Stop me if you’ve heard this one; a grandmother takes some time out of her vacation to leave a terse review of her accommodations, then winds up being escorted from the premises in her pajamas. Oh wait! That’s not a joke…

Welcome to Bad Review Retaliation!

Time will tell if this becomes a regular feature here on Review Party Dot Com, because we do cover a lot of negative and biased reviews, as well as owner responses. But some owners respond a little harder than others, and today we get to go Hell- er ‘scuse me - Helen, Georgia!

What the Heck Happened in Helen?

Back in September 2021, Susan Leger brought her granddaughter on a short trip to the Baymont Inn & Suites. Having booked through Hotels.com, it wasn’t long into the first night when an email from the company landed in Leger’s inbox. The simple question it asked?

How’s Your Room?

The simple response Leger gave?

Three Stars.

When Hotels.com prompted her further, asking “What went wrong?” she listed issues in short order:

“Rundown. Pool’s not open. Toilet doesn't flush well.”

Fair enough for a fair rating of Three Stars, eh? A few problems like that certainly could knock a few stars off, especially if the pool had been part of the original appeal.

Anyway! Our bedtime story doesn’t end here, however, because as Leger and her granddaughter were getting ready to go to bed, her phone rang. And the voice that was about to sound off on the other belonged to none other than the hotel manager.

Yikes! The Manager?

Yikes is right! A lot of people already have paranoia about being recorded and monitored while staying in hotels, but if they’re also watching the reviews flow in, then tying them back to their current reservations, that’s another level of scary! Especially when your phone starts to ring. And it wasn’t the room phone, either, it was Leger’s cell phone.

On 11Alive.com, Leger recounts in her own words what manager Danny Vyas had to say:

“This guy is on my cell phone ranting at me, and he said that he's kicking me out. He’s called the police, and I have to leave the room.”

And the next thing she knows, an officer from Helen Police Department is at the door, asking her to leave, and confirming that it is within the law - ahem IN GEORGIA - for guests to be ordered to leave a hotel based on nothing more than a negative review. And we thought it was bad in Thailand.

SO. Quick side bar on that garbage legality:

So things are kind of all fine and dandy under subsection (a). The manager has to give you advance notice if they are going to terminate your occupancy, and that notice has to be equal to the amount of time paid for by the guest. But uh-oh, subsection (b) says that, y’see, here’s the thing, they actually DON’T have to give you any warning if they are terminating your occupancy “for cause",” which begs the question of what would even fall under (a), when they don’t have cause to terminate but decide to do so anyway.

Anyway! That’s neither here nor there. What is important is that subsection (b) gives “the keeper” the right to immediately boot you if you fail to pay sums due, fail to abide occupancy rules, fail to have or maintain reservations, OR take some vague, unexplained “other action.”

What might fall under that broad scope of other actions? If you guessed “leaving a bad review,” then you are Georgia right!

Again from 11Alive:

The police report obtained through an open records request shows there was only one reason for the expulsion. “Leger had given the motel a bad review,” Officer William Barrett wrote.

So, back to that chaos

Right, thanks for the reminder.

To make a semi-short story only somewhat long, an officer helped Leger and her granddaughter find another hotel, but they had to walk to it in their pajamas. Not exactly the dream vacation the pair had envisioned, even if it was only three days in the mountain country of Georgia.

Now, the manager, Vyas has been a bit all over the board in his response. The 911 call - and yes, let’s remind ourselves that this guy had to see the bad review, then take action, AND THAT ACTION WAS CALLING 911 - the 911 call allegedly features Vyas saying that the hotel was preparing to refund the room (more on that later), but he has since said he ended the call declaring that they needed to leave because they were unhappy with the room.

Follow up investigations by the local news had Vyas claiming that Leger called repeatedly with complaints before he finally called 911. Leger denies this.

But the refund! Back to that. Apparently Hotels.com does not allow for refunds due to the terms and conditions agreed to at the time of booking. However, the investigations - and Leger’s insistence that Hotels.com was responsible since they prompted her review - eventually led to a refund, and Vyas provided a printout to 11Alive showing the money had been returned.

But Hotels.com, huh? Kinda scummy, guys! Well, they’ve now removed the Baymont from their list of hotels in Helen, and are investigating themselves, releasing the following statement:

Hotels.com has a zero-tolerance policy regarding retaliation and we will remove any guests, hosts and/or properties from our website who exhibit or promote such behavior in-stay or offline. We have temporarily removed this property from our sites while we conduct an investigation to determine the appropriate next steps.

Yeah. The contintental breakfast egg is on your face, but it’s good that you’re taking a step or two towards making it right, even if this isn’t exactly a happy ending.

The lesson for the rest of us out here? Don’t leave that review until you leave the hotel!