Last week, my wife and I checked in to a downtown hotel in a city we were visiting. In the part of the transaction where I was asked to swipe my credit card for incidentals, the front desk worker began to nervously stutter out the reasons why she needed it. I immediately understood that she was probably anticipating yet another jerk pushing back.

I politely interrupted with a smile.

Me: “I understand and accept the reasons that you need it.”

And I swiped my card. Done.

The look on her face was really sweet. I could tell she was relieved she wouldn’t have to do the whole song and dance. I felt so bad for her that she most likely has to deal with this so often during every shift.

A woman came into our hotel with her dog to get a room. The check-in process got off to a rocky start when she learned that I would still require her to pay a pet fee for her emotional support dog. Even after I explained that they have no legal standing and are not covered under the ADA, she insisted:

Woman: “Other hotels waive the fee!”

I’m sure they do. Unfortunately for her, I know the law.

Once that was handled, I went to run her card. The way we have it set up, the card reader is on my part of the desk and I run it myself. If we need a PIN, we set it up on the counter so the guest can enter it. She stared at the card reader for a moment.

Woman: “Can you run it as credit? I can’t remember my PIN.”

I went to do that, but it still asked for a PIN, which I explained. She got flustered.

Woman: “I’ve been staying in hotels for the last ten nights and haven’t had this issue before. Can you just type the card number in?”

Me: “No. If I can’t run the card using the chip, I can’t accept it. That’s part of our anti-fraud policy.”

For some reason, she decided this was suspicious and unusual. She took one of our business cards and wrote down the time and which of her cards she’d used on the back of it before heading out the door.

A few minutes later, she came back in looking properly frazzled.

Woman: “This is all so suspicious! I’m going to report you!”

I didn’t ask to who, but I did give her my first name and title. She also informed me that she was going to cancel her card, which I guess means she’s just choosing to make her own life more difficult.

Then, she looked around the desk for a moment, examined the wall behind me as best as she could from a few feet away, stared at the security monitors, and finally left.

Seems like that dog is going to have a lot of emotions to support tonight.

Related:
PIN-headed, Part 20
PIN-Headed, Part 19
PIN-Headed, Part 18
PIN-Headed, Part 17
PIN-Headed, Part 16

I’m the night auditor at a hotel with a major homeless problem. Every night, it’s something or someone new.

It’s around 11:45 and I’m forty-five minutes into my shift. This man walks in, goes straight to the TV in the lobby, and feels around for the button to turn it on.

Man: “Can I have the remote?”

Me: “Do you have a room here?”

Man: “Yes.”

Honestly, I don’t feel like being wrong in a confrontation if the man is, in fact, a guest, so I don’t question it.

Once he falls asleep, though, that’s where I draw the line. That’s it. I yell, ‘Sir,” at least ten times and flicker the lights on and off. Nothing.

So, I get up, go upstairs, get a stray luggage cart that I know makes a ton of noise, and come back to “put it up”. The squeaky mess of a cart wakes him up as I pass him, and he looks at me like I’m the villain in his story — the evil woman that won’t let him sleep on the couch in her place of business.

Me: “Sir, you can’t sleep here. You need to go up to your room or you need to leave.”

He gets up, huffs, and walks right out the door. I watch him go off in an odd direction, not out of the parking lot at all. He goes right around the building to the pool and HOPS THE FENCE.

I go right out to the glass door and stand there with my arms crossed until he notices me. He finds my presence funny. I don’t. I unlock the door with my master key.

Me: “If you have to jump the fence, you probably shouldn’t be here.”

He feigns insanity and confusion. He’s disoriented now, his eyes are squinting, and I’m no longer funny.

Man: “I was just charging my phone.”

Me: “No, you’re not. You’re out by the pool, and there isn’t a phone. You were asked to leave and you’re sneaking around.”

He sucks his teeth; now I’m just annoying to him.

Man: “Well, can I come through that door, then?”

Me: “No. I kicked you out of the hotel. You can wait right there until the police come.”

He found a way in; he can find a way out if he wants to. Then, I close the door and walk away, already dialing the non-emergency line.

He knocks on the door.

Man: “You don’t have to call the police for this! This is doing too much!”

Maybe it was, but at that point, I had to make a stand and set an example.

The cops came, and they eventually found him and served him a trespassing notice, and I got a happy, spiteful ending.

I’ve worked in hospitality for nearly a year after leaving teaching, and while I can say it’s calmer here, it’s only because teaching these days is so crazy. I work at a smaller boutique hotel, so while we have some entitled guests, mostly it stays quiet during the week, with only problem customers on the weekend… usually.

It’s the weekend.

We’ve had an older disabled guest staying with us for the past week, and while there have been accessibility issues, we’ve done our best to help him! He’s nice but just needs more help than he has available. On the second day of his stay, he fell, but two folks on staff helped him: my manager and the male head house staff member.

I am disabled myself and unable to lift anything over twenty pounds. My bosses know this and had no issue with it at all, as I work at the front desk, and the most I help with that involves lifting is luggage.

Today, the older gentleman fell again right before I arrived. The lady working night audit called Fire and Rescue as she knew that, even together, we couldn’t lift him, nor did we want to risk trying in case he was really injured this time. Rescue responded pretty quickly and helped him, the gentleman thanked us, and once his son arrived for him later to take him back to the airport, he was totally checked out.

However, two separate guests on the same floor as him were extremely put out that they were awoken by Rescue. Even when we explained the situation as much as we could, both rooms were still flipping out. One even asked for a full refund for a three-day stay due to inconvenience in the morning before checkout.

My manager and I told them they were welcome to call their online travel agencies, but we would under no circumstances be issuing refunds since Rescue didn’t even have sirens on. I walked the Rescue workers up, too, and they were at a normal volume, not overly loud, etc.

One woman even stated that we should have left the older gentleman there and had Rescue in at a more “reasonable hour” than seven am.

I just can’t imagine being that heartless and callous about an old guy who needs help.

One Friday night, I stay at a chain hotel. I make my reservation at 4:00 pm and check in at about 9:45. I get to my room and do the usual — order a pizza, shower, and watch TV.

At midnight, two women in their fifties open my door. They both apologize and immediately walk out. I have a little chuckle about it and let it slide. I figure the doors don’t automatically lock for whatever reason, so I flip the lock and go back to watching TV.

At 12:15 am, I get a knock on my door. It is a different front desk attendant than who I checked in with. This is a woman in her fifties.

Employee #1: “I’m going to need you to come downstairs.”

Me: “Why?”

Employee #1: “Because I don’t know who you are, why you’re in this room, or how you got in here.”

I get dressed and head down, a little agitated not because I am going downstairs but because of her wording.

I give her my ID.

Employee #1: “My coworker checked you in to Room A but sent you to Room B. Sorry, he’s new. I’m going to go ahead and let you stay in Room B since you’re already there.”

Gee, thanks. So, I walk back up to my room, undress, and hop into bed because I’m ready for it.

At 12:30 am, the room phone rings. It’s the front desk attendant again. She tells me she needs me downstairs again because she can’t find my payment information, so once again, I get dressed, trudge downstairs, and hand her my card. She doesn’t do anything with the card except read the numbers and check her screen. She had the information; she just wanted to verify it, it seems.

I go back up and crash. The next morning, I go to check out and there’s a different attendant at the desk — this one a woman in her twenties.

Employee #2: “How was your stay?”

Me: “There isn’t anything on the computer about what happened?”

Employee #2: “Ahh, yes. I am deeply sorry for everything, and I can give you $10 off of your stay.”

My stay was $115 originally.

Me: “$10? I would think having two women walk into your room and then getting called down to the front desk twice, all after midnight, would be worth more than a $10 compensation.”

Employee #2: “She had you come down here? She didn’t tell me that part.”

I explain the whole story.

Employee #2: “Oh, my God. I am so sorry. I apologize. That never should have happened. I can knock it down to $75, but for anything more than that, I have to get approval from the general manager, who isn’t here this weekend.”

I accepted that with a smile — not the girl’s fault. I’ll definitely be writing corporate this afternoon, though.