What's The Highest You've Paid For Hotel Broadband?

Wed, Apr 28th 2004 5:29pm — Derek Kerton

I've been a lax in my writing for Techdirt this week for a couple of reasons: I'm working on some business in Seoul, and connectivity and time are always challenges with international travel, but equally because The Intercontinental Grand Seoul, and their ISP, Inter-Touch, are charging me $20 per 24hrs of Internet. I could have chosen the metered rate of US$0.50/minute in three minute blocks. Let's see, for example, four minutes would be $3! I think it's disgraceful that the hotel not only makes connectivity a profit center (which I can understand), but they have made it an extortion racket. The nice welcome message on the TV says that Intercontinental "understands the needs of the business traveler" better than any other hotel...unfortunately, they have used that understanding to screw the business traveler out of every dollar you are willing to pay for ancillary services. As a thanks to the Intercontinental hotels, I would like to remind those of you with reservations or plans to check with the hotel and see: a) if they offer broadband or WiFi, B) in how many rooms or areas, c) how much they charge. If you don't like the answer, you can change hotels. By the way, the material here says the Inter-Touch service connects to the net at a "superfast 100MBps", yet BroadbandReports.com tested this connection at 1.2MBps. Anyway, I invite you all to comment on the most you've paid for WiFi or Broadband in the comments section below.

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Jonathan Greene, 28 Apr 2004 @ 5:29pm

Cancun...
Cancun - Ritz Carlton - 30 bucks. I passed. It was for a wifi connection that sort of worked in my room and seemed way to much to deal with.
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Liz, 28 Apr 2004 @ 5:29pm

France
15 euro (~$20)- which was 1/3 the price of my room. I left with a bad taste in my mouth for Orange WiFi and Ibis Hotels.
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Sean, 28 Apr 2004 @ 5:29pm

Australia
Worse still is Australia where Inter-touch provide you with a cable of less than a metre long and actively block the use of Apple Airport wireless routers, so I am stuck at the least comfortable desk in the world paying AUD$29 per day
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