Courtyard Hotels in Bogota

Let me start with the positives: As Bogota’s airport is the major hub for domestic flights in Colombia, we spent 4 nights at the Courtyard. It’s very conveniently located in almost a walking distance from the airport and have a good shuttle service. As you can expect from Courtyard by Marriott (I am a platinum member) rooms are nice and the restaurant was good. Stuff were friendly. I would have rated it at 4 stars but… We wanted to get to Zipaquira Salt Cathedral (Catedral de Sal) and asked the receptionist’s help. They communicated with the transportation services they use (GERF) and gave us a quote of 220,000 COP for a minivan. Yet, on the night before travel they have told us the price is actually 379,000 COP. They have admitted they have made a mistake and the manager even suggested to compensate us with dinner for the honest mistake. I showed him the lonely planet book showing an estimated price of up to 160,000 COP for a taxi to Zipaquira which includes 2.5 hours wait at the Salt Cathedral. He mentioned their transportation services (GERF) includes a wait of up to 5 hours which would allow us enough time to visit the Cathedral and enjoy the city. We have accepted the offer and thought it was a real nice gesture from the manager to compensate us. After we have finished the visit to the Cathedral which took us about 2 hours, we have decided that instead of staying at the city we would prefer to go to Monserrat which is just a short detour from the way back to the hotel. We have asked the driver if we can spend the rest of the wait time on Monserrat instead and he acknowledged it. We spent about 2.5 hours to visit Monserrat. When we arrived back in the hotel the driver asked for 535,000 COP claiming the agreed total travel time they have committed was 5 hours, not the wait time as communicated and agreed by us. Given the trip to Zipaquira is about 2 hours each way that obviously doesn’t make sense as it means it allows only 1 hour at the Salt Cathedral and no time at the city. It means they have known we would need to pay much more. We have discussed it with the hotel reception and asked to talk with the manager who was not at the hotel but they were unable to resolve the issue. We have reluctantly paid the difference but felt we were cheated (…and paid almost 3 times a regular taxi service we could have ordered). Must admit the hotel gave us the dinner for free as promised but in 2 weeks of traveling in Colombia using hotels to arrange our transportations it was the only incident we have faced. Bottom line - good hotel but we felt cheated which ruined our experience. Suggest NOT to use their transportation services (GERF - see picture attached) or at a minimum be very specific and put the terms in writing to avoid such bad feelings and experience.