Q:
I was sent an email from Living Social with a deal to stay at the Golden Nugget on the description on the deal, it stated that after July I had to pay for a nightly $5 "Fremont Street Experience Fee." Did you ever hear about this? Is this another way of saying "resort fee"?
A:
This was the first we’d heard of it but we called the Golden Nugget and yes, starting July 1, this downtown hotel will be taking the "free" out of Fremont and instituting a $5/night "Fremont Street Experience" fee for hotel guests. A call-around to some of the other properties that occupy the section of Fremont Street overhung by the Viva Vision light-show canopy revealed that the reservations desks at the D, Four Queens, Fremont, and Plaza hadn’t heard about the development at their neighboring hotel and had no knowledge of plans to implement any such fee at their respective properties, although curiosity was piqued at the Plaza — currently the only downtown hotel to charge a regular resort fee, where the agent with whom we spoke said he now wants to know more about it. Yikes, we hope our inquiries don’t trigger an unwelcome trend!
That the Plaza, of all properties, would be particularly interested in this development is perhaps not surprising. Back on May 5, 2010, Fremont Street Experience LLC filed a suit against Plaza Hotel & Casino and Tamares Group, the Lichtenstein-based conglomerate that owns the property. Both were charged with failing to pay their electric bill — $429,990 toward the shared cost of keeping the Fremont Street Experience’s 12 million LED lamps burning. FSE claimed that Tamares Real Estate Investments had been delinquent since June 2009.
As with the other hotels located under the canopy attraction, the Plaza/FSE relationship is a two-way street. "As a member of the Fremont Street Experience, Tamares is included in the attraction’s print advertising, website, and overhead Viva Vision display," the lawsuit stated, according to Las Vegas Sun coverage of the litigation.
On Nov. 1, 2011, a summary judgment was entered – in FSE’s favor, according to Experience spokeswoman Mindy Era, who added that Tamares paid a settlement. The resolution of the case received no news coverage in the dailies and the amount of the settlement remains unknown, but if the hotel gets wind of the concept of levying a charge on guests to help foot the hefty electric bill, perhaps an additional charge will get tacked-on to the current $10 nightly resort fee (so let’s hope they’re not reading this).
The Golden Nugget explained their introduction of a fee on the grounds that they’re the largest contributor to the FSE fund, which is probably true, since they’re the biggest hotel on the block. Whether other properties will follow suit remains to be seen, but thanks to the reader who submitted this question and alerted us to the development.
from www.lasvegasadvisor.com
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