Search This Blog

Saturday, December 31, 2011

Top Ten Tips for Staying in a Hotel Room (by a Former Executive House Keeper)





After working as a Supervisor in the Housekeeping department of the 4 Diamond Grand Hyatt Denver ( suit, tie and all), a VERY brief stint as a room cleaner at the Jasper Park Lodge and finally a great time as Executive House Keeper at the Holiday Inn Hotel and Suites Valemount, BC ( not to mention being a hotel guest myself ) , 

I thought I would share my Top Ten Tips for staying in a hotel room!

These tips are in both your interest, the interest of the housekeeping staff and the environment in general.

Let me start by saying that the job of the housekeeper is a very difficult one. Back breaking labour, very low wages, the disgusting things that sometimes need cleaning up  and very little recognition make it one of the hardest jobs going  - in my opinion.

I remember when I first started as an Intern at the 511 room Grand Hyatt in Denver, Colorado. Being a student of the Hotel management program at the College of New Caledonia  and an International Intern, I didn’t have to clean rooms – I got to be a “Supervisor” straight away. This basically involved inspecting the rooms after they had been cleaned to ensure quality and managing the staff on a given number of floors.

My first day as a fresh faced Canadian at the Hotel, I was assigned to learn how to clean a hotel room “Hyatt” style , learning from an elderly Mexican lady named Hermalinda.  She was a fantastic person but the irony of this situation was not lost on her. 

As she showed me the proper way to make a corner fold on the bed sheet, she said to me “So, I train ju and then ju be my supervisor?”

I didn’t know quite what to say to that so I was like “ Ummm ... yeah. Sorry about that... “  

Needless to say this was not only humorous but a great lesson in treating these ladies (and men) with the utmost respect.  

So without further a due ,  here is the Top Ten:

1)      Leave a money tip.  If you’ll tip a waiter/ waitress for an hour of bringing you some food and cleaning your table – do something for the housekeeper who cleans your bathroom!  They don’t get tips or any recognition very often and it will make their day!

2)      Once in your room, always turn the deadbolt closed ( and/or have the latch on). This is for your safety - but also privacy.  If a housekeeper makes a mistake or is given the wrong room number by the Front Desk ( which has been known to happen) they will think you have checked out already and may just barge into your room with their master key. 

This happens.  A lot more than you’d think.  And it can be  horribly horribly awkward.

Unfortunately I am an eye witness to this as I once un-assumedly walked into an occupied room. What I saw in the following moments still haunts me to this day. 

An ordinary middle aged couple were engaged in a very intimate, very amorous, very naked activity on the bed ( by the way - see tip # 3).

I looked up and he looked up and we made eye contact.

Then she looked up and we made eye contact.

He said “Hello?” .  I said something like “I’m so so sorry” and ran to a bathroom my good friend Diane was cleaning and hid there until they checked out. 

3)      Don’t touch the Duve cover – Ever. Ever. Ever.

This is changing lately, but for the most part Hotels  clean their Duves or Duve covers very RARELY. In fact, once a year if your lucky.  

If you can imagine all the things people may do or leave behind UNDER the covers, you can be assured that they do the same ON the covers – see example in Tip #2 .  (The white bed sheets and pillow cases are okay as they get washed everyday).

4)      Don’t be afraid to ask for a late check out – they usually give them out no problem.  Just remember to keep the Do Not Disturb sign on the door.

5)      You may be the type to negotiate the price of the hotel room. That’s okay but doesn’t always happen. 

      Another way to go is to simply ask for an upgraded room ( at the original price). This is easier for the Hotel to swallow as they would rather give you some extra amenities and pay more labour hours or electricity than drop the price tag.

6)      If you are staying multiple days and you do not need or want your room cleaned each day – make sure you keep up the Do Not Disturb sign – or even better give your instructions to the front desk or House Keeping ( i.e. – “just refresh the towels and coffee packets” ) This can save on a lot of unnecessary work, cleaning product use and Energy.

On this note also, if you don’t need your towels washed during an extended stay, keep them hanging up – anything left on the floor is assumed to be dirty or garbage.

7)      Don’t leave the luggage cart you used to bring up your luggage INSIDE your room. If you don’t want to bring it back down to the lobby just leave it in the hallway and hotel staff will be happy to take care of it. ( Otherwise they run out of luggage carts and have no idea where to find them... making other guests go without)

8)      As for valuables such as wallets, electronics and jewellery etc... make sure to hide these away in your luggage. The vast majority of housekeepers are honest folk who don’t want to lose their jobs but there’s no need to tempt fate!  

      The Front Desk may also have a safe for you to keep especially valuable items in.

Also, if you do think something has gone missing, make sure to look for it thoroughly first and if you do contact the Hotel staff be non accusatory at first, just asking for help finding this object.  Its quite humiliating to make a raving scene and then realize it was at the bottom of your purse the whole time or stuck in the fold out bed ( true story).

9)      When leaving your hotel room at the end of your stay , gather all your luggage together and then do a scan of the room.  The most popular places where things are left behind?  The fridge, drawers, under the bed skirting and in the wall sockets.

10)   Towels, Linens and TVs are not the type of things you can take home from a hotel room.  Nor do you want to trash your hotel room . Not only are these things deeply disrespectful to the staff – you have to remember –

They still have your credit card info and are more than happy to charge your card after the fact!

No comments:

Post a Comment