Contacting Premier Inn..impossible!

Distressedcustomer

Booked Premier Inn semi-flex rate which entitles to amend or cancel booking 'upto 3 days' prior to arrival. In their T&C, example provided can do so upto midnight Weds arriving on Sat.
My booking arriving this Tues and therefore applying same logic, can do so today Sat upto midnight....looked online and my booking notes I cannot!
Therefore I thought  would give guest relations or hotel a ring, but I cannot, I have to use their online form, which I did and they have upto 10 days to reply!!! That is right, I cannot even ring the hotel I am staying at, Premier Inn have gone totally online.

IS THIS ANYWAY TO RUN A HOSPITALITY BUSINESS?

Anyone else think this is ridiculous? Have Whitbread plc group lost the plot?

peachyprice

Why can't you phone the hotel?  Have you Googled the hotel you need and called the phone number? 
I've just tried the two I stay at regularly on the google numbers and got straight through. 

Distressedcustomer

Unfortunately not my hotel, went straight to central reservations line.
Premier Inn website even notes they are not accepting calls and to use online form..

bradders1983

I have no idea if this would work but do you have a local Premier Inn near you? Worth going in and seeing if the person on reception can get through to someone for you?

Neil49

Which Premier Inn is it?

Note, if you phone late in the evening then it's very possible that the call will be diverted as they have limited staff at that time. 

Distressedcustomer

Marlborough PI and tried 8am, then 11am, went straight through to central reservations answer phone...you think they might want to make a few sales by phone.
The fundamental of hotel business is customer service, in this case there is none to make even comment on.

The central reservations line simply says to 'protect staff' it is closed, when majority of other companies with staff WFH, which indicates Premier Inn are clearly going for a pure online model, and this is classic case of how it fails...what if customer needs to make special arrangements, hotels can get busy and so as a contingency need to contact a central customer service or reservations line.

Jumblebumble

Distressedcustomer said:

Booked Premier Inn semi-flex rate which entitles to amend or cancel booking 'upto 3 days' prior to arrival. In their T&C, example provided can do so upto midnight Weds arriving on Sat.
My booking arriving this Tues and therefore applying same logic, can do so today Sat upto midnight....looked online and my booking notes I cannot!
Therefore I thought  would give guest relations or hotel a ring, but I cannot, I have to use their online form, which I did and they have upto 10 days to reply!!! That is right, I cannot even ring the hotel I am staying at, Premier Inn have gone totally online.

IS THIS ANYWAY TO RUN A HOSPITALITY BUSINESS?

Anyone else think this is ridiculous? Have Whitbread plc group lost the plot?

I am sure that when they have 10 days to reply this means up to 10 days.
They will probably deal with your query quickly although if you were complaining that the receptionist took too long to appear they might well take 10 days

Distressedcustomer

I was trying to confirm a few things on my booking and before travelling half way across England, confirm they actually have my booking. Unable to check in online as previous.

My MSE forum post 1Aug  morning and still not heard anything 5pm Mon 3Aug, this is very poor customer service.
I still do not understand why there is no customer service

'Temporary closure of our Customer Contact Centre

To protect the safety of our team members, we have decided to close our phone lines. Please do not call any Premier Inn phone numbers as your call will not be answered. '

bradders1983

bradders1983 said:

I have no idea if this would work but do you have a local Premier Inn near you? Worth going in and seeing if the person on reception can get through to someone for you?

Is this suggestion feasible? You never acknowledged it.

DCFC79

You tried twitter ?

Distressedcustomer

Thanks for suggestions but unfortunately no local PI near me and do not use Twitter.