You know the moment. You booked a room at one price, and at checkout the total is $80 or $150 higher than you expected, stacked with charges you never meant to agree to. I have argued my way out of enough of these to know which ones are worth fighting and which you are stuck with. Some good news first: as of May 2025, a Federal Trade Commission rule requires US hotels and short-term rentals to show the full price, mandatory fees included, before you reach the payment page. That makes the sneakiest charges easier to spot while you compare. It did not make them go away, though, and it left out airlines and car rentals entirely. So the fees are still on your bill, you just get to see them sooner. Here are the seven that show up most often, what each one really is, and the way I get the junk ones knocked off before I sign the folio.
1. The resort fee, by whatever name it is using
This is the charge that stings the most, and it hides behind several friendly names: resort fee, destination fee, amenity fee, urban fee. It is a mandatory daily charge on top of your room rate, and it runs from under $10 a night at a modest property to more than $50 at a big resort, with some luxury hotels past $100 a day. It supposedly covers wifi, the pool, the gym, and local calls, the things most of us assume come with the room. Two reliable ways around it: book your stay with points at Hyatt or Hilton, which waive resort fees on award nights, or hold top-tier elite status (Hyatt Globalist members get them waived). Before booking, I check a resort-fee lookup site so I know the real nightly total instead of the teaser rate.
2. Parking, the most captive market in the building
Hotels have figured out that parking is a captive market. In big cities, self-parking can run $30 to $60 a night and valet climbs higher, often with a separate charge each time you pull the car out. If you are driving, price this before you book, because a cheap room downtown can cost more than a pricier hotel once you add five nights of valet. I look for nearby public garages, which are frequently half the hotel rate, and I ask whether in-and-out privileges are included. For road-trip families, this one line item can flip which hotel is actually the better deal.
3. Early check-in and late checkout
Arriving at 10am or needing the room until 4pm is where hotels increasingly attach a fee, sometimes $30 to $50 for a few extra hours. It is negotiable far more often than they let on. Loyalty members usually get late checkout free just by asking, and front desks will frequently hold your bags or flex the timing at no charge on a quiet day. I ask rather than assume, and I ask the night before, since a calm request away from the checkout rush gets a friendlier answer.
4. Premium wifi
Basic wifi is usually free now, but plenty of hotels throttle it and then sell a faster tier for streaming or video calls at $10 to $20 a day. If you have any loyalty status, the quicker tier is often included, so log into your account before you pay for it. Business travelers who live on video calls should check this at booking, because a hotel that charges for usable wifi is telling you something about the rest of its fees.
5. Minibar and snack-tray sensors
Some rooms now use weight sensors on the minibar and snack tray, so nudging a $9 water aside to reach your own bottle can trigger a charge you only notice at checkout. If I am not going to buy from it, I ask the front desk to empty it or I leave everything untouched. Always scan these line items on your folio, because sensor charges are among the easiest to get reversed when you flag them.
6. The vague sustainability and safe fees
Watch for small daily charges labeled sustainability fee, energy surcharge, or in-room safe fee, whether or not you ever opened the safe. These are close to pure padding, and they are the ones I push back on hardest. Because they are not tied to anything you actually used, a polite request at the desk usually gets them removed without much argument.
How I get fees removed at checkout
Here is my routine, and it works more often than you would think. I ask for an itemized folio at checkout and read every line before I pay. When I see a charge for something I did not use or agree to, I name it specifically and ask politely to have it removed, because front-desk staff can waive fees on the spot far more than they volunteer to. Being a loyalty member helps, so I join the free program even for a single stay, since members get waivers non-members do not.
If a charge slips through and I only catch it later, I email the hotel with my folio attached, and a calm, specific message usually gets a refund within a few days. For a mandatory fee that was never disclosed before you booked, your credit card’s dispute process is a real backstop.
Quick questions I get
Can I just refuse to pay a resort fee?
If it was disclosed before you booked, it is a legally required charge, and refusing outright rarely works. Your leverage is loyalty status, points bookings, or picking a hotel that does not charge one. The FTC rule means it now has to appear in the upfront price, so at least you can compare honestly.
Did the FTC rule get rid of these fees?
No. As of May 2025 it forces US hotels and short-term rentals to show mandatory fees in the total price before checkout, but it does not cap or ban them, and it does not cover airlines or rental cars.
None of this takes nerve, just the habit of reading your folio and asking one clear question. I treat every checkout as a two-minute review, and over a year of travel it has saved me more than any single points trick. Next time you book, add the room rate and the fees together before you compare hotels, and decide on the real number at the bottom.
Featured image: Photo by Helena Lopes on Unsplash
