An Open Letter to the Hotel Industry on Wi-Fi Jamming: Let It Go
Photo Credit: A customer leaves a message on the window of a Sheraton hotel room, in frustration. Flickr / Regan Wright
Skift Take
Fair or not, the modern traveler judges hotels by their Wi-Fi forwardness. The American hotel industry has everything to lose and nothing to win in this fight, even if it wins a ruling by FCC.
No good will come out of this.
The American hotel industry could not have picked a worse issue to put its weight against. At stake is protecting a relatively minuscule revenue line while losing the battle in the court of public opinion in every possible way.
Here's the issue at stake: Should guests be forced to use a hotel property’s Wi-Fi network or should they be allowed to bring their own? Whatever the result of this battle, it is guaranteed to be one of those cases where even if the hotel industry wins an official ruling in its favor, it will lose every ounce of customer goodwill it has accrued.
So lets unpack this a little. Last year one of Marriott's properties was caught jamming conference attendees’ own Wi-Fi networks at one of its hotels in the U.S., and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) ended up penalizi
