Hotel Industry Legal Issues: Dept. Of Justice (DOJ), In Settlement Of A Complaint Against Hilton Hotels Over The “Americans With Disabilities Act” (ADA), Now Mandates That Hotel Owners Provide Required Number And Categories Of Accessible Rooms And Ability To Reserve Those Rooms Online

“…the settlement represents the first time the Department of Justice has required a franchisor to require all franchised or managed hotels that enter into a new franchise or management agreement, experience a change in ownership, or renew or extend a franchise agreement, to conduct a survey of its facilities and to certify that the hotel complies with the ADA…”

“..It is also the first time that an agreement under the ADA has specifically detailed how a hotel reservations system should be made accessible. The agreement also represents the first time that a hotel chain has been required to make its online reservations system accessible and to provide on its website current data about accessible features in guest rooms throughout the chain…”

Allegations in the department’s complaint include:

• Failure to provide the required number of accessible rooms
• Failure to disperse accessible rooms among the various categories of available accommodations
• Failure to provide individuals with disabilities the ability to reserve accessible rooms through Hilton’s central reservations system on-line or by telephone
• Failure to provide individuals with disabilities with the accessible sleeping accommodations that they reserved.

For more on the Justice Dept. Complaint and Findings:  http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/2010/November/10-crt-1268.html