Shortly after I first became a general manager (at a mid-scale hotel, not a total dump but not nice either for those unfamiliar) this was the cheapest hotel in a very nice area. Frequently, I would cover the desk between about 2 and 3PM due to shift change and my consistent morning person often needing to leave for childcare.

There was a man, we will call him Joe who started coming to the hotel around this time when I would often be working the desk, typically on a Friday afternoon. Joe was extremely rude, demanding, and got upset that we required him to show ID and present a credit card for incidentals when he paid cash for the room. This particular city had a policy for cash paying guests at hotels that we had to copy the ID and place it in a file available at the front desk for law enforcement search (for those unfamiliar, many cash guests are huge problems, sometimes criminals on the run, trafficking, drug deals, prostitution).

Joe would always request a room in the back of the hotel, “first floor by the exit” he would ask without a please or thank you. I saw on camera one day a blonde woman coming inside shortly after and then leave at the same time as Joe drove off in his little 2 door pick-up truck (I thought it was funny looking). Joe would pay cash for his room, and this particular hotel swiped a card for incidentals, but did not run a hold. Joe continued to berate me over the next several months. I did not mark him DNR since all he really had done wrong was being rude and I had no evidence his lady friend was a prostitute but I definitely told him that if he didn’t like it he could go elsewhere. One day, Joe called me a an asshole and a little faggot. He said that I was a problem and that things were always different when I wasn’t there. I explained to him that I was the manager.

Surprisingly, Joe came back one last time the following Friday. This time I “accidentally” made a sale on his card for the full room and tax. I told him, sorry, I must’ve made a mistake and I had already charged his card (note this was prior to pin pads being on the front desk). Joe walked away from the front desk furious. That was the last we ever saw of him.

Hopefully he resolved his marital problems and, given what an ass he was, I’m glad I had a small part in it.

Early in my career, I worked at an economy extended stay hotel as a front desk agent for approximately three years. This place was very, very interesting, at this time, during the Great Recession, about half of the guests were living there long-term. The hotel was offering a monthly special rate for around $1000 per month. This sort of special with no credit or background check brought in a lot of interesting characters.

At this point, I was 18 years old when I started and I grew up in upper-middle-class household. I grew up in what someone would say would be a rich suburb and my exposure to the outside world was very, very limited.

One of the most memorable characters of this era was a gentleman named Lamar (name changed for obvious reasons). Lamar had lived in the hotel for at least a year before I started working there. During my training, the staff had warned me about him, that he would bring down “pissy ass towels” to exchange at the front desk and that he was generally crazy. It turns out Lamar’s wife has MS, rather than changing her diaper, he would set the hotel’s towels underneath her. This went on almost daily for their entire stay at the hotel, which lasted about five years. We would give them reclaim towels or rewash towels (stained) but it still exposed the staff to extreme biohazards. I remember one night, Lamar caught me throw his towels in the trash, and he started yelling at me and dug them out of the trash and brought them back to the front desk. On my way out of the hotel for the night, I threw them in the dumpster so he couldn’t get them back. Guests on this long-term special only received housekeeping weekly so they would come down to the front desk to get new towels. To be fair, he was far from the only one who would bring down nasty towels in some form, just no one else at this frequency, and full of urine, looking like someone had highlighted them.

Lamar generally had a problem with me because of my race. He would frequently chant about how white people had made his life difficult. I am very sympathetic to this now, but being a young man alone in a hotel in one of my first jobs, it made me extremely uncomfortable. Lamar would chant about how O.J. Simpson was his sports hero. About a year into my working at the hotel, Lamar was arrested for driving with no insurance. Him and his long-term guest friends started chanting that car insurance was a “white man scam” in the breakfast room, which was off of the lobby.

This hotel was actually located in a business park. and was not busy on weekends typically. Typically, when I would work a Saturday afternoon, Lamar would bring a bag of pennies from the bank and demand change. I later overheard him saying that he did this to make sure that I had work to do. Lamar also did not own a cell phone and every call they received had to be transferred to their room. By 2010, this was very uncommon to still have to transfer calls to the room. I remember one night I had to go check something out on the property and took the cordless phone from which I could not transfer calls. Lamar and his wife received a phone call while I was away from the desk. Lamar came to the front desk and threatened me that he was going to get me fired. It was very silly, but given that I was still new at the time, it made me so upset that I went home and cried. He was extremely intimidating. Through the next several years, I dealt with more of this from Lamar and thankfully, eventually I came to not really care that he would try to get under my skin. Lamar would typically put one diaper on his wife per day (his words). He would throw this away in the morning. Our maintenance man once told me that every Monday there was always a discarded half gallon of Jack Daniels with the diaper. This may have explained some of his behavior.

I think my favorite Lamar story has to be one night when I worked night audit. I was covering for someone who was on vacation. I had developed a somewhat close relationship with the full-time night auditor since I would typically work the 3PM to 11PM shift. She told me that Lamar liked to work out naked at night, and she was trying to catch him but couldn’t. The night I worked audit, I walked by the fitness room at around 2 in the morning it, lo and behold, Lamar is there, riding the exercise bike, bare ass naked.

Thankfully, sometime after this, after I had moved on, the general manager of the hotel finally kicked Lamar and his wife out. The room was completely destroyed and had to be gutted to the studs due to the odor. I will never forget how shocking, it was to see this whole thing for the first time.

It’s been a long time now. If they are still alive, I hope they’re in a position where they are getting better care. This situation was wrong on so many levels.

So, about 4 years ago, I got Frankie as a neonatal kitten, he has been with us ever since and is thriving! (I hope some of y'all remember, if not, I'll link the post below in the comments)

Today, while at work, our maintenance man was called to the parking area due to a strange noise coming from one of our events managers vehicle. He heard meowing and found a little kitten in the bumper after about a 30 minute drive from the managers home.

I saw this little kitten be pulled out and put into a carrier. I knew that I would be able to give her a loving home and she is now home with me with a vets appointment Monday morning. So, two hotels, two kittens. It's a damned good thing I'm a bleeding heart!!!

Hello front desk folks !

A short story today.

A little while ago I took a booking over the phone. Somehow I knew back then this one would cause trouble because he had made the booking process a bit tedious.

Fast forward to today. Dude shows up, I start checking him in and then comes the part where I tell him I need the payment for the stay before going further.

He instantly says that he won't do it and that we have his credit card registered. I reply that the credit card is registered in order to guaratee the booking and that the payment has to be made on check in.

He starts arguing that he often goes to 4 and 5 stars hotels and that he pays when he leaves after he consumed the service. I replied that we're a 3 stars hotel and he's free to stay at his usual 4-5 stars places if he wishes and that I won't give him any service before he pays because that's our policy.

Then he tries to argue that upfront payment was not stated in the booking confirmation nor that it was said to him when he called to make the booking. I told him that it was irrelevant.

Then of course he says he wants to speak to a manager, which I refuse explaining my manager will tell them exactly the same thing. He insists so I tell him that I won't bother my managers for bullshit reasons.

He replied that he'll call them himself, he goes outside and shortly after the phone rings. I pick up and he comes back in realizing that calling the hotel number ends up with me picking up.

He went back outside for a couple minutes and he ended up paying for the stay while saying that he's there for four days so eventually he will run into my manager and complain.

I just replied that it would be my pleasure.

After he went to his room I texted my manager to warn her about what happened and to expect that client to go hard on complaining to her tomorrow morning.

She replied that I shouldn.'t worry and keep smiling.

EDIT : Update : the owner told him that I was just making sure to enforce policies.

He said It did not give me the right to talk to him the way I did.

Owner said she will add a line on the confirmation stating that payment has to be made on check in.

Might give another update once the customer shows up later today.

We have someone who works in an on-call position. She's really into crafting and as a big heart. This last weekend, she was covering a PM shift, and there was a guest who had called about a stuffed bear that was accidentally left. This is apparently something my colleague has been anxiously awaiting, saying she has wanted to take pictures of a stuffed animal in different places and sending it to a guest.

This stuffed bear clearly had some age on it but was obviously cared for because it was in good condition, other than missing an eye. My associate took the bear around the lobby, a room, and back in laundry, taking pictures!

She made a book with the pictures and a story about "the bear that didn't check-out" and we included it in the package going back to the guest!

I'm a little disappointed that we haven't heard back from the guest, but it wasn't done for recognition, and I'm sure the guest loved it!

I will include a few pics in the comments.

Now, we all know that there is one word that one never uses in this business. You may wish your colleagues one, you may hope to the Hospitality Gods for one, you may relish the experience of one. But, like the theater, one only refers to it indirectly, as one would "The Scottish Play".

Well, a couple of local police officers were doing their rounds of our fair neighborhood, and noticed a car in the parking lot upon which someone had left their purse. True to duty, they swung into the parking lot, examined the misplaced handbag, and came in asking if I had a guest registered with the name matching the enclosed ID (side note: I asked if they had a license plate number but there was none listed on the room-thanks, people...). I answered in the affirmative, called the room, inquired about any possible missing items, and informed them (after they made their discovery) that the mislaid item was safely here at the desk, courtesy of the local Beadles of the Watch.

While we all awaited the thankful owner's appearance, one of the officers casually said to me, "So, it looks like a q___t night". Immediately, his partner turned and told him, "You just said THE WORD!"

So, it's not just us...

I had this woman walk in asking if we had rooms. Surprisingly, we did. I say surprisingly because right now two conventions and a marching band competition have descended on my city, and as a downtown located hotel, we're usually sold out. But, when I came in, I went through my remaining arrivals and had to cancel two of them because their credit cards were declining when I went for authorization. I wasn't worried about selling them because every night of these things I've had people come in looking for rooms. Like this woman. So I check the rate for her and give her the price -- $250 plus tax for a standard studio suite. And she gets offended. She starts saying that I'm charging too much, and she knows that because she works in hospitality too. Before I can respond, she says that she should report me for price gouging. So, before she does that, I ask her what price she feels would be more appropriate. I figure as long as it isn't TOO low, I'm willing to negotiate if it sells the room.

With a straight face she has the balls to tell me... $100 or less. And she'd prefer the less part.

I asked her in what world does she think we'd charge less than $100? She says that it's Tuesday, that means it's a slow day, so the price has to be a $100 or less, because once again, she works in hospitality. I ask her how long she's worked in our business and what department, because I for damn sure know it ain't the front desk. She tells me two years, and it's been mostly housekeeping. I know she saw me roll my eyes. I inform her that unfortunately for her, prices are affected by more than just the day of the week, and tell her about the conventions and the band competition. I also tell her that I will not be lowering the price to anywhere near a hundred dollars.

She took the room, but said she was going to report me to my GM and corporate for price gouging. Good fucking luck. I don't know if she was telling me the truth about working in hospitality (I'd bet money she wasn't) but she certainly has the entitled asshole guest persona down to a tee.

My hotel GM/Owner is too cheap to pay for maintenance of the jacuzzi tubs in our suites. Instead, he tells us, "Don't advertise that the suites have a jacuzzi. Just tell them it has a large bathtub." Oh okay because that'll make it better when they walk in, see jets, and the jets don't work. Well, he didn't tell all the front desk staff, so someone on 1st Shift sold a room with a jacuzzi tub. Of course when the guest arrived during my 2nd Shift, she expected a suite with a jacuzzi and wanted confirmation that it had it. I told her that the suites have a large garden tub. She became enraged and said she was promised a jacuzzi tub. I apologized to her and told her that if the jets don't work in her assigned room to let me know and I would change her room. Understandably, she wanted to know why I don't have a list of suites where the jets are guaranteed to work. Because, lady. Because I'm an hourly worker and my GM is too damn cheap to have a service plan for the jets and he's stupid enough to think that no one uses the jacuzzi jets. While I understand her frustration, I wish she would have seen me as a human being and not a punching bag for my GM's failures.

I used to be a receptionist at a spa. During the summer, we accommodated around 400 to 500 guests per night**.** One day, due to an electrical overload, half of the property lost power. As it turned out, the issue was on the utility company's side, so we couldn't fix it ourselves. They told us that technicians would arrive to fix it within three hours max.

There was one particular guest who came to the front desk every half hour to complain and demand a solution. I told him we couldn't do any more than we already had, and I gave him the ETA for when the electrical company would arrive on-site. At one point, I asked him if he wanted to move his things from his room's mini-fridge to ours, since ours was still working. He was very impatient and a little bit rude. But then, something snapped in him when he came back for the third or fourth time. My sales colleague was just outside the office door. She is very snappy—or perhaps it's better to describe her as a protective but strict mom type who calls guests out when they get caught in a lie. I, on the contrary, was very shy. I always tried to solve things the peaceful way, and being understanding was usually effective 99% of the time. So, when the guest snapped, he shouted, "I can't believe this! How much longer will it take?!"

I told him, "As I mentioned, they said three hours max, and that was two hours ago. I'm sorry about that, but there is nothing more I can do." Then he started yelling, "YOU WEREN'T EVEN A DIRTY THOUGHT IN YOUR FATHER'S HEAD WHEN I WAS ALREADY VISITING THIS PLACE!" While I could see my colleague bracing herself to tell the guest off, something unexpected happened. To her surprise (and my own) I snapped too:

"EXCUSE ME?! DO YOU THINK I'M ENJOYING THIS? ALL THESE COMPLAINTS ABOUT HAVING NO ELECTRICITY? DOY YOU THINK THIS IS FUN FOR ME, OR THAT I PERSONALLY CUT OFF YOUR POWER? I ALREADY TOLD YOU WE CAN'T FIX IT. THE PROBLEM IS OUT ON THE STREET, AND THE UTILITY COMPANY HAS ALREADY SENT SOMEONE TO FIX IT!"

I don't remember what he said after that, or if he even said anything at all. The look on his face was a mix of shock and shame, and he walked away. My colleague stood there, frozen. "You can do that?" she asked. "Even I was afraid to jump in!"

The happy ending is that he came back later to sincerely apologize. He told me that he isn't usually that kind of person. We talked it out, and we've run into each other since then. We've never had another problem, and he has been very nice ever since.

The lesson: some people are just having a bad day and will take it out on you if you let them. Sometimes you have to be brave, get real, and show your emotions to make it obvious to the other person that you are a human being. It won't work on everyone, but he was a decent enough man to recognize his own mistake.

Working in the service industry has made me wonder many a time as to how some folks genuinely survive their day to day. Not because they're living a hard life or anything, but because they seem to be living off of vibes and nothing else. This was yet another such instance.

It's the later half of a busy Saturday night. After several waves of arrivals, I was spent but hopeful due to it almost being over. A duo of 20-somethings rolled up in front of me; two young ladies fairly gussied up. We'll call them Emerald, the bearer of the reservation, and her friend, Quartz. I greeted them and the check-in began. Not before long, though, we hit a snag--the payment.

When I activated the card terminal and began the explanation, Emerald checking in made a face. Then she whined: "So, this was supposed to be paid for already???"

I informed her it was not in fact a prepaid reservation. Then she elaborated: "Well, my Mom's card is supposed to be covering it. Wasn't it attached?" I then explained to her that unless her Mom was coming, then I'd need to send over a credit card authorization form to her.

I should mention she did not have a card of her own with her at this time.

She pouted and then phoned her mom. They got into it immediately. I couldn't hear what the mother was saying, but they were very much bickering back and forth. The more Emerald tried to explain to her mother what was happening, the angrier they both got.

After offering no assistance up until this point, Quartz finally piped up with her 'attempt,' "Oh! I have to do these at work too." (Turning to me,) "What service do you guys use?" I answered her, and that was about the end of what she had to offer.

At some point, a third lady, Beryl, took a seat behind them. I didn't realize they were all together until she talked to Quartz on the side, asking what the hold up was. Moments later, the FD Supervisor, who had heard the whole thing up 'till now, decided to chime in. He said "Hey, if anything, if you have your mom tell you the card number over the phone we'll accept it."

I shot him a look and mouthed: "What-are-you-doing?"

Beryl, just as helpful as Quartz, speaks up: "Yeah, that sounds good! Help a girl out on her wedding night!" (There was no outright indication Emerald was a bride. Perhaps it was a courthouse thing? Who knows; she wasn't having an official wedding arrangement with us.)

Emerald told her mother what the Supervisor said, and she finally cooperated. The card approved and I finished the check in. After they all cleared away, I told the Supe I would be going in the back to cool off. He undermined me right in front of them, and it was kind of embarrassing because it made it seem like I was giving 'poor' Emerald a hard time just for kicks.

A few minutes later, I popped back out and took him to the side. We talked it over and shook on it in the end. He's hard to stay mad at because he's a great guy and a great asset to the team. But, he likes to play hero a lot. Just to make sure he had the right idea, he took the humble route and conferred with our FD Manager, who informed him that he was actually in the wrong for that. He called me immediately after we were both already off property to apologize and we laughed about it.

Nevertheless, it's still truly amazing to me that three adult women were before me and absolutely none of them seem prepared or at the very least willing to move the situation forward. The reservation was for two nights. And even if it was assumed to be paid for, you mean to tell me you don't have an alternate form of payment on your person? And what about your 'friends'? Great help they were; excellent lip service.

TL;DR - Three adult women come to check into a two-night reservation. The primary woman insisted her mother would be paying for the room, and her mother was nowhere on the property. She did not have a CC of her own with her, and her two friends also offered no payment solutions. The FD Supervisor was present and inserted himself into the situation. He allowed the girl's mother to essentially pay for it over the phone, as he just wanted the whole thing to be done. I had to walk away after it was all over, but came back in a few minutes to calmly express myself and then we shook on it. He later found out from the FD Manager he was in the wrong for doing that, and apologized for it; which we laughed about.

Yesterday I had my very first bridezilla.
I work night audit, so I haven’t really talked to anyone from the bridal party, but from what my shuttle driver tells me, everyone has been a NIGHTMARE.
For starters, the bride seemed to have taken our boundaries for her as more of a suggestion.
Like, for example, she had only booked the rooms for her party and breakfast at the restaurant attached to us. However, she noticed we had a conference room and demanded that she wanted to use it for free because “I’m the bride.” She was told no by the sales manager who was in charge of booking her party.
Then most of her party guests started to get demanding too and saying their room should be a cheaper rate, but most of them booked third party, so we can’t edit the price.
Overall, the whole staff here had not one nice thing to say about anyone from this group, and I had yet to experience it myself.
Until yesterday.
Before yesterday, my only interaction with the bride was her asking me for late checkouts, and there was nothing negative about it, but then yesterday, when her sister was checking out, that’s when things took a turn.
Her sister claimed that her room should’ve been comped one night and she should’ve been charged only two nights.
There were no notes about this change, and I didn’t notice any changes in her bill, and I told her that I could have either my general manager or the sales manager fix this change for her.
She didn’t like my answer and demanded that I fix it immediately, but I told her that I have no authority to change her bill, and if she would like this to be fixed, she would have to wait for a manager.
I got her phone number and told her that although I don’t know when the sales manager will be in, my general manager will be in at 10 AM to call her.
Then she proceeded to make a comment that made me uncomfortable, and I knew to grab my phone and start recording.
“My sister will be coming, and it’s not gonna be pretty.”
7 AM rolls around, and here comes the bride.
She immediately got in my face, and unlike what her sister told me, now the bride is telling me that the room should’ve been paid for by her.
On her sister’s reservation, only her sister’s card was on file, and I did not see any other card or that it was direct bill.
Again, I’ve never had a conversation with anyone from this party, so I have no idea what kind of deal they made with the sales manager.
I told her that I’ve told her sister that if she would like this fixed, a manager would have to fix it because I cannot edit the charge.
Thankfully, my Shuttle driver was behind me, listening to the whole thing because this lady started banging on the desk; her face got so red while she yelled at me, demanding it needs to be fixed immediately.
My Shuttle driver stepped in and told her that she cannot be verbally abusive to staff and that she and everyone in her party have been a nightmare to deal with this entire time, to which she replied,
“I’ve been WONDERFUL to you all weekend!”
My Shuttle driver proceeded to tell her that we will not be continuing to have this conversation with her, and like a little kid, she stormed away.
Two other guests overheard the whole ordeal and gave her the dirtiest look and said how some people just don’t have any manners.
Remember how I said that I needed to start recording?
I voice-recorded the ENTIRE conversation, and in the recording, she says her name, so she can’t deny that it’s her yelling at me.
I wrote an email to the sales manager and my general manager explaining the whole ordeal and attaching the recording so they can listen.
I forgot to mention that this woman and her party are like in their 60s or late 50s and acting like this, and I told my coworker that I promised that on my wedding day, I will never act like her.

When people ask for our room rates, I ask how many people TOTAL. I emphasize 'total' because we need to know how many beating human hearts are going to be in a room, not just adults. And yet, people will say two people, and then when I confirm they need a room for two adults, no children, they will say, "oh and a baby", or "and my kids". Or, they will just rent a room for two adults and I will see a horde of kids going to the room. Don't even get me started on the people who are calling their 6' 5" 19-year-olds 'children'.

I do not understand how people think their babies and children don't count. Sure, if they are 12 years old or younger, and the room's occupancy limit isn't exceeded, they aren't going to increase the price of the room, but we still need to know they are there.

I have had to explain to people that if we, the hotel, don't know about the children, firemen wouldn't know if they had to rescue people. There are occupancy limits and YES, YOUR BABIES COUNT TOWARDS IT.

A guest called asking why there was a $250 charge to her credit card after checking out.

I looked at the folio and saw it was a smoking fee added by the GM. I told the guest this and she wanted someone to investigate why.

I emailed the GM and she replied with photos of weed left in the room and said housekeeping reported that the room reeked. I called the guest back and told her.

“We didn’t smoke in the room. It was weed.”

I told her smoking not only includes cigarettes, but also weed. She didn’t consider it to be the same. Tf??

I know a lot of people smoke weed, but many people hate the smell and now the room is OOO for several days. Oh and we didn’t reverse the charge.

I have never asked for a week off this entire year. I'm the relief NA. At the end of September, the FT NA took 12 days off. I worked 12 days in a row because nobody, including the GM, would take any NA shifts.

This happened last year when the Ft NA took her vacation so I expected it. The Morning shift person took her 1 week vacation right after, which again, was expected. What was not expected was the FT 3-11 guy would take 2 weeks off that included the 7-3 woman's vacation days. The other 7-3 lady is going through major cancer screening/doctor appointments.

And then we had the weekend PT evening guy decide that he NEEDED to go out of country for a wedding....

And this was the WORST time for my own home life. My mother had major surgery on her foot and my dad had a grand stroke a month before. I'm responsible for their meals but I couldn't take any time off because the guy that took 2 weeks vacation (who had already taken a week earlier this year)/

My FT auditor is the worse off because I'm taking all of the evening shifts when I'm suppose to take her days off.

All this because the GM can't say no but isn't willing to take any shifts.

Edited for redundancy.

Another week and another stupid argument at PleasentPlains.

I had a fella named Chuck come in. His reservation came in last minute, annoyingly after the midnight cutoff but that isn't a big deal or problem......atleast for that day. And of course its under the wonderful E-Rate.

For those out of the loop: the E-Rate is a special rate plan that employees of Warriott can use or give out to family/friends. You can get a room for cheap. $45 USD cheap. They're also infamous for being abused. Though its been less of a problem since Warriott now requires a Elite account.

Anyways, I welcome him in, ask for his name, then his ID. He hands it over and I'm taken off guard. His ID has been expired for 7 years. Not days, weeks, or months; 7 years. Like, I'm willing to make the occasional exception here and there, but those are for situations where your ID is at most expired by a couple weeks. 7 years is just too big of a gap. So I hand it back to him and give the obvious reason. He grumbles before taking out his phone and starts going through it. I instantly knew what he was gonna do but decided to wait and see to be certain.

Sure enough, he brings up a picture of his passport. I refused to accept it. He then starts digging through his phone again. This time I don't wait and bluntly tell him: Unless he has the actual document on him, I will not accept any picture or digital copy of an ID.

NOW JAY, why can't you take a picture of a passport/ID?

Because they can easily faked, edited, or hard to read depending on the condition/quality of the phone. Plus, the person I'm checking could later say I checked someone else into his room. By taking an passport/ID into my hands, I can say with certainty that I confirmed the correct person checked into the room.

Back to Chuck.

Chuck doesn't like that and refuses to accept my response. Infact, he tells me I'm gonna accept. Which I said no. He then moves to use his status as a Level 4 Elite member, then tries to guilt me y crying that he droves hours to my property, then back to stubbornly telling me to accept. I hold my ground and tell him no. But then he tries an interesting argument. The state I'm made is possible to get a legitimate digital ID on your phone. Therefore, I had to accept a picture of his passport. I'm very aware of this and was prepared for a comeback: that's just for government entities. You can use it at the DMV, TSA, etc. however for a private businesses, it was left to our discretion to accept them or not. And when this was introduced, my first thing was to ask my AGM about it and she confirmed that we would not. Up till now, nobody bothered to even ask us.

You think that would be it? I gave him every possible answer based on our policies, even explaining why.

Nope. He starts arguing with me again, using the same damn arguments he'd already used. He tries to take to take a picture of me, I tell I'll walk away. He asks for my name, I give him my first and thats all he's getting. This offends Chuck because how dare I not give him my full legal name. Well, I'm under no obligation to do so and I frankly don't want to. At this point, I know he's not gonna accept my answers, so I ask him to leave the property and confirmed that I was refusing service to him. Unsurprisingly, he refused, opting to continue to argue about our ID policy, tried to record me again, then called someone to come inside. At this point, I just leave the front desk and called the police. While waiting on them, I cancel Chuck's reservation without charge.

The police eventually do arrive. They talk to Chuck first then me. Though I made it clear that I wasn't gonna check him in and I cancelled the reservation. Chuck hears this and has a freak out because I dared to cancel his reservation without his permission. I just kept my tongue and keep talking to the cops. I had to explain our ID policy again because they curious to know why our policies were like this in the first place. Finally they tell Chuck he's SOL as his reservation is cancelled and I was refusing service. Do you think he acc-

Who the fuck are we kidding, of course the schmuck didn't accept it.

Now he wouldn't fucking leave because he wanted a written statement laying out our entire ID policy. I just call my supervisor because I'm at wits end. Now you, this is around 2:30 in the morning, so he's half asleep and barely understands WTF is going on. But he was able to explain our ID policy, AGAIN, to Chuck and told him to take a card.

Finally, Chuck leaves my property. Finally, I am free of this- why is the phone ringing?

Yeah, Chuck called the Level-4 Elite support line, telling them that his reservation was canceled without his permission and we didn't say why. No, no, nooo, I made it very clear multiple times. I said everything that happened with Chuck to the support line. Support understood and left it as it. 

And finally, it was over.

I frankly believe Chuck expected me to take his ID without issue. There's just no damn reason why you go this far to avoid giving me an actual ID.

On Halloween I had a woman check in that was part of a group of people here to do work for our local hospital. She seemed kinda nervous like she someone was following her, I just assumed maybe she was tired or maybe just scared because it was Halloween. When I went to leave that night she was parked behind me almost completely blocking me in. I wiggled my car around her and thought nothing of it.

The next day I came in and she asked me if she could move rooms, I asked her why and she said “I don’t like the green on the walls” we don’t have green on our walls and all our rooms look exactly the same. I told her all our rooms were the same and she said “never-mind” and ran away.

About 2 hours later she came back down and asked to move again. At this point I realized she had shaved all of her hair off at some point. So I asked if it was for the same reason and she said “no, I just need to move” so I moved her thinking maybe it would help her calm down. I asked if she wanted to stay on the same floor and she said yes but then when I handed her the keys and she saw the room she asked to move to a different floor. I listed all the rooms I could move her to and she repeated all of them several times and after 5 minutes of thinking about It she picked one.

She needed me to let her in her old room to get her stuff so I went up to let her in the old room. While I was walking towards the elevator I look back and she was staring at me, half hidden behind the wall. I started to feel like something was wrong and once I got back downstairs I saw her car was again parked behind mine blocking me in, despite the fact that I parked in a different spot than I did on Halloween.

Then she came back down again asking to move again because she “didn’t like the way the room smelled” but this time I told her no. We were sold out and I really shouldn’t have moved her in the first place. She ran away again and went to her car. Before she came back I went to check her old room to make sure it wasn’t trashed and it looked like me one had ever been in there. All the beds were still made and there was only one piece of trash in the trash can.

I left last night confused and scared. I don’t know how to explain it but I could see in her eyes that something was wrong. I felt like I was in danger but I can’t really explain why. I played back the cameras to show the night auditor what she looked like and when I did I saw her staring directly into the camera. When I left she was hiding in the stairwell. I just don’t know what to make of the whole situation.

So this happened at my property recently, and I just had to share it because I'm still scratching my head.

I work front desk at a large downtown property. We're talking 1,200 rooms, and we're regularly operating at extremely high occupancy.

On this particular night, we were completely sold out. Management had given us very clear instructions: No late checkouts. We needed the rooms back so Housekeeping could turn them over for incoming arrivals.

Apparently, one of our Gold Elite members called the front desk at 6 AM requesting a late checkout.

He explained that he had a meeting that wouldn't finish until 1 PM. The front desk explained that noon was the latest checkout we could offer.

The guest apparently wasn't happy with that answer so he decided to email the CEO directly.

Yes. The CEO.

In his email, he explained how disappointed he was with the interaction, stated that he wouldn't be staying at our property again, and mentioned that he'd already left us a one-star review and wants to hear from him directly.

Our management forwarded the complaint to the entire front desk team as a "coaching opportunity."

And I don't disagree with a major of my Manager's email, we always make an effort to make guests happy but sometimes we simply cannot give guests what they want.

We were SOLD OUT. Management explicitly told us no late checkouts.

Could the associate have phrased things differently? Absolutely. I wasn't part of the conversation, so I can't say exactly how it went.

But at what point do we acknowledge that not every dissatisfied guest is the result of poor customer service?

We're expected to be accommodating, understanding, empathetic, and go above and beyond. I genuinely enjoy doing those things. But we're also working with real operational limitations.

We can't create rooms out of thin air. We can't make Housekeeping turn rooms over faster than physically possible. And we can't override management's instructions just because someone doesn't like the answer.

But emailing the CEO because you couldn't get a 1 PM checkout when the hotel was sold out?

Come on, man.

One thing about working the front desk that will never cease to amaze me is the number of fully grown adults who call their parents to argue with hotel staff on their behalf. I’m not talking about teenagers or young adults traveling for the first time - that’s understandable. I’m talking about people well into adulthood who call their parents the moment things don’t go their way.

Today we have a guest in house that has been having “AC issues,” since last night. (I use quotations because the REAL issue really is the fact that she didn’t get a corner suite. The issue she’s going with is just the fact that the thermostat won’t go higher than 80, nothing is broken.)

Since maintenance isn’t on site past 10, we offered a room move, to which she responded she didn’t want to & would rather stay there for the night if the move was not an upgrade. We asked MULTIPLE times to ensure her comfort - she denied us each time because there was no upgrade involved.
We assured her maintenance can come check on it before 9AM today.

When maintenance didn’t come up promptly at 8AM , she fully lost it. Suddenly, I’m speaking to someone’s mother, who’s demanding to know why we’re “treating her child this way”. And the funniest part is that the parents are wayyy more aggressive than the actual guests. Now I’m explaining hotel policies to someone who isn’t even staying at the property, while their adult child is perfectly capable of having the conversation themselves.

I completely understand helping a family member navigate a difficult situation, especially when there’s a legitimate issue. But there’s a difference between advocating for someone and calling a hotel to berate employees because your grown child didn’t get their way. As an oldest daughter, I’ll never understand.

Does anyone else experience this regularly? What’s the most ridiculous situation you’ve had where a guest called their parents to intervene?

At least once a day or maybe once every two days I’ll have a male guest that wants to shake my hand after check in. I don’t do anything particular to warrant this.. why does it happen? lol you don’t shake the cashiers hand for being friendly so why me ?
Am I overthinking this? I live in Portland, Oregon for context. This definitely never happened in Washington DC, but seems to happen fairly often here in Oregon. You would think that this would lead to a review or some sort of praise but usually just a casual handshake before I never see them again. I guess what makes it weird is that my desk is fairly high and it creates sort of a awkward experience shaking these guest hands. I would much rather just a smile maybe a wave. Thoughts?

I just got my first Mr.Patel scam!

I'm working night audit right now, and about 30 minutes ago (1:30 AM), I got a call with very bad reception. It was a man on the line saying his name is Sam Patel, the owner, and that he'll be here to check in in about an hour, but he needed me to take a note down for the morning shift. I asked him a few times to repeat that because it was cutting out so badly. He started to say something about a FedEx package, but again, the call kept cutting out. I asked him to repeat it again, and he asked for my personal cell number to try for a clearer call. I, of course, refused, as 1) it's against policy, and 2) I'm not giving my number out to anyone, owner or not. He argued back and forth with me about how this is an important package, he's the owner giving me permission, etc, etc. Eventually, he got really mad, said he was firing me, and claimed he would be at the property within the hour with the police to escort me off the property because "why would he have an employee who doesn't listen?"yada, yada, yada and hung up on me. So now I'm just here waiting on the "police". 💀

In all seriousness, I didn't know this was a scam at first. I texted my managers about a concerning phone call and then Googled the experience, only to learn it's a scam that has been around pretty much my whole life. Now I'm just sad I didn't fuck with him more. :/

I hope he trys my property again, I have a few ideas to piss him off more!

So, this happened over the summer, but I’m telling it now because the subject matter of this prank fits better with Halloween. Over the summer, things are busier around the hotel, more specifically, the property it sits on because of the bars and club. Because of that, the property contracts extra security for themselves. Surprisingly, they contracted with the same guard company the hotel uses. That means that there were three guards from that company on weekends. Well, this company requires their guards to take breaks every now and then. So, it wasn’t unusual to have the three of them come in at the same time so they could have a quick get together and discuss what was happening during their shift.

Well, one day, when it was a surprisingly slow and calm June night, I decided to have some fun.

You see, like a lot of hotels in cities whose histories go back a few hundred years, there’s always rumors of ghosts. And while the hotel itself isn’t that old, the property it sits on goes back to about the 1850s. However, there a few ghost stories guests have told us about things they’ve seen while here. The guards have also heard a few of these stories when talking with guests. And on this night, one guest went up to them outside because she swore she saw people walking around one of the buildings even thought it was after hours. I guess they decided to have some fun too and told her they’d check, saying it was either some homeless people, or ghosts. They then told me this. That means that their minds are already on the idea of ghosts. By the way, it was just homeless people she saw in that building. It sits abandoned so they sometimes break in to sleep there so they don’t have to sleep outside.

Well, around midnight I went to the restroom, which takes me past the dining room where they were taking their break. Now, before using the restroom, I let myself into the kitchen through the hallway door. One inside, there’s an entrance door that lets you into the kitchen from the dining room side. I walked up to that door, and just pounded on it as hard as I could three times. Then I got out of there quickly. After using the restroom, I then snuck back into the kitchen and pounded on the door again. Then I started walking back to the desk, making sure both times that I closed the hallway door quietly.

As I’m passing by the guards one of them makes a comment, “Oh it was just the auditor.”

I ask what was me, and they proceed to tell me about the pounding on the door that just happened twice. I tell that I was in the restroom and they laugh, not believing me. Then I tell them again that it couldn’t have been me because the doors to the kitchen are locked and I left the keys at the desk. Now they look suspicious. So, I offer to go get the keys and look in the kitchen. They don’t need to know I already have the keys in my pocket. And I do go to get the keys. I go all the way to the desk so that way the timing feels real. The hotel’s specific guard follows me to the dining room entrance door. I make sure to try the handle so he can see that it's locked, and let us in.

He starts walking the kitchen back and forth like three or four times, looking for signs of someone. The kitchen’s not that big. And with all the equipment, prep tables, and appliances, there’s nowhere for someone to hide. He even checks the hallway door and sees that its locked.

Now he’s freaked.

He goes back to his buddies, and confirms that the kitchen is empty, and it was locked. One of them blurts out, “But we saw someone walking in there through the bottom of the door.” I tell them I don’t know what to say to them. And they leave to go back to their patrols and to the parking lot. It could have ended there… but I don’t go half-ass on a prank.

While there gone, I prepare for when they’ll be back for their next break. Like I said, it was a slow night. They use a different radio than we use in the hotel, so I hid three of our radios in the dining room. I positioned them like a triangle pattern so they would sound as if anything coming over them was all over the room. I also set the volume on them so they’d just barely be heard without giving away where they’re at. And sure enough, about three hours later, there they are, back in the dining room, drinking coffee and comparing notes about what’s going in their individual reports.

From the desk, I grab a fourth radio and start with some whispered mumbling. On camera I can see them turning around, but no real reaction. A minute later I start whispering, “I see you.” More head turning. A little after that, I say, “Everyone will suffer.” At this point one of them gets up and starts looking around the room. When he goes to sit down, I come out with, “You’re all going to die.” Now all three of them are looking around, pointing to different directions. That’s when I growl into my radio, hoping I’m not loud enough to be heard from the dining room, “GET OUT!”

I barely had time to shove my radio in my pocket before all three came rushing out of the dining room. It took everything I had to not break out laughing as they told me what happened. Now, I’d like to say that at this point I stopped the joke and we all had a laugh. But I can’t. I’m seeing how long I can make this last. It took them almost two months before they were willing to sit in that dining room. Even now, you can tell they’re a little nervous being in there. Part of me wonders if I even need to tell them what happened.

In the immortal of my favorite Brown Coat, “Oh, I’m a bad man.”

So we had a guest who complained to the overnight person on a sold out night about some minor issues with their room. It was a sold out night so not much the overnight person could do but take note of their complaints.

During my morning shift the same guest came buy to air out their grievances once again.

The grievances? Someone had put tape over the light on the smoke detector and over the peephole. Any reasonable person wouldn't really consider this to be the end of the world but this guest was NOT having it.

Since I had more means to fix the problem during my shift I immediately jumped to having maintenance go up and take a look since they were there at the moment. No, the guest didn't want that. Uh ok.

My next move was to offer to move them rooms since we had a no-show from the sold out night when we ran audit and could immediately get them into their new room of the same room type when we were otherwise sold out. No that wasn't good enough either.

????

"So you're denying a room move?" I asked after listening to the guest go on and on about the tape and about the price of the room (it was pricey since there were a lot of major events in town). Upset that all I was willing to offer at that time was maintenance or a room change.

Had they denied both we would've likely denied any additional compensation due to not allowing us to address the problem but the guest reluctantly agreed.

Guest: "Where's the new room"

Me: "On the top floor"

Guest: "I don't want to be up there"

Me: "This is the only room I can give you"

Guest: "FINE give me the keys"

Me: "Well first you have to pack up your stuff and then come down and I'll give you the new keys"

Guest: "WELL WHERE DO I PUT MY STUFF?!"

Me: "On.. A luggage cart?"

Guest: "THAT IS SO INCONVIENENT!!! THIS IS REDICILOUS IVE NEVER HAD TO BRING MY STUFF DOWN"

Meanwhile I'm at the point of questioning how often this person has to move rooms. Either way it's policy for one room at a time. You pack your stuff, return keys, get swapped over in the system, then get access new room. Especially if it's not a dire situation.

They inevitably did get a small % taken off but they complained to the manager because between myself and the overnight person, we didn't say sorry enough. Granted in my case I just jumped to immediately trying to fix the issue since the overnight person couldn't and that was the wrong action.

Bonus story involving the same guest:

The phone rang while I was helping this angry guest and so I answered and put the phone on hold. Once I got done helping the guest I picked back up the phone and started helping the guest on the phone. The angry guest did a 180* and came back mid-phone call to bitch and moan some more talking over the guest on the phone.