In response to a recent article on the travel site Gadling.com the following comment was posted. I agree completely with this woman's point of view. I'm passing this along even though some comments don't apply to the Dixie Belle,but everyone who ever stays in a hotel/motel can benefit by knowing some of these things before your next stay.
Kristina Oct 5th 2010 10:07PM
I am the General Manager of a hotel in NY. The fastest way to get what you want is ABSOLUTELY to be nice. If you are nasty when you arrive, you can bet on the fact that we will put a note on your reservation, on the housekeeping notes and in what we call the "log book". If you start out your stay nasty, we absolutely will do anything possible to NOT help you. A few important papers, should be locked away at the desk. I know my front desk staff better than I know my housekeepers, and to be quite honest, we are not responsible for the things left if your room. It says it right on the back of your door. Along with the innkeepers laws, the fire escape route, the maximum rate allowed to be charged for the room etc, it tells you right there. The past court cases have sent precedents that a rented hotel room is much like an apartment. I can go in whenever I please, but you cannot hold me responsible for anything that happens to your belongings. Unfortunately, there is no renters insurance for hotel rooms.
1. NEVER book using an internet site. Always call the hotel directly. Sites purchase rooms from us at a discounted rate, which yes, helps us fill rooms. What they don't tell you is that your room is guaranteed for only two people (unless specified otherwise), that your smoking preference is not necessarily guaranteed and that you will be the FIRST person to be moved out of your chosen room type if we are overbooked. We also will move people who pay the most to the suites if we are overbooked on standard room types. You should first and foremost look on the internet for pricing, using sites such as Kayak.com. Then you need to go to our website, THEN you need to call the hotel. If you are staying more than one night, my staff are instructed to automatically offer you a lower rate, or a free suite upgrade at the price of a standard to ensure that you will walk in the door happy and stay with us again.
2. Always research the area you are travelling to. If you do not like noise, DO NOT book an airport hotel. If you start complaining about the noise from the airport, we are going to assume you are a moron. YOU booked this hotel, we did not force you. If you want a lower rate, do not book in the middle of the city. Yes it is convenient. But you will have to pay a hefty parking fee, if you can even get a space. You will also have to deal with more noise. All hotels have their information on the internet, on a printable page that outlines the features of the hotel.
3. Do not complain about the quality of the towels, bedding, soap, shampoo, FREE breakfast, etc. We do not have a choice as to which of these things we purchase and use. Our brands have standards that we have to follow, or we pay fines. You will most likely not get a discount. We will simply come out and tell you that we are forced to purchase these things through our brand supplier.
4. If your room is not cleaned to your standards, please for the love of god, simply ask the front desk to have a housekeeper come by again. I am usually the one who will come and clean your room because I want to see for myself where my staff is lacking. The management really does care what the rest of the staff does during their workday. Mistakes are made. You are not perfect in your job either.
5. If, during your stay, the housekeepers did not clean your room, or did not make your bed, its almost half of the time, the guests fault. If you leave your Do Not Disturb tag on the door, the only person who can go in your room is a manager. And yes, we will check the room to make sure no one is lying in there dead. We are required to enter each room every 24 hours to make sure there is nothing wrong. If your bed is not made, please look to see if you left personal items on the bed. My staff are not allowed to touch your belongings.
6. If you have children, ask to be placed on a lower floor. Or in the rooms directly over the front desk, or other non-room space. Then the kids can run around all they want and you wont get a phone call from my staff asking you to knock it off. We really do want you to enjoy your vacation.
7. Do not EVER yell at my staff. Or get violent. I will have you not only thrown out of the hotel, but I can have you arrested.
8. Do not leave valuables in the room. EVER. There is a safe deposit box at the front desk. All medication, jewelery, money, electronics, passports,
9. When I tell you that there is nothing I can do, there is either A. Really nothing we can do because we are full etc, or B. you have been a complete jerk and I am not going to help you.
10. Do not take things from the rooms. Not the towels, blankets, pillows, ashtrays, NOTHING. My housekeepers do pay attention and I will charge your credit card. On the registration paper that you signed, it clearly states that any damages to the room or theft of items will result in charges to your card. Yes I will charge you twice what it costs for the item.
11. I will post an extra cleaning fee to your room if you leave the hotel and it takes my housekeepers forever to clean up your disaster. They have me come upstairs and take pictures, and no fighting with your credit card company will help you. My account with the card company is bigger than yours as a corporate business.
12. If you want a quiet floor, ask for the floor where the corporate travellers are kept. I put them on the highest floor of the hotel so that they won't be bothered. They spend 50 times what you spend in my hotel and are treated the best. I know all of their names, wives names, have pictures of their kids, and will honest to god bring them breakfast in bed free of charge if they are sick. I will also pick up their drycleaning, have flowers sent to their wife for them or anything else. Corporate travellers are our favorite guests because they usually only have housekeeping come in every few days, dont make any noise, are out early and back late and they dont complain.
13. If you are not travelling on government business, do not try to book the federal rate. I will catch you and most likely charge you more that you should have been charged if you had been honest.
14. Don't try to cram 15 people in one room. You are breaking the fire code and you can absolutely be fined for this. We charge an extra person fee in the room because if costs us more in wear and tear, linen usage, breakfast costs etc. Sometimes, we will waive the extra person fee if you are nice.
15. Dont call the 800 number for the brand. They are in a foreign country and have NO IDEA whether they are booking you in the right neighborhood, much less the right country. We cannot cancel your reservation outside of our cancellation guidelines because the owners of the hotel would fire us. Your $100 is not worth my salary, I'm sorry.
16. Do not let elderly people book rooms for themselves if they are not seasoned travellers. It sounds horrible, but they honestly end up really frustrated because they don't really understand a lot of the policies we have in place and they drive the front desk staff crazy when they say "WHAAAT??" every three seconds.
17. You have to give a credit card to book a room. Period. I will sometimes hold a reservation until 6pm for you. If you are late, I will sell your room.
18. If you do not know the difference between a debit and a credit card, do not use your debit card. Our credit card system cannot tell the difference and will deduct the money from your bank account electronically until well after you have checked out. We release the money back to you the day you check out. It can take your bank up to 10 days to get it back in your account. If you cannot afford to have that money held up, hit the ATM and just pay in cash. You will usually have to put down a fifty dollar deposit, but you get it back. It saves a lot of grief. This is why we ask for a credit card at check in, not a debit card. I will most times not send a fax to your bank telling them to release the funds, ESPECIALLY if you have accused us of stealing your money. We just assume you are an idiot.
19. If you get blood or vomit or urine or whatever on the towels or sheets, please ask for a garbage bag and bag them yourself. My housekeepers really really do not appreciate these messes. I do not let them handle linen that has bodily fluids on it because it is dangerous. They go directly from the bag into our huge washing machines and no one is contaminated. I do not let them bleed all over your room, please do them the same courtesy.
20. If you book an advanced purchase room, you will save a lot of money. IT CAN NOT BE CANCELLED. You receive this courtesy discount because you are guaranteeing you will be in the hotel on that date. We honestly don't care if Great Aunt Frida jumped off a bridge. That is not our fault.
21. If you want to know a really good secret, ask if the hotel is overbooked when you check in. We do something called "walking a room" which means we pay for your stay at another hotel that has space. We have to book you into a place of equal or greater value according to our standards. You get a free room, you help us save ourselves a lot of grief, and honestly, you may end up with a nicer room.
22. Book your room three weeks ahead of time. At least. THEN call the day before, before your cancellation window, and check the rates in town again. Sometimes we have to Fire Sell the rooms to get rid of them. You might just do better. Book the room under your wifes name, cancel yours and there ya go! $20 off. Nice huh?
23. ALWAYS become a member of that hotels loyalty program when you sign in. Gold Crown Club, Choice Privileges, Wyndham Rewards, Priority Club Rewards, Hilton Honors, etc. Ask at the desk for them to sign you up. We get a bonus for signing people up, and sometimes we will upgrade your room for free. A lot of times you will get free drinks, coupons, free bottled water or snack, a pass to a managers reception etc. Not to mention the fact that you earn points which add up to free nights or free stuff in the future.
24. If you have made yourself unwelcome at a hotel, don't try and stay there again. Especially if you have called our 1-800 to complain about something trivial. You cost us $150 in fees, and we will cancel your reservation. Honestly. I have a blacklist. Not only that, but when I kick you out of my hotel for being a jerk, I am going to call all of the other hotels in the area, and they wont rent to you either. I will give them your description and tag number and the staff will be on alert to not rent to you. I really do know the managers of all the other hotels, and we hang out together. Not to mention the fact that the owners of my hotel, probably are friends with, or already own the hotel down the street. Its not really that competitive of a market when you get down to it, because we help each other out a lot.
25. If your secretary books your room incorrectly, dont yell at my staff. The problem is not within our company, its within yours.
26. Don't smoke in a non-smoking room. I really do charge that $300 smoking fee and you won't get that money back.
27. If you have a dog you are bringing on vacation, DO NOT leave them alone in the room all day. They will wreck the room, no matter how good they are at home. If you offer the agent at the desk $20 to dog sit, they will almost always let you keep the dog behind the desk with its food and water, take the dog for a walk a few times on their breaks, and actually give the dog attention. We will charge you if the dog wrecks the room. It's worth the $20. Trust me. If your dog is psychotic, BOARD IT. I have been bitten quite a few times. I am an animal lover, but trust me, eventually its going to be a severe enough bite and someone is going to get sued because I had to go and snatch a dog out of a room because it was bothering our other guests. If your dog bites me, we will have a problem.
BE NICE and you will almost always get your way. Don't freak out because you did not get new shampoo. That does not deserve a $20 discount. I am going to look at you like you are crazy and hand you five little bottles of shampoo and send you on your merry way. And then I will blacklist you.r
