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My other half mislaid my Amex card somewhere in the car and called me to come down from our hotel room and help search for it. So off I goes and on passing reception I thought I’d ask if anyone had handed one in first. They said no but they would let me know. So I carried on to the car park and it was almost the first thing I found. After much gentle ribbing we then went back to our room. On passing reception there was no one there to say we’d found it so thinking no more of it and with no outstanding charges we left.
When I got home I received this email from Amex
‘Hello (name),
Your lost Card was reported to us by a third partyWhile there’s no reason for you to worry, we have invalidated your lost The American Express® Rewards Credit Card ending in (numbers) as a security measure. It can no longer be used to make purchases.’
Is this normal procedure or am I a control freak thinking this wasn’t their call???
I’d ask to speak to the Manager (they’ll probably fob you off with the Duty Manager at best) and make a complaint and check out and refuse to pay for any further nights booked.
They’ve broken Data Protection Laws, at least. It’s your call to decide whether it’s lost or not when your searches, only one of which is an enquiry to the desk, have been completed. Name the employee if you can and complain about their breach of privacy, mention data laws, and add their incompetence and lack of basic courtesy in not discussing with you the step they then took without consultation.
They’ll keep you waiting long enough at the Reception desk for you to book another hotel on your phone while you’re waiting.
Amex will tell you it can’t be undone so you now have massive inconvenience possibly worse whilst a replacement card is obtained.
And no, I wouldn’t be bought off with any offer of complementary drinks etc. But I would accept 25% off the bill whilst I continue to check out.
Was this in the UK? While it is annoying that this happened I think the hotel was just trying to help. In retrospect you should have told them that you found the card although I suspect that they might have told Amex before you even got back into the hotel and I am guessing they did it to make sure that the payment they’d taken on your card was still processed by Amex. They would have had the card details although I agree it does seem a bit off that a 3rd party can get someone else’s card stopped. Not sure what you can do now except just wait for a replacement card.
Lady London all very well but Julia had already left the hotel so asking for discount /drinks / staff names etc simply wasn’t an option!
What actual data protection law has the hotel breached?
The hotel likly reported a possible lost card based on its usage agreement with AMEX and Amex took the decision to cancel based on thst.
I don’t think the hotel reported the card as lost the moment Julia mentioned to it but later after she left on the basis that she hadn’t told them she’d found the card.
Lady London, I wouldn’t want to cross you if you were the customer, you are right on the money and the other breaches of care I hadn’t even considered. Well that settles it, it was my choice and they did take their money before it was reported. It was also at a UK airport hotel so they didn’t know if I was just coming back or going on holiday. Could have been really awkward if I hadn’t got any back up cards.
AJA I totally agree with your comment regarding anyone who has the mind to can cancel your card. And you wouldn’t even know unless you checked your email regularly.
I don’t think the hotel reported the card as lost the moment Julia mentioned to it but later after she left on the basis that she hadn’t told them she’d found the card.
Nope. The time of the automated email was roughly 25 mins before we left. I think they took the money then reported it lost. Difficult to prove this stuff without asking Amex directly.
I don’t think the hotel reported the card as lost the moment Julia mentioned to it but later after she left on the basis that she hadn’t told them she’d found the card.
Nope. The time of the automated email was roughly 25 mins before we left. I think they took the money then reported it lost. Difficult to prove this stuff without asking Amex directly.
Obviously it’s all rather inconvenient, but all this talk of data breaches etc. and that you should ask for 25% off your bill is complete cobblers. At this point, there’s not even any evidence it was the hotel who cancelled the card. The inconvenience of lost cards is also greatly reduced these days when Amex can put a replacement into one’s Apple wallet in a matter of minutes.
I don’t think the hotel reported the card as lost the moment Julia mentioned to it but later after she left on the basis that she hadn’t told them she’d found the card.
Nope. The time of the automated email was roughly 25 mins before we left. I think they took the money then reported it lost. Difficult to prove this stuff without asking Amex directly.
I’ve just checked the folio and it says ‘Deposit Transfer at Check-In’. So they had called for the money as soon as I turned up.
Are we sure the partner of the OP didn’t report it lost say in the app then forget about it once found and now hasn’t owned up? Occam’s Razor and all that…
I don’t think the hotel reported the card as lost the moment Julia mentioned to it but later after she left on the basis that she hadn’t told them she’d found the card.
Nope. The time of the automated email was roughly 25 mins before we left. I think they took the money then reported it lost. Difficult to prove this stuff without asking Amex directly.
I’ve just checked the folio and it says ‘Deposit Transfer at Check-In’. So they had called for the money as soon as I turned up.
That’s standard wording for prepay or advance rates. The money is taken before your arrival and held in ‘limbo’ for want of a better word till it can be applied as the opening entry on your room’s bill.
I don’t think the hotel reported the card as lost the moment Julia mentioned to it but later after she left on the basis that she hadn’t told them she’d found the card.
Nope. The time of the automated email was roughly 25 mins before we left. I think they took the money then reported it lost. Difficult to prove this stuff without asking Amex directly.
Obviously it’s all rather inconvenient, but all this talk of data breaches etc. and that you should ask for 25% off your bill is complete cobblers. At this point, there’s not even any evidence it was the hotel who cancelled the card. The inconvenience of lost cards is also greatly reduced these days when Amex can put a replacement into one’s Apple wallet in a matter of minutes.
@JDB you’ve misquoted me.
@Julia has got it in one : the clue is the hotel took their money THEN reported the card as stolen/missing or made an unnecessary, intrusive comment to Amex that caused Amex to think the card was lost, which was incorrect and not their right to make any comment about. Whose interests was the hotel looking after…Haha. The card was never stated by its owner to have been concluded to have been lost and they weren’t asked to do this.Yes this stupid self-serving hotel probably has some small print in its merchant contract with Amex, that it can call on to cover its self-serving action, though heaven only knows why they also took the liberty of assuming Julia would have no other means to pay their bill. But in discussing a guest’s financial facilities with a third party without the permission or request or at least the knowledge of that subject person, no useful purpose was served other than them assuring themselves Amex would pay *them* and they had no right to intrude on @Julia’s privacy by doing anything that would lead to the further outrageous step they took.
How did they not know she perhaps may well have left the Amex guarantee in place but planned to take advantage of another card she had an offer on, to pay her final bill? There was no just cause to discuss her financial arrangements with any third psrty at any point whether they had a relationship with the third party or not.
Aftet I’d read the manager the riot act I stated I’d *accept* 25% off my bill – not that I’d be so blatant as to suggest a figure but I’d expect a concrete apology to be offered and would nudge. As she said,:she could have been just departing on a round the world trip and this hotel could literally have ruined it. “One’s Apple Wallet”, btw, is not held by everyone 🙂 .
BAFIS : I’d overlooked that Julia only found out about this after she’d checked out.
The hotel are dangerous idiots.
They’ve broken Data Protection Laws, at least.
No, they haven’t. If they called Amex and said card number XXX (which they legitimately had on file) had been reported lost/stolen, they have not broken any DP laws. IF the hotel had offered any additional cardholder details (and we don’t know that they did) Amex would have disregarded them anyway, and they certainly wouldn’t have confirmed things like cardholder name in this situation.
You could actually make an argument that the hotel would have been negligent if they hadn’t told Amex a card that they had the details for had been reported to them as lost/stolen (I don’t think a particularly strong argument, but still).
But it hadn’t been reported stolen to the hotel by the card owner. the hotel reception was asked whilst other searches continued and were actually successful.
It wasn’t reported, at all, to the hotel it was simply an enquiry amongst other enquiries continuing and searches continuing.
The hotel are dangerous idiots. The client has the choice to inform them if they need anything done, the client didn’t need them to do anything and it stayed that way.
It depends exactly on the phrasing that was said to the hotel for sure, and it does seem like the hotel may have overreacted/acted stupidly – depending on that phrasing, which may or may not have been said with a tone of panic – op can clarify on that.
But none of that has anything to do with breaking data protection laws, which was the point of my comment.
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