Samantha Cole, a spokeswoman for the N.C. Attorney General’s Office, says the N.C. Department of Justice has not received any complaints from consumers regarding resort fees. But she says the department’s Consumer Protection Division is always concerned if undisclosed or improperly disclosed fees are being imposed on consumers.
“However, our office would not take a position on a specific company or advertisement without looking closely at how fees were presented and disclosed to consumers,” Cole says.
The calls for increased scrutiny of resort fees in North Carolina came just days after U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Missouri, sent a letter to the Federal Trade Commission, asking the agency to examine how hotels across the country are presenting resort fees to consumers. McCaskill’s letter notes the FTC launched a similar examination in 2012 and subsequently sent 22 hotel operators and travel agencies. But she says the FTC has brought no further enforcement actions against those allegedly engaging in deceptive pricing since then.
Lynn Minges, president and CEO of the North Carolina Restaurant and Lodging Association, says part of the problem may be the explosion of online booking sites, some of which may not add mandatory fees into the cost of a room. She says her organization has joined the American Hotel and Lodging Association in urging the Federal Trade Commission to open investigation into online booking practices that are deceptive in targeting consumers.
“We applaud efforts to insure that consumers are not mislead by deceptive business practices and commend the Federal Trade Commission for recently taking action to warn consumers about rogue online booking websites,” Minges says. “In some cases, consumers are not getting what they want or pay for and are dealing with additional room charges, cancellation fees or service charges and accessibility problems and that just is not right.”
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