I want a refund!

Frankly, these people are idiots. They're trying to challenge something with no written or recorded record because they managed to lose a ton of money. Next year they'll probably decide to really stick it to Cedar Point and go to Michigan Adventure instead. What idiots.

The hotel door locks run on batteries, not electricity. The black out would have no affect on that. The hotels do not need to have access to the computers to check in guests. If they were following proper procedures then they could have manually checked in guests but would not have been able to use the charge card machines.

I understand hotel managers (fulltime/silver tags) took it upon themselves to start issuing refunds to those that wanted to check out b/c they did not have contact with executives that might have told them otherwise.

Stop for a second. Let's all remember that the news stations were saying there was no way of knowing when the power would come back on and in some cases it could be days. Now, picture hundreds of guests at a desk waiting for an answer.

So, the hotel managers make the decision to issue the refunds. People check out and go home.

Somebody up the chain, presumably the top dog, doesn't agree with the decision. He is the boss after all so he directs hotel staff to RECHARGE credit cards even though the guests have left. Surprise!

Now, the entire organization looks stupid. Even if the chief didn't agree with the decisions he should have sucked it up, made policy changes, and moved on. Instead, he directed staff to charge cards without authorization of card holders which is a big no-no and those people have a legitimate beef.

A great example of taking something bad and making it a whole lot worse.

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"You can dream, create, design and build the most wonderful plance in the world...but it requires people to make the dreams a reality."

The hotel doors do run on batteries, but short life batteries like security lights. They will work for a certain amount of time and the battery will lose its charge. Also, if people have not checked in yet, as in the case of the family in the article, there is no way for the cards to be issued to that room since the card programmer runs on electricty. Battery locks or not, they still could not get in.

BTW, did you know that it is a health code violation to serve food during a power outage? Some people had to be getting hungry, especially those with kids.

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Beer and golf Thursday thru Monday, Cedar Point & beer, Tuesday and Wednesday.

I know for a fact that the door locks are not hard wired at Breakers or Sandcastle. Some types of door locks ARE hard wired but the system in place at on-Point hotels was chosen for the very fact that it ran on battery packs.

You may be right about the key programmers but I think even they had battery chargers that should have been able to last the few hours. Worst case scenario is that a manager could have opened a room for guests just to get them settled somewhere until the power came back on.

Of course, this is a separate issue from someone being told they were getting a refund only to find that their credit card was recharged. Jeff is right in that anyone with a receipt of the refund should dispute with their card company. It should never even come to that. This was an outrageous decision by the power(s)-that-be. This was a Disaster Transport if I ever saw one.

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"You can dream, create, design and build the most wonderful place in the world...but it requires people to make the dreams a reality."

If the doors are not hard wired, and the managers are able to get into the rooms, then why were people waiting in the lobbies and hallways? Something is not adding up.

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Beer and golf Thursday thru Monday, Cedar Point & beer, Tuesday and Wednesday.

I can only hazard a guess.

If the rooms were not cleaned before the lights went out (most of them should have been) maybe there weren't clean rooms to check guests into. This is the least likely scenario give the time the power went off.

The hotel managers should have had reports run an hour or so before the lights went out. Those reports are run continuously throughout the day for this very reason. They would allow a manager to see the status of rooms in the hotel without the computers on. With those reports, the managers could manually check guests into rooms and then go back when the lights came back on to update the computers. This requires some work and skill but it can be done. Hey, hotels didn't always have computers.

I don't think the keys had anything to do with this. Just about everyone who checks into the hotels has already prepaid one night so they certainly could have been checked in and paid up when things were restored to order.

Perhaps the guests made a conscious decision to not check into rooms seeing as there was no certainty when the power would come back on.

In any event, I fully believe that full-time managers told guests they would get refunds and upper management changed course after the fact.

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"You can dream, create, design and build the most wonderful place in the world...but it requires people to make the dreams a reality."

as far as guest not being able to get in there room they could enter the room there was just no electic in them .. they were also being provided flashlights for use in the rooms. there for they would not have had to sleep in hallways and such. as far and not getting the refund leave it the ceo of cedar fair they are they ones that decided against it!!!!!!!!!

I'm not sure what kind of character this lady has, but every single Cedar Point employee is instructed not to even mention refunds of any kinds unless they are instructed to by a higher up. This being said, most likely this person is more than likely lying or heard the employee incorrectly...

Nobody is lying. Hotel Mangers did in fact tell people that they would get refunds. The guests had the right to think they were hearing that from a person who had the authority to make that decision.

The person who said "NO" and directed people with credit cards on file to be recharged (even though they were not present) was the top dog himself.

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"You can dream, create, design and build the most wonderful place in the world...but it requires people to make the dreams a reality."

Just to play devil's advocate, how do you know this?

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Jeff - Webmaster - GTTP - My Blog
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What time does the water show start?

I am not going to say anything that will get people in trouble but I think this is an important topic. When you empower people to make decisions I think it is important to back them up. I am not talking seasonal people here either.

A judgment call had to be made that night. There was no way to know if the power was going to come back on or not. Since there is no official policy on something like this people had to make decisions. Imagine you are standing in front of a lobby full of people who are demanding a decision.

If the power didn't come back on that night I suspect the decision would not have been reversed. The power did come back on and suddenly things didn't look so bad. Hindsight is 20/20 but I would have more respect for the powers that be if he had supported his management team.

If they now want to write a policy that deals with these types of contingincies and share that with everyone, great. But to upset guests and disregard your managers when they aren't the ones that should be blamed is weak.

And for these guests to be accused of being liars I think it is important for someone to stand up and say that it isn't the case.

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"You can dream, create, design and build the most wonderful place in the world...but it requires people to make the dreams a reality."