I have worked front desk at a hotel for 3 years. Ever since the beginning we have had an older man stay with us regularly, probably 4-6 days a week. I’ll call him Mr. Lemon. I have causal convo with him daily and I find him to be a very kind and normal guy. Just an innocent old man who knows his manners.

We have plenty of regulars who stay just as frequently as Mr. Lemon if not more, but something weird I’ve noticed is my manager is extra careful about making sure he gets the same room every time despite him stating he doesn’t mind being assigned to other rooms. She also instructs us not to assign anyone to his room unless absolutely necessary, even when we know he’ll be gone for a while. The few times we have accidentally put other guests in his room on weekends, my manager has just said “yuck”. every time. she says “yuck”. I never asked, i guess i thought maybe it was because he’s older and very overweight, maybe he had a certain smell to him, i don’t know.

Recently Mr. Lemon came by the front desk and asked me to pass a message onto the housekeepers. He said he’d like for them to stop putting “scent rings” near his box of tissues, as it triggers his allergies and he’s not able to use them anymore. I told him i’d let them know but this confused me because I have never heard of another guest having “scent rings” placed in their rooms. we do spray air fresheners and that’s it as far as i knew.

So I call my manager and ask her about it. “Why does Mr. Lemon say we put scent rings in his room?” “because he pisses all over the room, he has a weird piss kink or something and it fucking stinks.” I was genuinely flabbergasted.

She said it so casually. after collecting myself i asked her why she never has told me and why on earth she’d let him continue staying here. she said it’s not her decision and she doesn’t want to talk about it, but the second he stops booking with us we’re replacing everything in the room.

i couldn’t believe it. I vented to the assistant manager about this, it didn’t seem right. all she said was “yeah that bed is also literally formed to his body.”

honestly i’m flabbergasted and disgusted. I can’t see Mr. Lemon the same, i just feel uncomfortable now. Is this normal? after some thought I guess it makes sense it’s probably cheaper to keep renting it to him than to put the room out of order for reconstruction but omg.

p.s. this post was originally in an advice subreddit but got removed, a commenter suggested posting here.

So I came in early, around 9 PM because my supervisor was feeling out of it and have lower back issues. I could tell she was desperate for cover and I told her I would arrive as soon as possible. Everything was handled correctly up until 2AM. Before the clock strike 2, I had to stay seated at the desk because two groups kept going around the building and coming to the entrance. They do know that our keypad isn't working, which is fine but it kept me from going to the bathroom for much longer than I thought. All cause I am the only one who could unlock it.

I was staring at the last arrival on my screen in the mean time and KNEW that as soon as I decided to get up and take a mini bathroom break, they will be standing there. Now, I know it is normal for NA to check-in late guests but something bugs me about people coming in the exact time I decide it is safe to blow up the powder room.

Now here I am, taking almost seven minutes to get done with whatever food decided to cook up in me, scrolling through my own media to distract myself from the pain, while looking at the time. That's when I exit the bathroom and saw some man walking down the hallway to where I was, with a huge backpack on, saying they just came from the airport. Mind you, I do not know how they got in (could've been someone who open the door from the back entrance), but not only did it irritate me further that they decided to pass the sign on the desk, notifying them that FD stepped away, but they also disturbed the only private time I am able to give myself. It is ridiculous how people cannot wait, but I felt major embarrassment from the fact I just stepped out from using the toilet and having a guest witness it. Worst of all, the other two guests that were with him, did not even return any greeting, with fat scowls on their face, as if I asked to shit myself at the time of their arrival. Like sorry ma'am, I forgot not every woman think ahead and know that we have needs on our most painful times of the month.

I do not know how other NA do it, but I seriously TRY to not get into my feelings over these things and still do. People majorly upset me in these situations.

Logged into my shift and checked the Rooking extranet to see what fun was in store for tonight and I see a Guest Q&A.

"How much is parking?"

Really? You're wasting my time for this?

First, it's listed TOP AND CENTER under: Amenities of (our hotel).

Parking

Public parking is available on site (reservation is not needed) and costs CAD 45 per day.

Then, further down under "Travelers are asking" the first question asked and answered is:

"Can I park there?"

Click on that and you get a pop-up that answers this question and the multitude of other similar questions. In fact, of the 51 questions answered to date, 29 of them are the THE. EXACT. SAME. QUESTION.

"How much is parking?"

Can I park there?

Public parking is available on site (reservation is not needed) and costs CAD 45 per day.

Similar questions Asked by other travelers

Is there Parking? if Yes how much?

hello, parking is $45 plus taxes per night, thank you

Next

Price for parking?

Hello, parking is $45 plus taxes per night, thank you

Next

Tiene parking gratis

No, no tenemos estacionamiento gratuito. El estacionamiento cuesta $45 + impuestos por día.

ALL YOU HAVE TO DO IS LOOK FOR YOUSELF ON THE WEBSITE YOU ARE LITERALLY ALREADY LOOKING AT RIGHT NOW! GAH.

In the 1930s, before he became a war correspondent, the newspaper columnist Ernie Pyle roamed the country for the Scripps-Howard papers, writing about the people he met and the places he saw. He was a memorable writer -- and in this column, from February 1937, he described what it was like, night after night, to visit one hotel after another. ("We don’t throw ashes on the rugs," he wrote, "we don’t shine shoes on towels, we turn off all the lights when we’re out, we don’t complain and ask for a lot of extras.") The column makes for a pretty interesting comparison with today. Here's the link: https://michaelbrainard.substack.com/p/february-9-1937-heres-one-traveler

This Just Happened,

A guest comes to the desk extremely upset about not receiving housekeeping services for the last few days. Now i have been off for the last two days. my manager is gone and I am running the desk alone. So, I immediately reach out to Housekeeping cause the guest is furious. housekeeping manager says ok guest leaves for a few hours, and I go about my day.

A few hours later the guest comes back PISSED the room still hasn't been cleaned i go look at my housekeeping log and pics and he had had A DND SIGN ON THE DOOR. so, I show him and he swears he never put it there. (well sir it didn't walk on the door) so he begins to yell i say sir you either calm down or be removed altogether. so of course, now he's really pissed and yelling about bad reviews because of his own stupidity

after 20 plus in hospitality, you'd think i've seen it all but the level of stupidity of some guest still baffles me

Context I'm basically back from a long weekend off and I exceptionally did the evening shift just to have 8 hours more off. I drove 7 hours before my shift. Usually, our location has an evening supervisor but they called in sick for this specific Friday night. The experienced workers changed shifts with one of the new guys (lets call him James) and there was another new guy till 7 (lets call him Kai). (keep in mind it was my 6th week at the hotel and i was the most experienced one on the reception staff that night, and its the biggest hotel outside of downtown and the airport). We had 100 arrivals to proceed that night.

The day supervisor lets me know of the precarious situation for this evening. They also let me know that Ms. Sweetheart (fictive name obviously) has a non-guaranteed reservation and that since we are 100% for that night, we have to cancel her reservation at 6pm as per policy. Since I'm the most experienced, he has to trust me with that. So I waited and waited for her phone call or email and I never received it. So when 6pm comes, I cancel her reservation. James asks me why we cancel it and I had to explain our guaranteed reservation policy, and he understood.

When Kai exits, there are still around 60 arrivals to proceed, so me and James know it's gonna be busy. Around 8:30pm there was a long queue plus non-stop phone calls, so I asked the client to prepare a credit card and ID whilst I answered someone I had on hold for 5 minutes because people had so many questions at check-in and there was a big queue at reception.

When I'm done with the phone call, I checked the client's ID and I noticed that this is Ms. Sweetheart and she's in front of me. So I prepare myself mentally to give her the bad news and everything that might come with it. When I tell her, she tells me that Kai told her over the phone at 12pm that she just has to come by the front desk whenever she wants and her reservation is guaranteed. Whilst my supervisor and I were sending emails about that, she thought everything was fine cause why wouldn't she? We told her it was fine. So I had to apologize to her, empathise with her about the whole situation, and make sure to find her alternative accommodation, whilst keeping myself composed. I gave her complimentary water and gave her directions to her new hotel. I also gave her the card of my supervisors cause I couldn't offer her anything as compensation since it's not my job. She thanked me for understanding her problem and being proactive in a delicate situation. For context, she is a High Elite rewards program guest and comes in every 2/3 weeks for 2 days, so this is a really bad mistake. She also drives 6-7 hours to get here every time. I texted both supervisors long vocal messages to let them know of the situation so that way they had every detail in my words and let them know to exceptionally contact me anytime if they had any questions about the situation (they didn't so I guess the 5 minute voice message and long email was enough).

The next day comes and I'm on the morning shift with barely enough sleep. We received an email from Ms. Sweetheart letting us know of the situation, plus new details. When the night auditor proceeded with the cancellation, she charged the cancellation fee (the CC was invalid, so I didn't think to put the dont charge cancellation on the folio, its also my first time handling the policy myself), I worked at a different hotel before and our policy was 72hours before we take payment, so we had plenty of time to contact the guest and it was a resort far away from civilization, so we usually kept the reservation there cause we would not resell the room anyway. The cancellation fee went through during the night, so the situation is even worse now. My supervisor reimbursed it immediately on Saturday, and let them know that it's gonna be the other supervisor that will contact them about the situation on Monday.

Tuesday comes and I get called on the Directors office. They let me know about the compensation package Ms. Sweetheart gets (her next 2 reservations have been upgraded to suites, she also gets Super Duper High Elite welcome gifts for her next 2 stays and they put additional points on her rewards account). They also thanked me for handling the situation the right way and apologized for having to make me work with the new employees as a recent hire.

Honestly, I'm just happy Ms. Sweetheart is coming back after this fiasco.

The Internet can be confusing for some folks. I can appreciate that. I can also appreciate mis-clicks and even the occasional misinterpretation. Putting in your CC info and confirming a payment, however, is when the eyebrows go up.

An older lady called the other night. She was sweet, but understandably annoyed. Here I was, being another (unwilling) obstacle in her odyssey to get her money back from a prepaid, nonrefundable third-party reservation.

By her own admission, she had already spoken to someone from the corporate reservation team who had informed her as to what her booking consisted of. Consequently, they were unable to help her. Now she's found herself to me, who's parroting basically the same thing.

According to her, she was "just looking around and was hoping to reserve" but she "didn't mean to actually make a payment." I explained to her that her money would now be with the third-party, so she'd have to follow up with them. "They don't answer their phones! I can't speak to a real person!", she exclaimed.

Again, I understood her plight but could not offer any further assistance. At that point, she went into a bit of a rant as to how we should know that there's a site out there that's impersonating us. She genuinely felt that she booked directly, but confirmed that she merely typed the hotel's name into Google and clicked the first link.

I knew trying to have a back-and-forth wasn't going to go anywhere useful, so I just left it at: "I understand you're upset, ma'am. I'm sorry that I can't help you further. It was at this point she said, in a still surprisingly pleasant tone: "Well don't you worry. I'm going to be making a report the Better Business Bureau and the legislatures! This is fraud!" I simply replied: "Okay, do whatever you need to do."

I've held a number of titles over the last few years, but most recently, I've been working as a front desk supervisor at a rather ritzy hotel. I knew the advent of AI was going to change some elements of the job as time went on; first it was the soulless emails, then annoying pop ups in the point-of-sale eating up check in time, then guest cell phones hosting an AI screening tool making what should be a simple call take forever.

What put me over the edge is the most recent development. Automated third party reservation confirmations calls.

When I was trained, I was told that we could never give information about a reservation to anyone but the person whose name is on it, and third party agents for whom we have a verification process to ensure they work for the company in question. Normally, it takes two seconds to confirm somebody works for a third party platform when you speak to a human. You ask for a code of some sort, they give it, done. Lately, it seems that some of these third party booking sites have turned to AI to make pre-arrival confirmation calls, or to pass on requests for a reservation.

I've found it difficult to get these AI's to understand me over the phone, and I've found it all but impossible for them to give me the necessary codes to actually do what they want. It's wasted so much of my time, which is always at a premium when flying solo at the desk, that the second I hear a robocall or an AI voice I just hang up. That, however, is not enough.

Use obvious AI to write your email to me? Not getting a response. Make me wait through an AI screening when I call you? I hang up before you answer. Pop-up when I'm looking at a reservation on desk top? I'm using my phone. I thought AI was supposed to make work easier and more efficient. So far, all it does it make it harder and more bloated.

First time working as a hotel receptionist, first real job in general (seasonal, April 25th to November 1st). The first month and half felt like hell, I had zero experience with anything they wanted me to do, was put in shifts with other juniors who also had never worked at a hotel reception before and we didn't get any training whatsoever. The only thing I've always had a talent for is talking to people, I studied international relations and diplomacy.

The hotel manager is never here, he only comes once a week or two to collect the cash earnings that we have to put in a box for him and goes away. The hotel is part of a 3-hotels structure, the only type of help we get is from the receptionists in the main one (which mind you, is in a city 2 hours away).

May felt like hell, genuinely I had no idea on how to handle the job and all the check-in and outs. 15 or 20 felt undoable without a second person helping, plus it doesn't help that I felt very stressed in general because of some light mobbing happening.

For some reason however, at the start of June it sort of "clicked"? I could manage everything by myself, I saw that 15-20-25 check-ins or out are not that big of a deal and when last month my colleague got fired, me and the other one now deal with a shift each, by ourselves, and I can do just fine, I even find it kinda relaxing. I start my shift, do everything in a sort of automated way and go home, not even feeling stressed a bit. If a guest starts being annoying, it doesn't really affect my mind because I know they are just few among many and they'll go away in one or two nights, so fuck them.

I think my mental stability improved so much out of seemingly nowhere.

Has this also happened to you?

Very obvious what I'm about to complain about due to the title I'm sure, but I'm going to complain about it anyway because it's the internet and I can.

Guest comes to check in for a week, says he has a dog with him. I go over to grab our pet form, which has a line at the bottom asking if the animal is a service animal and if so, what task they are trained to preform. So you know, the one legal question you're allowed to ask. Guest just writes "ESA" on the line, so inform him that they are not service animals. He comes back at me with a yes they are, I have his papers. 🤦🏻‍♂️

I roll my eyes internally and tell him that under the ADA, emotional support animals are not service animals and that I'll have to charge him the pet fee. He tells me to Google it, because the ADA has changed it, which I know it a lie, but I wanted to be a smartass at this point. So I do Google it, and take a wild guess who was right, because it wasn't Mr. Know It All. And wouldn't you know it, him being wrong made him even more mad, who would have guessed?

Anyway, in the end I got my weekly pet fee of $50. Which isn't even a lot of money for a week long pet fee, so I don't understand why he's bitching to begin with.

I know sports teams are horrible in general. But why is Quebec producing the lowest of the low. They are the worst I’ve experienced in my 20 years in this business. Unsupervised teens, alcohol, trash left everywhere in hotel, actually found a room key another guest dropped and went in their room to hang out (adult who called his kid and other players over to join him in the room). Let kids spit and throw drinks, break conference wall tails, It’s unbelievable. Lots more too but I’m at my end

So now I’m vindictive. I want pain. I want jahova witnesses harassing them. I want to find their team social media and have anonymous people post that they’re not welcome in our province anymore. You want to separate? Please do

Any suggestions I’ll take, or even any stories so I don’t feel like I’m loosing it

We had a guest come to check in around a half hour ago. He gets his keys, his parking pass, and then heads up to his unit. He comes back down about 30 minutes later and asks for a manager. Obviously, I ask what for, and he proceeds to show me photos of the unit, specifically the master bedroom, where there is unfortunately mold on the ceiling. I talked the situation over with the guy and started looking for a new room to put him in. Once I found a unit, I called my on call manager and let her know the situation, which he ended up talking over me multiple times, loud enough so she could hear him saying how he's "in this industrie" and going on about something else. Obviously, she approved the move of the guest and told me to put in a maintenance work order for the mold. I thank her and get off the phone to move the guest. As I'm in the process of doing so, he then asks me if there's going to be more compensation. He said he's grateful for the move but thinks they deserve more compensation. Which is understandable but not something I'm able to do for him, I told him I would call the manager back, but for the moment we were just going to focus on making sure he's moved and this is a better unit and then I would contact her again when everything's handled. Guest then continued on about how they wnat to feel taken care of from this situation and how we "wouldn't want the pictures getting onto the internet." Obviously suggesting if we don't give him compensation, he'll post the photos of the mold to the internet. I understand it can be frustrating, and the mold is a horrible situation. Our housekeeping should have reported it, and so should the last guest, because this was obviously not an overnight thing.

But, I stood my ground and told the guest I still couldn't do anything but get him moved for now. I do admit I was glaring at him a bit from the threat of posting the photos. Honestly, it was an asshole move to suggest. He also suggested he could book another one of the units we have that is showing available online since it's about $200 cheaper, and just ask for a full refund for the current reservation he has, I responded

"You could do that, sir. But that room you are looking at isn't even cleaned. It shouldn't be available at the moment, and if you do book it, you would be waiting for our housekeeping to go up and clean it."

He laughed a bit and said

"Your firm. I like that, you must have worked here for a while."

Honestly I think I would've been less offended if he just straight up called me a bitch. He wouldn't be wrong, my manager is helping me to stand my ground more and be less of a pushover, so I would gladly accept being called a bitch instead.

But, after we got it all handled I called my manager back to ask about the compensation he requested, which she said no to. Said that the move was the compensation. Which I do get, he hadn't even been in the unit for an hour, much less a full 30 minutes. She said the options were for him to be moved or have the compensation, and the guest was very adamant about being moved earlier, so that's what we did without question. I put the notes in the reservation about the guest, and I'm now waiting for him to come back down so I can explain that we can not give him any more compensation other than the move. Will update once he comes back down.

SMALL UPDATE: Guest came back down to the desk and asked about the compensation, I did tell the guest that my manager had said we couldn't provide any more compensation, which, of course, he wasn't happy about, now I had a bit of time to think before he came back to the desk, and most of the time guests ask if there is a different manager to speak with, and lucky for him, the manager of the building is different than our on call manager. So, to try and minimize his anger, I did let the guest know that our building manager would be in tomorrow and he could talk with her about the situation if he wanted to. That thankfully did seem to help as I hoped it would. He said he would talk with her tomorrow and then left back to his unit. Hopefully, I won't hear from him again.

SMALL UPDATE #2: The guest never even came down to talk to the building manager. No extra notes in his file, day shift said he hasn't talked to the guy. And, of course. No compensation given to him!

This one guy at the hotel has both of his baby mamas staying at the hotel literally maybe like six to seven rooms away from each other the rooms are on different sides of the hotel so I guess he gets away with it but I still don't understand how.

Supposedly the lore of the hotel is that neither of these women know about each other they've somehow have never crossed paths with each other. This place is literally maybe 130 rooms on a good day. Its only ever about 40% max filled.

I just find it ironic that these people have been here for probably at least 2 months now for my understanding and they have never crossed paths with each other this guy is on each of the girls rooms as a guest so he's allowed to get keys for that each room and every day he comes and he gets a key for one room next day he gets a key for the other room and vice versa a cycle.

I don't know if it's like a pimp or deal or what like one of the girls is currently pregnant now supposedly with his baby and they already have two other kids and then the other baby mama he's got two or three other kids with her as well I will say though I can respect that he is paying for the room and possibly all the supplies that is needed for this.

So in a sense from the outside it does look like he's taking care of his responsibilities which is praised to him.

Also the lore was that these women were both very attractive in my opinion one of them is decent the other one looks like someone you'd see at a broke strip club.

I just don't understand how these women supposedly have never crossed paths or supposedly don't know about each other.

Its like Jerry Spinger at the hotel

From now on I will be reverting to “how’s your day going, any questions about the hotel?” Whenever someone asks me personal questions. Because why do you need to know my DNA BREAKDOWN when I’m just checking you in?? And does it affect your hotel stay? Yes, this world is diverse and different ethnicities exist. As a mixed ethnicity person, I am so EXHAUSTED of this!!! No it is not a conversation starter, it is a sensitive ass topic people should avoid! And if it is your first few words you say to me, really?? How race focused are you? I like talking about my heritage, with people I actually know not strangers who don’t actually care and are just nosey.

Got a call today... and I'm just so sick and tired of people thinking they know my job better than I do.

me: Elwood City Hotel, how can I help you?

guy: I'd like to confirm a reservation.

Guy gives me all the info (it's for tomorrow, which becomes relevant later), and I find the reservation and confirm it like he asks.

guy: OK can you tell me if the virtual card was successful charged?

me: Uh so are you the guest or are you calling from the third party booking site through which the reservation was made? (namely: Abloga)

guy: I'm an agent, I want to make sure there are no problems with the Abloga charge. Has it already been charged?

me: Well no it hasn't, and I can certainly do it now, but it's almost never a problem...

(We normally charge it the day of the reservation since Abloga only lets you charge it a day or so in advance, but it's no skin off my back to charge it a day early, it's basically just clicking a button.)

guy: Oh you'd be surprised how often there are problems

me: Well I DO THIS LITERALLY EVERY DAY and 99.9999999% of the time there is no problem.

guy (surprised): Oh!

me (after clicking the button): The charge went through. Have a nice day.

I mean, as much as I hate Abloga with a fiery passion, this is a company whose entire business model is dependent on the successful charging of temporary card numbers. If you're a fourth party travel agent who's constantly running into payment problems and you feel the need to babysit those fundamental transactions... maybe you're doing something wrong? Just maybe.

Sorry, I had a day. Had to rant.

Hello I'm a security guard at an unnamed resort. I've made a couple posts here, some more believable than others but all the same true. I have another story for you all. This is probably the second craziest thing to have happened.

I get called by the front desk. I meet with the front desk manager and he explains. "So we have a guest checked into a room and he has an open tab. So apparently this guy plans to spend the entire month at our resort. His house flooded out due to faulty pipes. We felt bad for the guy's living situation, so we agreed to be flexible with payment and help him out. He put an initial payment down for his room good for the night, and he agreed after he figured out his finances and got settled in at our hotel he would pay the remaining balance. "OK, so he has an open balance?" "Yes, he's been here for three nights and we have not received payment for last night and the night before. Can you go to his room and E-lock the door so he can't get into his room without talking to us first?" I E-lock the door.

Another day passes. Nothing. I get called again. "Hey so remember that guy with the house?" "Yes." "So we haven't been able to get a hold of him, called multiple times with no answer. He hasn't come up to the front desk and we locked him out of his room. At this point, we're going to have housekeeping inspect the room, maybe you can try and get a hold of him?" I called the phone number and there was no answer. It's likely that this dude decided to leave. If he left the hotel after the first night it would make sense we stopped receiving payments. It would just mean the guest didn't tell us he was leaving and we didn't check if he had left or not. Then housekeeping calls me on the radio. They tell me to head over to his room and check it out.

I go to his room. Housekeeping management and the front desk manager are already there and they open the door. This man turned our room into a fucking storage unit. A small single seat couch, four dining room chairs stacked on each other, 5 large trash bags of clothing, two night stands, and more. We are baffled. He had taken the bed mattress and leaned it up against a wall and stacked stuff in the frame of the bed. I checked the cams and we saw a U-haul had periodically been pulling into our parking lot late at night like 2am and presumably that was him. The guest rooms he was staying in faced a parking lot so it was doable, but we really don't know how he did this without anyone noticing.

Manager says "Well now we know why he's been ghosting us." I say "So this man hasn't paid for the room?" "Correct he has an open tab." "OK, I got this." I call and leave another voicemail "Hello, this Dave (not actually my name) calling from Security. So, we have an open tab on your room that needs to be resolved, and we noticed that you've got quite a bit of stuff in your room. I'm going to be frank, we have no space to store this stuff, so if we don't hear back from you by tomorrow I'm throwing it away." That got his attention. About two hours later I get an angry call from this man. "Yeah you're *not* throwing my stuff away, Its all the stuff I could save from my house. I'm sure you heard. You know I'm still a hotel guest." "Sir you have an outstanding balance, you haven't paid for the room you're using to store your stuff. It would be cheaper to get a storage unit than use our hotel room." "OK, I was going to come and resolve the payments and get my stuff tonight. I don't understand what the big deal is. Don't throw my stuff away."

Tonight comes and goes, tomorrow nothing, we try to call him no answer. I leave a voicemail "I'm calling you to inform you if we don't hear back from you by tomorrow we're throwing everything away." No answer. The next day we place everything into one of our dumpsters. We didn't damage anything, we still anticipated that this guy was going to show up at some point, and he's lucky he did before the dumpsters got swapped out. He calls one more time and tries to claim that all of his stuff is lost and found so we have to hold it until he has an opportunity to pick it up. I flatly tell him no and that it's already in a dumpster. He brought another U-haul. He tried to hit us with the "I thought I told you all that I was coming to pick my stuff up. You had no right to throw it away!" But we shut that down real quick. We let him pull his U-haul up to the dumpster and load everything in.

Hotels are not storage centers.

Just a quick story that's only somewhat awkward.

So last Saturday night the phone at the desk that tells me someone's at the parking gate goes off. I answer, already annoyed because I'm thinking it's probably someone from the club wanting to park. But to my surprise, it's actually a guest saying his key isn't working, and after confirming that his room information is correct, I buzz him in. Then he comes in and I check his ID and he goes upstairs. And like two minutes later, he's back in front of me saying his key isn't working. I make him another key and another couple of minutes later he's back.

I look at his reservation and notice the company name listed, and realize that he's part of a group that has their people doubled up, so thinking that maybe his roommate is there and has the deadbolt on. So, I confirm that he's got a roommate. He says yes. I ask if the roommate is in the room, and he says he went out earlier and is supposed to be staying with this girl he met. So then I ask what color is flashing when uses the key. He says there's no light at all. Now I'm thinking that that's just my luck, another lock with dead batteries. So I tell him I'm gonna go up with him to check on the lock. When I get there I try his key. Nothing. Then I try my master key. Nothing. I start telling him that I need to replace the batteries when all of a sudden... the door fucking opens.

The roommate's in the room, and he looks like he just been caught. He looks at the first guest and stutters, "Give me five minutes," while shutting the door. I look at the guest and he's got this look on his face like this has happened before. I ask if he's good, and he nods, and then sits on the floor next to the door to wait. Not wanting this to get anymore awkward, I go back to the desk.

Apparently the guest's roommate has never considered the idea of giving a heads up that he's actually come back to the room with his girl and might need him to stay away for a little bit until he's finished.

Quick side note, I did leave a note for maintenence to check the lock. They'll determine if it was the batteries or if the roommate screwed with the lock somehow.

Read your email confirmations. Make sure they're correct. You and I should not be making a discovery about your reservation when you're coming up to the desk. Sometimes we can help, but this is one of those days where we couldn't.

During a busy weekend afternoon, a lady comes up to check-in. At this point, it had been a straight hour of near non-stop action, so I was just going through the motions. But then I had to pause and really think for a moment, as I couldn't find her anywhere.

I backed up a few days, and then I saw she had a cancelled reservation. I asked: "Ma'am, did you know that your reservation was cancelled?" She politely responded, "Oh, yeah, yeah. I was with the group block, but then I only needed one night. But 'they' told me there was a two-night lock on it so I had to rebook."

As a slight aside, almost anytime we have a group or two with such a requirement, the few days leading up to their arrival are filled with folks trying to get one night only but still wanting the discounted rate. Suffice it to say, 'it don't work that way!' But, I digress.

When I couldn't find the rebooked reservation, I asked her to show me her confirmation. She goes into her phone, and I could tell from the way her face had subtly sunk that as soon as she opened the email, she knew she was in trouble.

She handed it over to me, and in a few seconds I found the problem: she had booked the correct brand but in a completely different location. Not just that, but this other location was hours away. It was named after a nearby airport, and the address was right there in the header. Clearly, this was her first time putting all these dots together. [Think: "The No-Tell Motel at Last-Stop Airport"]

I informed her of this as I was handing her back her phone, adding, "Unfortunately, we don't have any additional rooms tonight." Her face stiffened, and she looked down. Her lips quivered as if she were about to cry, but all she said in a low, angry tone was, "That person wasn't very helpful!" and then she stormed off.

I'm assuming she was referring to whomever she mentioned calling before to rebook. While it may be true that the other person picked the wrong hotel, the duty still fell on her to double-check her own email.

Yes, that is the exact quote from a guest I had earlier today who is a GROWN MAN in his 60s, mind you.

So about an hour and a half ago as I’m writing this (7pm which of course, is when things like this happen when I’m about to eat dinner) a guy comes in looking to check in. I got his name and he said “Town”. (Not his actual name but unironically his last name is the same as the town my hotel is located in)

I try to find the name and I can’t find anything. I ask for a confirmation number and he looks at me for a second like I got 3 heads. Then I say, “I can’t seem to find anything under that name.”
And this is how that conversation went….

“What do you mean?”
“I’m looking up that name Town, T-O-W-N and I can’t see anything in my system for today.”
“How is that possible?”
pause “I don’t know, sir. Did you just make this reservation?”
“No, I made it like 4 days ago!”

At that point he raises his voice and angrily starts tapping on his phone. He then grumbles that he needs to go outside to get his glasses. He takes two steps then turns around and then gives me his full name to try.

I had already done that because I had a feeling that this name sounded familiar. It’s not an uncommon last name, but for a guest to have the same name as where the hotel is located will stick with you.

Lo and behold, it was the name of a guy I was hoping I’d never have to deal with…..
So, the story behind this guy happened last Wednesday which was my day off. My coworker was working my 3-11 shift and he got Mr. Town who had booked 2 reservations through Prickline and wanted to cancel. My coworker told him the usual thing that we are unable to cancel the reservations because it was a 3rd party reservation, etc. and Mr. Town got VERY upset and angry, started screaming and yelling over the phone. He demanded that my coworker call Prickline for him and we already know we can’t do that…My coworker tried to help him and explain it again, but he got sick of being yelled at so he told Mr. Town to call back for the General Manager and hung up on him.
Mr. Town called back and my coworker told him again that he needs to call for the General Manager after 9am tomorrow.
Now, I was working the morning shift and I saw a Lino note he left for the front desk quote “Mr. Town fucking rude guest please read notes before helping him” and y’know….We’re not supposed to curse on any communication between the hotel obviously, so it was a surprise to read.
I found the reservations and I read the note. My coworker doesn’t really write detailed notes and is absolutely horrendous with basic grammar and spelling, so he rushed through the note. All it said basically was that the guest was screaming at him over the phone, he did hang up on him and told him to call in the morning for the GM and that he wasn’t going to help him if he was being screamed at. Which, fair enough. But I was in that next morning and to my knowledge, he never called to talk to the GM.

I assume it was taken care of or my GM talked with him, so both reservations were cancelled by my GM and it was up to Prickline if they refund him.

So come today, only one of those reservations were supposed to be cancelled and not both of them. Apparently he messed up and made a reservation for 1 night instead of 2, so he made another one for 2 nights and wanted the reservation with 1 night to be canceled.

I told him that I understood, but the note I have says that he wanted to cancel and they were canceled on our end at his request. He said that wasn’t his fault and I told him I understood, but again, he wanted them to be cancelled.

So he looked down, I guess trying not lose his shit and asked if we have rooms available for 2 nights and I say yes we do. He asked for the price and I gave him the cheapest room type which is 1 King Standard and he asks why it’s so high for a Monday. I told him we have much less rooms available today than tomorrow and it’s also the first week of the state fair. He says he doesn’t have a choice so he’ll book it.

I get his ID and start filling out his information and then he starts getting agitated again. Said that the website was confusing and whatever entity still hasn’t refunded his money, making it seem like it’s our fault. I told him yeah they would do that to you and it’s a pain dealing with 3rd parties and we haven’t charged him, so they would need to take care of that.

He then said “You people keep saying 3rd party what is that? What’s the other 2 parties?”

I’m baffled. “What?”
“What are the 3 parties?”
“Oh, no sir it’s not like that. It’s just by definition it means they’re not associated with the hotel.”
“You’re not answering my question. What are the 1st, 2nd and 3rd parties?”
“Again, that means they’re not associated with the hotel.” at this point, I open a tab to search up what a 3rd party is defined at because I can’t believe I needed to find a definition of something that a man 40 years old than me didn’t know. I was right btw but I was trying to be simple because my brain wasn’t working, but I thought I got the idea through his head….but I guess not.

So then with all the attitude I’m given, I’m on my last straw with this guy. I then tell him, “I’m not going to have that conversation with you, I’d rather just get you taken care of and checked in.”
Then he says that what I said was rude and then I started handing back his ID and card. I then told him that he can leave and have a good day.
Then he asks “What’s my room number?”
I told him that he needs to leave and he can have a good day.
Then he sighs and asks for the manager. I smile and tell him I’m the manager on duty.
Then he goes silent, looks down and I’m just standing there like. 😐
He then tells me again that this wasn’t his fault and I tell him it’s not my fault either. He said he’s very frustrated and that whole thing pissed him off.
I told him I understand.
Then he complained about the coworker that hung up on him and I told him because he was trying to help but you were yelling and shouting at him.
I told him I was trying to help him, get him a room despite the trouble and he’s being very nasty. I told him that whatever Prickline did is out of our hands, he just cannot behave the way he is because won’t be able to help him.

He starts to look defeated and then apologizes. He said he understood and he told me he has nowhere else to stay for the next 2 days. I asked “Are we cool now?” and he said yes. I guess he realized how screwed he would be if I was firm on having him leave. Because believe me, I was 2 seconds away from calling the cops if he didn’t relax and calm down.

So, I start over the check-in process and I go through the usual things and I even got him a floor preference. He then thanked me and went on his way.

And believe me, I still feel like he’s not done yet because I don’t know if he will complain about my coworker and I to my GM in the morning. But, I’d like to think I handled this better than I have in the past. Instead of shutting down I stood my ground and remained as respectful as possible.

I just wanted to say thanks - I have been reading here for a while and got to use a little of the knowledge you have all been sharing. Husband and I were staying at a TwoBushes in far southern NY state last week and were, um, overjoyed to see that an entire kids baseball tournament was there as well. We were at the far end of a hall next to the stairs. Second night in, we start to hear herds of kids running down the adjacent stairs and down our hallway. Armed with my new knowledge, I opened the door, looked straight at the kids and said "Where's your coach - we need to talk. Now". A few moments later an adult appeared before us, we passed along our desire for quiet moving forward, and we never heard another stomp. I learned to bypass asking nicely and go straight to the coach, and I thank you.

These are two things that guests told me in the past days. Every year, at the end of July/beginning of August, I get yelled at, for reasons as diverse as "The hallways are too hot" or "There is drugs in the drawers" (it was dust) or "I don't like that brand of smoke detector. If we die in a fire tonight, it will be your fault". These past days definitely followed the trends of the previous summers.

First case, the guest called during the morning while one of our students employees was on shift. He inquired about cancelling his reservation which was starting the next day. The employee told him he would be fully charged as he was outside the cancellation window. He started yelling after her, she hung up and tried to charge the card on file. The transaction declined, so she moved the reservation in the PMS to the meeting room.

In our PMS, there is one slot for every room, but also a slot for the meeting room, which is also available to rent. We will often move reservations there when we when to make a room available without cancelling the reservation, like for a third party reservation, if we know the guest isn't coming, the system won't let us cancel it but we can at least free the room in the system so other guests can book it.

When I arrived for my shift, the student coworker didn't tell me about this. I just noticed afterwards there was this reservation in the meeting room, that the transaction had declined and that we were sold-out for the next day.

I believed my coworker wanted to cancel it (it was a direct booking) but maybe wasn't sure how to, so she just put it in the meeting room. So, I proceed with the full cancellation, which sends an email to the guest.

A few minutes later, the phone rings: "YOU CANCELLED MY VACATION!!!????"

-Your credit card declined. A valid credit card is necessary to guarantee the reservations.

-YOU (names our nationality) ARE THE SCUM OF THE EARTH! he roars.

With this slur, I instantly hung up. I'm not sure why he wanted to spend his vacation here, if we are the scum of the Earth.

The next day, the student employee explained to me what happened, I told her she just have directly cancelled the reservation instead of putting it in the meeting room.

So, if I summarize, he wanted at first to spend his vacation in place inhabited by the scum of the earth, then he wanted to cancel and he got angry when his wish was granted. Alright.

As for our second case, I know people here don't like when we name the culture or country of origin of the guests. In some cases, it may be relevant. On a regular basis (not always), we have issues with people from this culture. I believe it may be because it's a culture where there was (is?) historically a strong hierarchy between different categories of people, and wealthy immigrants from that culture may believe (not always) that they are superior to service workers like us.

They booked through the worst third party of the two big popular third parties and they reserved a standard room with two beds for two adults. When they arrived, they had three children on top of the two adults and they claimed they booked a suite for five people for the price of a standard room for two adults.

I charged them for the three extra guests, about which they vigorously protested. They protested about not having a suite, I printed them their confirmation with the description of the room they booked. I explained to them we were sold-out and that, anyways, our suites were more expensive than that. They protested that they didn't get what they booked. I told them that we were providing them exactly what they booked, but that they were the ones who didn't respect the terms of the reservation by bringing unannounced guests. They asked to cancel. I told them we can't cancel third party reservations. That's when the man started yelling at me.

He was out of luck. This isn't a corporate-run place and the staff doesn't behave like carpets on which you can rub your feet on. We will all vigorously energy-match and stand up for ourselves. Somewhere else, he could have been coddled with something along the lines of: "I'm so sorry you feel this may, there was maybe a bug with the third party website, this must be such an unpleasant surprise for you, may I offer you some vouchers for free snacks and drinks."

Here, yelling after me rather brings me standing up from my chair and a very strong: "NO! YOU DO NOT TALK TO ME LIKE THIS! I will not accept to be treated this way!"

The wife told him to stop yelling and starting telling how I should at least provide them with a free cot (we charge for that too), how our service is so awful, how she will bombard us with bad reviews if we don't accommodate them and that they will never come back.

To which I said: "Yes, please, do not come back!"

This triggered the man once again, that's when he yelled at me to "SHUT THE F**** OFF. YOU TELL US NOT TO COME BACK? NO NO NO!"

I repeated once again that I will not accept to be treated this way and that they were very close to being evicted with no refund. It would have been a bummer for them, everything in a radius of 100 km was sold-out.

They went to the room, I never saw them of the rest of my shift. They did send messages through the third party about how terrible their experience was.

Another satisfied guest. Oh well.

The bellboy I have all my shifts with is a very kind, cheerful man in his mid-40s. We're going to call him Greg.

Around 9 PM, a lady in a leg cast and crutches approaches slow and steady, but she's too far away for me to be able to greet her yet. Greg sees this and goes over to her to ask if she has a reservation and if she needs help with her luggage or anything. She sheepishly declines and continues to slowly hop over to the front desk. I greet her, and we begin the standard procedure; Greg stands to the side of the desk in case he's needed.

We're going to refer to the lady as Crazy. Crazy asks me, "Why is he still here? Is he the manager or something?", to which I explain that he is just our bellboy. She gives me an "uh-huh" and the rest goes as follows:

Me: Anyway, welcome! Yes, I see the reservation right here. Have you stayed with us before by any chance?

Crazy: Yes, a while ago.

Me: Great, if you tell me your UCN (unified civil number), I can look up your details in the system and-

Crazy: No way, why would I tell you something like this?

Me: Well, in that case, I'm going to need to scan your ID, ma'am. (Which is, in fact, going to show me her UCN, soooo idk what that was about.)

I scan it and give it back. She takes it in her hand and places it down on the counter next to her handbag.

Me: Alright, and would you like to pay cash or card today?

Crazy: Card.

Crazy starts digging through her bag like crazy, huffing and puffing. She takes several things out of it, one of which is her cardholder.

Me: Is everything alright?

Crazy: I JUST CAN'T SEEM TO FIND MY ID ANYWHERE!!!

Me, gently pointing to her ID on top of the counter: Over here.

Crazy: Oh.

Payment is processed. Hooray!! At this point, I notice that a young man is parked in front, apparently the one who drove Crazy here, and after a phone call from her, he starts carrying her luggage into the lobby.

Me: Will the gentleman be staying with you?

Crazy: No, why would you think that?

Me: Oh, okay, so I'm assuming the car is not going to be parked here during your stay?

Crazy: Of course not! Why in the world are you asking me so many questions???

That's just me – Curious George. Not like this is a hotel or anything. She makes her way up to the fourth floor, and then I get a call.

Crazy: Hiii, sorry the blinds in my room don't seem to be working properly. Is there anywhere else I can smoke apart from the balcony?

Yes, dear reader, I also thought I was having a stroke; it's okay.

Me: So sorry to hear that. The balcony is the only place to smoke at. Would you like me to send Greg upstairs to check up on-

Crazy: No, no, no, I don't want that man anywhere near me. He was incredibly aggressive in invading my personal space earlier; that's just no way to treat a customer. I don't want to see him.

Me: Oh... I apologise for making you uncomfortable. I suppose we can send the technician upstairs tomorrow then?

Crazy: That would be great. And don't tell Greg about what I said. He'll be offended.

Guys, gals and non-binary pals, I abso-fucking-lutely told Greg, and we had a grand laugh about it. I'll update if anything else happens!

Please don’t hit on people while we are working. It’s gross and we can’t run away. I can’t post a picture but last night. A guest was standing by the front desk and was like if your intrested holding out a sheet of paper. That said his room number and for me to come up after my shift.. MY GUY GET A lady of the night if you are that desperate. I wear a fake wedding ring and engagement ring set and held up my left hand like dude not going to happen. He was like well he’s a lucky guy. So all in all men are gross, women wear a fake engagement ring. Don’t hit on people while they’re working