Opinion ID: 627779
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Reservation System

Text: 19 Defendant presented evidence that on November 22, 1988, the 800 number reservation system was notified to remove the Sheraton South from the reservation system effective November 30, 1988, the date set for termination of the parties' agreement. On November 29, 1988, after plaintiff instituted this lawsuit, Sheraton directed that the Sheraton South remain in the system until further notice. 20 Plaintiff produced evidence that Sheraton Corporation entered a stop sale on the Sheraton South into its computer in late 1988. The computer listed April through November 1989 as stop sales. A stop sale means that reservation agents on the 800 number will not book rooms for those nights for that hotel. It is possible for each hotel to place a stop sale from their own computers when their rooms become full, or when they predict filling their rooms. Barbara Whittemore testified that the Sheraton South did not place the stop sale in question. Defendant's testimony on this point was that a stop sale can be entered as a close out on a property whose franchise has been terminated so that the reservation operators will not book reservations for a property which is no longer affiliated with Sheraton Corporation and that this practice did not violate the reservation agreement. 21 The district court did not find that either of these actions were a breach of the duty of good faith and fair dealing such as to give rise to damages. The court did find, however, that Sheraton had acted in bad faith in manipulating the listings in the reservation system in favor of the Music City Sheraton between 1985 and 1988. The Sheraton reservation system lists hotels by city. If a caller does not identify a particular hotel, attraction, or area of the city, the reservation agent will instruct the computer to list the properties in an order that begins with the property closest to the geographical center of the city. The same listing would be used if the caller requested a downtown hotel. Sheraton concedes that the Sheraton South is closer to the city center than the Music City Sheraton and that the Music City Sheraton was listed first. Additionally, the deactivated Sheraton Nashville was listed second. 3 Therefore, the Sheraton South, the hotel closest to the city center, was third in the reservation system's listing of hotels for Nashville. Sheraton argues that this error was inadvertent and it was corrected on December 7, 1987. Sheraton also states that the improper order again occurred on November 22, 1988, and lasted for seven days until it was corrected on November 29, 1988. 22 We find that the district court's conclusion that Sheraton breached its duty of good faith and fair dealing was not clearly erroneous. Pacific Eastern introduced the testimony of several individuals who, when they contacted the 800 number and asked for a hotel in Nashville, were first given the Music City Sheraton and on several occasions were not even told that another Sheraton was located in the Nashville area. On one occasion, the caller asked if there was another hotel farther outside of town and was informed that there was another Sheraton down south someplace but that it was far away from everything. (App. 272). On another occasion, the caller was informed that the Sheraton South was 15 miles from downtown and approximately 15 to 20 miles from the Grand Ole Opry. The Sheraton South is approximately seven to eight miles from downtown. (App. 240). On several occasions, Sheraton was informed of the inaccuracies of the reservation listings, both orally and in writing, but the problem was not corrected.