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That's Not Long-Distance
The Travel Technologist · January 3, 2002

John Steinsky thought the $70 phone charge he'd racked up while staying at the Courtyard by Marriott in Parsippany, NJ, was a simple mistake. "I use my calling card religiously for long-distance calls," says the Halifax, Nova Scotia, product manager for a software company.

But it turns out Steinsky had put his faith in the hotel's claim that local calls were free. The property's definition of "local" wasn't the same as his. He believed that dialing a "1" plus an area code and phone number would incur the extra charges for a long-distance call. Marriott claimed that local calls only applied to certain exchanges. And it listed them in its directory.

"I felt duped," he says. "They should at the very least have little tent cards that say, 'If you call anywhere outside a two-block radius from the hotel, you are likely to incur long distance charges.'"

There is, says John Rojan, the hotel's general manager. It's a sticker affixed to the phone, plus there are two notices in the guest directory. "Most of the time people don't read it," he laments. Rojan also says his hotel shoots straight when it comes to long-distance charges. "If the phone company says it's a local call, it's a local call," he says. "For example, a call to Newark from Parsippany, which is in the same area code we're in, wouldn't be local."

He's right. It isn't entirely up to the hotel to define a long-distance call. Phone carriers determine what's local and what isn't, although a property may at its discretion amend the list of exchanges. That didn't happen to Steinsky, but it's been known to happen elsewhere. The hardware and software that handles a hotel's calls is capable of determining how much to charge a guest, right down to the exact number dialed.

It can get even more confusing to the customer when you have what's known as an area code "overlay" - meaning that two area codes exist in the same place. In my area code, for example, Bell South recently introduced a new overlay code, 786, for new numbers in the 305 area code. Meaning you could dial a "1" plus the area code and number and still ring a phone next door.

And finally, just when you've got it all figured out, a hotel will charge you for toll-fee calls. Or impose a time limit on phone calls to prevent you from hogging the phone line with your Internet dial-up connection. At the Courtyard, the magic number is half an hour; elsewhere it is 45 minutes or an hour. After that, the meter runs faster - anywhere from a flat fee to 10 cents a minute or more. Think of it as an Internet tax.

Hotels say the surcharges are necessary because guests are tying up valuable phone lines, but that's ridiculous. Only the most antique phone systems are incapable of handling the heavy users that stay online for hours at a time. And besides, if they were so worried about tying up the phones, then there'd be a charge for incoming calls as well. Imagine that.

There's no point in arguing about whether Steinsky should have read the directory. Rojan's correct: Few people do because they're as dull as a phone book. There's also no point in wondering whether Rojan, or Marriott, should have offered more disclose. You can always offer more disclosure (how about a meter on the phone that measures the damage, which is what a lot of European hotels do?).

Only one thing can be said with any certainty: If you want to avoid a surprise on your hotel bill, don't pick up the phone. It's as simple as that.

Christopher Elliott is a travel commentator based in Key Largo, Fla. All e-mailed questions may be edited, condensed or republished at the site's discretion. The Travel Technologist appears weekly on this site. This story was also published on SmarterLiving.com.