I would be extremely surprised if hotels can just do this with no consequences, even if you somehow signed into it on their T&C.
what consequences can you put on a bankrupt company?
I guess that guests might have claims for not used part of the stay but that’s going to be handled by bankruptcy process and there are rules who get money back in which order I guess employees get their paychecks first or something.
If they can't afford it, they face prison time.
I bet that would fix the issue damn quickly.
Won't happen in this timeline, though.
Personal financial liability would probably be more effective.
Force them sign a special type of insurance, or something else where other companies can temporarily pick up the pieces until the current stays are over. Make the company pay into a fund to pay for that before they get their license to operate the hotel, and make it a legal requirement that the fund needs to be able to cover all the currently active stays for N days. Consequences can be put on the people who run the company, that if they don't fulfill their legal duties they get fines or even prison.
Of course, this is just me brainstorming ideas in two minutes, I'm sure with a proper legal system and actual professionals they could work something out to protect guests and works better than "Sorry, we're bankrupt, you need to leave in one hour or sooner".
1. Secure creditors (like liens on specific assets)
2. Administrative expensive post bankruptcy
3. Priority unsecured claims like employee wages
4. General unsecured creditors like suppliers and customers
5. Shareholders
I think customers who paid by credit card or have travel insurance might be able to make a faster claim with those as the legal process is slow especially since it involves multiple countries where they do business.
Are they really operating on such slim margins that it would have been a threat to their business/chains if they didn't immediately evict and re-book the room(s) out?
If you paid by credit card, just start a chargeback?
Unicorn status (1 billion) in 2020, to bankrupt in 2025. Another Zero Interest Rate Phenomenon.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonder_(company) https://www.linkedin.com/in/francisdavidson/
No, they IPOed via a merger with SPAC in January 2022, and almost immediately the price of the company took a dip. 2021 was probably when the SPAC was founded/IPOed, and the relatively flat price prior to 2022 was because it was basically a pot of money.
Really amazing how much of a reliable indicator this has become.
Forbes 30 under 30 seems to be a bit more interesting for narcissists, as it really focuses on their "great achievements".
If you haven’t heard of him, check him out in his podcast ‘Your Welcome’, spelling intentional.
Reminds me of this song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x5Ye8fBEkcc
Shameful. Given the choice between integrity and money, it seems they chose money.
You can't throw someone out of their home without notice because you have a business dispute with some third party.
...for leasing to a hotel chain that later went bankrupt?
>You can't throw someone out of their home without notice because you have a business dispute with some third party.
It's a hotel. Hotels typically have less tenant rights than long-term accommodations.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/guide-to-the-rent...
I guess the company lived up to its name by reminding every guest that the company itself has(had?) a “life” as complex and eventfull as the guest’s own.
"A stay you can count on. Experience travel without the guesswork. While every space is unique, you can always count on the Sonder Standard. All stays feature designer details, keyless entry, fast free WiFi and our 24/7 digital concierge."
Trying to make a reservation returns "Your session timed out, but you can start a new hotel search below."
This badly hurts Mariott's brand. Their page reads as if they stand behind Sonder. Marriott supposedly has about 30 brands, and now you have to ask which of them are fake fronts.
[1] https://www.marriott.com/en-us/hotels/nycho-the-merchant-hot...
A good unicorn will bring in XYZ billion[1] in profits and a bad one will bring in XYZ million in reputational damage.
Which is exactly why franchise operators get put through the wringer, while 'pod hotel but with an app' startups get the red carpet treatment.
---
[1] Yes, I know that is bullshit, but I'm not an exec, I don't get paid to be wildly optimistic.
Marriott took the route of spreading out their brands. Sheraton, oh that's Marriott? I see. Westin? Huh. Le Méridien, never heard of … oh, Marriott.
Whereas Hilton seem proud enough to stick their name in a thing, even if it's a trailing '…by Hilton'. I wonder how this affects, say, bringing in a new brand.
'Sonder': anonymous. Never heard of it, until now. Gives Marriott some distance. Goes to hell? Cut it. How hard do you really need to try to onboard that brand?
'Sonder by Hilton': I know who owns that. I know which brand to blame when it goes to crap. Directly affects the core offering.
I just made up my mind whose scheme I'm joining.
You know what we do now? We get the Lonely Planet.
It turns out that living in a high trust environment is a lot better than living in a low trust environment, but if we're going to be living in a low trust environment, better to understand it than to pretend we can still act like it's still high trust.
What got LP flack years now has now spread to other guidebook publishers with little furor. I looked at a Rough Guide recently that had all the tell-tale signs that the publisher no longer considers fact-checking and quality control necessary steps. I do like a good guidebook, but in English that means only Bradt these days for its combination of abundant historical context and local knowledge, since so many of its guides are written by people who have been resident in the country for many years and often have an areal-studies background.
Big in North Africa and generally around the Med. Ownership changed quite a few times, I didn't know it ended up in Marriott.
I remember a case (maybe 30 years ago?) where a local health club chain went bankrupt, and anything anyone had left in their lockers was stuck there until the judge ruled on the case.
https://www.upi.com/Archives/1991/03/28/Court-freezes-assets...
But your stuff in the gym's locker aren't the gym's "assets"? Same if you parked your car in some bankrupt hotel's parking lot. Just because it's on some bankrupt company's property, doesn't mean your car is up for grabs by creditors.
The only trouble is that the building probably does count as the gym's assets, so even though your stuff isn't technically frozen, you can't really go in to get your stuff. But if for whatever reason you could (eg. breaking in?), you'd be in the clear to grab your stuff.
This will be an interesting case study to piece together. What were the factors that lead revenue to go down on expansion of your marketing and access reach?
I have my own suspicions, but the backstory with this is probably way crazier than I'm even thinking. Like, "Why would anyone ever sign that?" level crazy.
CSMastermind•1h ago
Sending an email to people saying you need to leave by noon seems crazy.
jahnu•1h ago
Waterluvian•1h ago
fukka42•26m ago
nradov•19m ago
colonwqbang•6m ago
pessimizer•54m ago
Ninjak8051•36m ago
All goes well for a while but the techies start slipping on payments. First it's a few days, but sometimes they miss by a few weeks, so you schedule a call with the VP to straighten things out. Eventually they get a few months behind, you're fed up and demand immediate payment or you will stop lodging their guests (who have paid the techies, but somehow the money has not made it to you). CEO calls to straighten things out, promises to wire the money by Friday, just please please please don't evict any guests. You agree, but Friday comes and goes with crickets, and on Saturday morning you kick everyone out.
fukka42•25m ago
Just stop accepting new guests and work things out with the techies.
wbl•15m ago
Ninjak8051•14m ago
michaelt•7m ago