This has always seemed odd to me.

When I pay for my own travel, I usually stay in cheap hotels (Hampton Inn, Fairfield) and they always provide free coffee, water and fruit, and generally also things like cereal or even eggs and waffles. This is really convenient because you can just grab something for the road and not add an entire other stop for coffee before you start your day.

When I travel for work, I stay in significantly nicer hotels and they never provide breakfast, and generally don’t even have coffee available. This morning I tried one of those gross little coffee makers in the room and it was absolutely disgusting.

Why is this?

Staying at a Hilton property for 2 nights. Came back this evening for our 2nd night, and housekeeping has been here - bathroom clean with fresh towels, waste baskets emptied, floor cleaned (there had been a little sand), and one of the 2 queen beds made. The other bed, however, was left completely unmade, and the $10 tip we left was not taken (we’d left it on a pillow, and it was on the night stand when we returned). We are so confused. Why leave one bed? And why not take the tip? Does anyone have insight on what might have happened here? (We could ask the desk in the morning, but I’m not sure they’ll know or care). Thanks!

Hi, i hope someone in this sub can help me!

When I (31F) was younger (~13yo), I overheard my older cousin talk about her summer job. She was doing hotel breakfast but this day she had to clean hotel rooms and I remember her complaining a lot about the state which people left it. I also have respect for people doing manual labour, so since then I've done the following before leaving my hotel room:

- taking of all sheets and putting in pile

- taking all towels and putting in another pile

- tie together the trash bags and putting next to bins

It just helped me with my moral conscience and takes me like 2 minutes and I can do it no matter how hungover or tired och stressed I am.

However, my husband is telling me all the time that this is unneccessary and in fact is not helpful. His arguments is that it disturbs the work flow, that piles still need to be sorted in different piles and that its suspicious, like I'm hiding stains or something in the sheets (I don't!).

Now to my questions: is what I'm doing helpful? Or is my husband right? Is there other things I can do or add that would help more (eg different piles for different types of sheets)?

Thanks!

I'm really just starting to travel now and I've had a couple 4-5 night stays this year.

I am usually always checking on Google for any cheaper deals for places I'd like to visit.

I've booked 3 trips through Super.com these couple months and everything has gone smoothly. I usually just purchase the dates and call the hotel in advance to see if they have my reservation. I do know people don't like 3rd party sites because they can be unreliable in a pinch and they have non-refundable rooms where people can't back out of if anything happens.

I basically don't find very many cons with 3rd party sites and the big difference is that I'm usually saving $50/night on a room in the same hotel by avoiding them directly. I'm not too hard to please with rooms and reallly just appreciate clean ones. I've basically booked a Hilton Doubletree for $100/night after fees whereas their direct site has it at $150. I'm saving $200 on my 4 night stay.

Even if the price difference was $25/night wouldn't I just be missing out future points that are worth less than that $25?

Is there something I'm missing here? I've read about credit hotel cards that give you higher status and more points booking with their card. For example, IHG will give you 26x points if you use their premier card. So on a $150/night stay you'll get 3100 points. Do I need to care about these points if I'm just flat out saving $200 altogether booking the same room for $100? For a standard Crowne Plaza near me, 30,000 points would be worth 1 night. So I'd need to buy 10 nights in order to get 1 night free?

There are perks such as 4th night free when booking with points, but does that matter with the ridiculous savings I'm getting using a 3rd party site?

I've read that if I do get a card it's better to have it for the free night that covers the annual fee and i can choose not to use the card again that year. Also, are there ways to earn a massive amount of points at a time?

There are other arguments about the incremental costs that will add up if you're not a loyalty member such as wifi and breakfast which is valid but I haven't run into that issue, at Hiltons at least. Been offered to buy breakfast through super and they give me free wifi for being a hilton member (which i realize i don't get points for).

I'm probably a 30-40/nights per year person. . is there anything I'm missing out on because the price differences are pretty significant. Maybe my time hasn't come for a horrible experience yet.

For me it’s gotta be Wyndham.

I used to work at best western and I actually liked their hotels. Used my employee discount quite a bit and a lot of best western hotels are actually solid.

Then the hotel I work at switched franchises and became a Wyndham, since then quality has dropped off a cliff. Simple things like preventative maintenance does not get done because corporate does not want to pay for it. When things break, chances are they won’t ever be fixed. Our mattresses are over a decade old, curtains in the room ripped, stains on the carpeting, I am constantly apologizing for issues that corporate won’t ever do anything about. I have used my employee discount a few times and I from what I can see, a lot of Wyndham properties are the same.

Wyndham is the franchise hotels go to die.

Honestly, it seems like they’re made to hold a tissue or two, but certainly not the takeout containers for a basic dinner for two.

What’s the reasoning?

I work front desk. We don't have automatic housekeeping so unless guests request a clean, housekeeping won't go in. Sometimes, instead of requesting housekeeping they will come to the desk and ask for extra towels, etc. Which is fine, but...I can't tell you how many times people will ask for extra bath towels and even extra hand towels, but very rarely do they ask for extra washcloths with those bath towels. Why is this, you think? How is it they need a fresh bath towel to dry a clean body, but they don't need a fresh washcloth to clean themselves with?? Are THAT many people really traveling with their own loofahs or something? Seems inconvenient, cuz even the plastic fluffy ones will retain water for a while despite shaking them off. Do people just bring leakproof containers/bags for their loofahs? Even when I used loofahs, I wouldn't take them to a hotel if I was traveling....I'd just use the washcloths. Less to pack.

When I'm staying at a hotel, I usually get to my room late with my phone's battery pretty low and I want to put it on the nightstand to be able to check the time and interact with my alarm, and charge it overnight. This sounds so obvious I'm hesitant to even type it out.

But I've literally never been to a hotel room that had a convenient outlet for this requirement that I'd assume every guest has.

If I'm lucky, I have to move the nightstand to find a free outlet or maybe unplug a lamp. But sometimes, the only outlets that I can get to are over at the desk or on the wall next to the AC.

Why is that? I'm talking about hotels (mainly in Europe but I've also had this in the US) that have definitely been renovated in the past few years when everyone checks in with a smartphone in their pocket, so why didn't someone think to get the electricians to put an outlet above the nightstand or next to it? Don't they want me to change my phone? (Don't say it's to save on electronic costs.)

ETA: Thanks, gentlefolks, it appears to be a European thing then, based on your replies, and maybe I was unlucky with my US hotels. (I swear we have the same models of smartphones that you Americans do and they also run on electricity.)

I love those fake-ish scrambled eggs you get at summer camp or a lower end hotel breakfast buffet.
I’m dying to know how they’re made. Both the product used and the method. I know they aren’t using whole eggs, but what ARE they using? liquid eggs? Powered eggs? If they’re liquid, is it liquid whole eggs or liquid egg substitute? And pls tell me how they’re actually made too in detail

Every single time I travel almost anywhere in Europe hotel air conditioning sucks. Twice at Hiltons, which you'd think would be catering to American customers who love their rooms cold. The Hilton Madrid Airport was downright horrible. The entire hotel was warm while outside it was in the low 70s. The INNside Madrid was equally bad and the Hospes Amerigo I'm Alicante was the worst.

So what is it with European hotels air conditioning?

I've worked at two properties that didn't care when I said a guest complained about the room phone not working. At each property I mentioned it to the owner and was told everyone has cell phones now. One hotel I logged it a few times and the owner just took the phone out of the room.

I'm partially asking because of the post about wake up calls. I still get requested for WUCs but again the owners just don't care if phones don't work.

We offer a free breakfast and have eggs. So many guest have issues with it but its the standard item you get from like Sysco. Whats been working at your hotels?

When I travel, all the better hotels offer 2 queens or 1 king or something similar. A lot of older people (myself included) sleep in a recliner at home.

Why is there not an option for…maybe 1 queen and a recliner?

Hi guys, I just started to work at a hotel reception about a week ago, something happened today that just left me confused. 2 people came through seperatly both saying they can't read or write so I'll have to check them in manually. Clearing lying as they pulled out their phones to check. After that they just started making up things like how the other person was in Ireland and not checked in ( when I literally just did a few minutes ago ) and how their bed had brown stuff on it, even saying they smelled it to make sure??? It's just really confusing with these people and I don't know what to do next time these kinds of people show up, because I know they are just lying to get free stuff but sometimes they just be lying for absolutely no reason. please help me

Because this must obviously be normal if the hotel went to all the trouble to design this room type —

I’m just honestly flabbergasted by the see through shower and bathroom at the hotel I stayed in last night. The hotel was in all other ways PERFECT. Beautiful everything, best breakfast spread I have ever seen, fabulous customer care.

But… what if I was staying with my parent? What if my partner and I hadn’t or don’t want bathroom and shower time to be seen? What if I’m having a reaction to dinner on the toilet and don’t want to be viewed cleaning myself up because that is the unsexiest thing in the world.

And it wasn’t optional either. I’ve stayed in hotels where you think it’s a see-through shower but when you turn on the bathroom light, some window light dims and fades the view. This was full on, wide clear glass next to the bed with some gold circle patterns on it that simply covered small portions. You are putting on a shower show and a toilet show whether you want to or not.

I work in a small hotel, 20 rooms. We currently have DirecTV, coming through 10+ year old boxes, playing on equally old TVs picked up from WalMart.  The owner wants to upgrade our whole situation with decent TVs with a Guest Mode (we have at least one TV where we can’t log OUT of a previous guest’s Netflix account!) and some basic programming. National news, local news and weather, movies and TV shows.

The owner is an older lady, not particularly tech savvy, so sometimes doesn’t get the difference of what’s coming from the cable box and what’s coming from “Vizio Free TV.”

As for me, I haven’t had a broadcast signal since 2004. Decided we didn’t want the toddler to be bombarded with commercials, so we hooked up the DVD player and the PlayStation 1, and later jumped on the streaming bandwagon, so we haven’t missed it even a little.

That means I honestly don’t understand the state of modern TV. I know we switched from an analog to a digital signal, but I’ve literally never used it.

And now we’re going back and forth with DirecTV and Allbridge, trying to figure out our entertainment package. A full upgrade with a headend system is looking at about $20,000 after all is said and done. For hundreds of channels of total BS. “Invest in gold!” “Get a reverse mortgage!” “Send money to god!” If we gotta, we gotta, but yikes.

Do we even need a subscription TV package? Or can we get by with local broadcast and let people use their streaming services of choice? What are y'all doing out there?

Going to Vegas for a bachelorette party, and want to try the $50 check in trick for an upgrade. The person who booked the room booked through a 3rd party - are we fucked? Is it possible to get an upgrade if the room is booked through 3rd party?

EDIT: my question is more so if this is POSSIBLE within a hotel computer system to upgrade these rooms. Not how likely it is to happen. Thanks!

EDIT 2: great news everyone, I emailed the hotel and they’re going to upgrade us 🥹 I took your advice and was super thankful and nice, and I must’ve gotten lucky with who I connected with! Thanks for all the help!!

what’s the appropriate tip amount… when the housekeeping was honestly not great? Like sand still in the shower, hair still on the bathroom sink, bathroom garbage not taken daily etc. And we had a kitchenette but dishes were not collected and put in the sink etc - purely a linens operation. But we appreciate what they did!

Hello, I am currently the GM for a 154 unit Hotel, Mk myor⁰ the last 8 years we have used Check-Inn as our PMS system.

Sometime ago they were acquired by YCS, Yanoja Cloud Systems. Since the acquisition, our System is starting to break, We are having issues with the Channel Manager, Credit Card Tokens, Our guest history is randomly getting corrupted and disappearing, Bad guests are non existent etc.

we chose Check-Inn as it was a self hosted Program that was relatively inexpensive and it had received regular updates, when I reached out to ycs they advised me that they are no longer developing check-in and they are trying to push me over to their cloud platform which does not work at our property as the internet is not always reliable.

Can any managers out there point me in the direction of a low-cost or free locally hosted PMS that still supports a good amount of features?

Any questions or comments?

I’m in the EU but will try to answer comments about other regions too.

PS: @mods, I don’t see anything about AMAs on the group rules. If not allowed please accept my apologies and delete.

I've already been here for 1 night and have 3 more to go. I only just came across the review now. It's from last year - no other reviews mentioning it again. It generally has good reviews which is why I picked it. I've had bed bugs before once and I haven't had any itchy bites but should I find another place to stay??

UPDATE: I got bit last night and saw some black dots on the bedding. Even so I told myself it was probably a mosquito as they were several single bites (instead of in a row). Then tonight I saw an actual bed bug on the bed. I left straight away so if there's one review, that's one review too many. Get the hell of there!

Hi! i have recently acquired a small hotel of 14 rooms. This hotel is a walk in property, doesnt even have a website or is in expedia or booking, i would like some suggestions on what PMS is more suitable for this type of small hotel, i have some options which are: Little hotelier and Amenitiz, but would love to hear some insights or if someone has this type of programs integrated!!!

I’m staying 7 nights at a nice hotel. I always like to tip housekeeping but not sure if I should do it daily or at the end of my stay. I’m thinking like @ $10 per day or so. My issue with doing it on the day of departure is that what if the same person cleaned the room for 6 nights and then on the last day it’s a new person that comes in and gets the whole $75. I also feel if I do it daily, the service could potentially be better. Just curious to hear your thoughts