I stimulas package depletes money from the government. The government just prints more money. In this scenario, the money is earned by the hotel by another person in the "paying" chain. The tourist is not out his money but the hotel didn't get his sale.
If it helps, I could not request a hold on the package until it made one delivery attempt. Later that evening I was able to request hold at FedEx location via the tracking information. I did this twice.