--On Tuesday, 27 November, 2007 17:53 -0500 Ray Pelletier
<rpelletier@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Preliminary information is that there will shuttle service
> between the Renaissance, Marriott and Westin. Extent of
> impact on rooms about 50. I am told we are the only guests at
> the Westin. I will report back with additional info.
Ray,
Given Fred Baker's and Dave Crocker's comments, what I'm about
to say may be unnecessary, but maybe it is worth saying anyway.
I suspect that we are getting attractive offers from otherwise
very expensive hotels precisely because they are renovating and
many groups have learned to not touch a hotel that is under
construction. While some facilities are more gracious about
trying to handle the problems than others and mass bumpings are
new to me, we've had noise, dust, an absence of hot water, and
other sources of disruption... rarely a really good experience
when we are sharing a hotel with a major construction project.
While I don't know if it has ever happened with the IETF, I've
certainly dealt with facilities which, in meeting disruption
situations, have taken an attitude of "well, we told you the
circumstances and you accepted a great rate as a consequence,
why do you think you are entitled to anything else". Of
course, that doesn't help the people who are bumped: while you
may have known about the renovations, I don't recall any
warnings on the IETF announcement of the hotel that said "if you
decide to stay in the conference hotel, be aware that they are
renovating, which may subject you to the usual renovation
disruptions". We also were not warned about the Palmer House,
and the comment in Fred's note about Philly came as a surprise
to me at least.
While I approve of aggressive penalty clauses, we need to keep
in mind that, if something is disruptive enough to reduce our
ability to get work done, the total costs to us are related to
the time and salary costs of everyone who is thus inconvenienced
and who has to find another way and more time to get the work
done. Those costs can easily exceed the total that the hotel
expected to collect under the contract, so a percentage price
reduction penalty (or the equivalent) is actually more of a
gesture than something that helps us recover our costs.
It seems to me that we need to avoid doing this in the future,
even if that means an immediate review of facility decisions
about IETF 71. You presumably could not modify or cancel that
contract based on the misbehavior of the Westin Bayshore, but
there might be grounds on the basis of the disruptions and noise
in Chicago.
john
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