HOTEL SOLICITATION ALERT

IVECCS attendees and exhibitors must be very careful in dealing with anyone offering hotel rooms for sale except for VECCS .

IVECCS attendees and exhibitors must be very careful in dealing with anyone offering hotel rooms for sale except for VECCS.  VECCS is aware that IVECCS conference attendees and exhibitors have been approached by other businesses representing that they have blocks of hotel sleeping rooms for sale.  If these businesses do in fact have such room blocks, and they make no misrepresentations in contacting attendees and exhibitors, this practice is legal and VECCS cannot prohibit anyone from doing business with them.

However, to be very clear, VECCS has only contracted with the hotels directly and has not contracted with any other company for room block sales or management.  VECCS cannot and will not vouch for the business practices of any other companies offering hotel rooms for VECCS’s conferences.  Some of these businesses engage in the following practices that can harm attendees as well as VECCS:

Selling fictitious reservations and credit card fraud:  With this practice, conference attendees believe they have made a reservation.  However, they arrive at a hotel to find that no reservation was made and their credit cards may have been charged.

Misrepresentations resulting in bookings outside the block:  These businesses may misrepresent themselves in many ways in order to entice attendees to book through them.  Examples include “bait and switch,” where they sell reservations that are inferior to what was promised (such as further from the conference site), or say that the official hotel blocks are full when they are not.

Trademark infringement: In this case, these businesses will utilize VECCS’s name and trademarks, including logos and conference names, when corresponding with conference attendees in order to make it appear that they are official agents of VECCS or the hotels when they are not.

Unauthorized access, use and selling of data:  These businesses may obtain lists of past, current or prospective conference attendees through a variety of means, including unauthorized use of websites or data bases.  In some cases, they may also purchase lists from sources that are not authorized to sell the data.

Obtaining inventory through misrepresentation or omission:  In many cases, these businesses obtain room inventory by deceiving the hotels or their wholesalers through misrepresentation or failure to disclose their intent.

VECCS negotiates with hotels for blocks of rooms and obtains concessions from hotels if VECCS meets its guaranteed room blocks.  Rooms sold through anyone other than VECCS and its official agents may not be credited to VECCS’s room blocks by the hotels, and, if the room blocks do not fill, VECCS could be subject to attrition fees.  Book your hotel ONLY through the links provided as VECCS cannot guarantee any reservations booked elsewhere.  Please notify VECCS should you be contacted by anyone other than VECCS regarding hotel reservations.