15 years, and they have now quit and moved on to other jobs. I am very customer service focused and it is frustrating to me not to be able to do much for a guest, having to placate them with phrases like "let me open a case and send it to the hotel". Most of the times the hotel doesn't even bother to respond.
System issues are driving me crazy. Can you imagine answering the phone, having a guest on the line who was waiting for 30 minutes to talk to me and I have to tell him "Sorry, my computer reservation system is down, can you call back later?" How difficult can it be to have an initial message stating "we are experiencing computer issues and are currently not able to make reservations. Please call back later."
I am also wondering if guests do realize that I am more likely to help if their tone of voice is pleasant. Screaming at me, demanding me to do something, cursing, blaming me for things out of my control.... will get you nowhere. I don't feel like I have a lot of power, but if you behave like a toddler with a temper tantrum, I will not go out of my way to assist you. Worst calls start with the guest screaming "the other agent just hung up on me" Did you ever wonder why? I don't have any issues anymore telling a guest "if we can not have a professional conversation I will release the call" I don't get paid enough to be screamed at for things out of my control. (I am making minimum wage)
And just because your buddy got something, it does not mean you are entitled to it as well. And please do not tell me how to do my job. "I am Titanium and I can cancel this reservation up until the day of arrival" Wrong, there are certain things that have to be met - unfortunately your reservation does not qualify.
BTW, the supervisor you are asking to talk to is just regular agent with a few more hours of training, and was thrown into the supervisory position on August 18 without being asked. Most resent their jobs by now because they never signed up to deal with irate calls all day.
Quite often we are the last who find out about policy changes. It is usually a guest who says "I did not get breakfast at the Marriott, only a $10.- voucher" and I will go and look in our "Knowledge Management" articles and find out that perk is no longer available for Platinum and Titanium members. How can you have breakfast at a Marriott for $10.-???
Posting points can now take up to 10 business days after check out. Airline point transfers (previously with SPG 2-4 business days) will now take up to 42 days.
I am giving out goodwill points to anybody who is being inconvenienced by the merger. My attitude: hit Marriott where it hurts. If all of us reservation agents would do it, maybe Arne would get his head out of his .... and take note.
Recently gave a guest 10000 points for having to call back 4 times to get points posted. That is worth $125.- US. We are supposed to have access to a system that shows us the guest folio so we can manually post the stay after 10 business days. More often than not that system is not working.
This is not the same job I was hired for and while I am flexible enough to roll with the changes, the lack of support from leadership, lack of computer programs, and increased frustration from the guests is making me look for a job elsewhere.

I work front desk at a former Starwood property but before that I worked at a Marriott hotel so I was looking forward to the merger. Sadly, I feel the whole thing has been handled badly, particularly the IT side.
Bonvoy is just the part that guests see, but Marriott has also messed up the reservations, rate codes, and all kinds of other things on the operations side. Tech support for staff at the property is as bad or even worse than the loyalty help line and it worries me that Arne Sorensen is out there bragging about how many new hotels Marriott will have over the next few year when they can't even handle/support the hotels they currently have.
I think we're all about to get Bonvoyed even worse.

If your wondering the following information is how you get points loyalty employees can gift 10k and a supervisor or elite agent can offer max if 40k managers only offer 200$ and 80k

For all you members who are mad we are just as mad being employees we are not properly trained left hanging when asking questions how to help guest and now they hire temps to replace regular employees. When you ask to speak to a supervisor they are not Marriott change platinum employees to take this roll with little to no training. All of the employees who love Marriott and SPG are gone the only people left are temps they don't even drug test before you book or blame someone remember shit falls from the top. Your loyalty doesn't mean anything to us now only your money.

I worked for Marriott for a little over 3 years. Marriott had a motto "Take care of the associates and they will take care of the guests." In April of 2018 Marriott rolled out their new "Service Delivery Module." At the same time, they stopped taking care of the associates. Before SDM, there were several departments to contact. Sales, customer care, rewards, etc. Now, no matter who you call, you are getting a sales rep. If you need to get sent to "loyalty" you are getting a sales rep that 3 hours more of copy and paste training. If you get sent to "elite" they had 2 more hours of the same training. And just to add, it was SPG employees leading the training. An entire new reservation system was forced on us that barely works because Marriott didn't want to pay Oracle to use the system they had been using before. To add to this, the agents were able to call supervisors that would help them fix things. The supervisors are now ordered not to help. Everything has to be "make a case." Cases are "supposed" to be resolved in 3 to 5 days. When I left, there were cases that were 4 months old untouched. The cases started in April. I've been told that since then, they have reached 110 million cases. When the changes started in April, agents that had worked there for 20 years were walking out in the middle of their shifts. The company scrambled to hire a bunch of people with less than normal training. There are a lot of agents that are just terrible. There are still a lot that want to help but can't. Even the former SPG agents are new to all of the system changes. Marriott tried to change 50 things at once with them all working at 25 percent. It needed to change one thing at a time. Waiting until it was running well. Then make the next change. My former coworkers say there is a new change that is about to take away their last resort system away next week. Good luck. So it is not IT like everyone says. Or usually lack of agents trying. It is the company not wanting to pay for a third party software anymore. And SPG training Marriott employees on a system that barely works. And neither company has used before. I almost left out the best part. The CEO visited a call center for the first time ever two weeks ago. Best of luck travelers. Don't blame the person on the phone. They are trying.

I work out of one of the Marriott call centers and I really feel we have suffered as much as our guests. At one time, guests whether they be legacy Marriott or Starwood members enjoyed contacting us to book travel or assist with their account. Now members have to suffer through an automated prompt, pretty much encouraging them to not contact us, and then suffer through extremely long hold times. This leads to less happy guests which in turn makes our job not as enjoyable. A large portion of my shift consists of posting missing stays or refunding points from cancelled certificates. It seems like the push for members to do more on the app or website has not decreased call volumes which was probably the original intent. I appreciate the quality of our hotels, but the IT and customer relation issues really causes a lot of frustration at our responsibilities and abilities. I will do the best for our guests and my company, I will not unnecessarily transfer guests or hang up on them. I just want my company to do the same and display the values of hospitality and customer service.

I've worked for Marriott for 14 years. I'll tell you the problem: they rushed it.

Offically they bought spg 2 years ago, however no one could share info until Aug 2018 (thus the reason the breach happened)

They have a good plan in mind. However its like a 5 year plan. They tried to do it overnight. #fyrefestival

If you think it sucks being a member imagine being an employee, knowing the solutions and muted every day.

I'm a front desk agent at a Marriott branded property that's managed by a third-party. The third-party is a big hotel operator. In fact, we share a general manager with the IHG property next door -- maybe 150 feet from the front desk. This is good and bad. Good because we own the local market. Bad because our management doesn't know Marriott well know. They're too focused on making money for the owner, who is too cheap to renovate the property because the owner dominates the local market and has no competition. For example, we're now charging parking and the may soon charge a "destination amenity fee" aka a resort fee. We've eliminated newspapers and now provide only muffins, toast and bagels with coffee, juice and coffee for the "continental breakfast." We've had several Elite Status guests complain that our breakfast isn't a breakfast but the general manager says it is and refuses to authorize an enhanced breakfast offering. Guests think we're Marriott. They complain to Marriott. They criticize Marriott. But in reality we aren't Marriott. And there's nothing Marriott can do either. Sometimes our general manager gives 2,000 or 1,000 points to guests to just make them go away and stop complaining about a bagel and coffee.

Imagine before the merger we had positions focused on one thing only. Now we have positions that are multiple positions. Front desk agent used to just do that.. now they are call center, front desk, and rooms controller. Never becoming an expert in what they do get poor service. Front desk had a high turn over rate, but now it will just accelerate it. That's the leadership of this new company. Let's consolidate and try to make the most money out of the guests and our employees. Arne might have lead us here to this large hotel system, but he has killed Marriotts values along the journey. There's individuals that want to serve the guest, but under this leadership it's getting harder to do and we feel you loyal members. I don't blame you for running off to the competition. They aren't treating us the employees as the most valuable assets they have anymore and that will translate into poor service to the guest. This is coming from a Lady and Gentleman of The Ritz-Carlton. Decade of service and I am ashamed.