Methinks the credit card dispute will be too subtle for the card company to understand. Especially if it based on a verbal promise from a host. All the hotel will have to do is provide the folio that shows the room charges, although I suppose the folio at checkout that shows only the food charges and nada charged for the room might mean something.

Having multiple credit card processing accounts myself, I know all about "chargebacks." It has happened very rarely to me, but as a merchant, I have won all of them, 100%. Basically, if he doesn't win at the first round and pushes for pre-arbitration, which is the second round for chargeback disputes, Fontainebleau will probably fold its hand. But if they are greedy enough to go all the way to arbitration, which is the third round, the card holder may have to pony up half of those arbitration fees in advance or at least agree to pay 100% of them if he loses, and the cardholder's 50% of those arb fees will be around $250 minimum and could be up to $1500., meaning that if he loses, he will lose not just the $2000. but also $500 - $3000. in arb fees (of course, same goes for the merchant, if THEY lose they will lose all those arb fees).

So, if the chargeback works for the guy in the first or second round, fine, but if it has to go to actual arbitration, might not be worth risking the fees.

And the downside to a chargeback is that it is antagonizing to the merchant, who will never deal with the guy again. There even used to be a website that listed those who had ever done a chargeback (as reported by merchants to the website), and merchants could go to it to look up names before dealing with a new customer.