I’ll Just Pull A Room Out Of My Butt, Then

I work in a hotel. I am just about to clock out and leave when a guest comes up to the front desk and asks about extending his reservation.

Me: “Good morning, sir! How can I help you?”

Guest: “I would like to extend my reservation.”

Me: “Sure thing! Let me see what I can do.”

I get his room number from him to see what his room type was to make sure we have it in inventory. We are a fairly new hotel, and we have a large long-term stay group with us that has been here since we opened, taking up about half of our inventory.

When I look at our availability, I see that we are completely sold out.

Me: “I’m so sorry, sir, but we are completely sold out tonight. I am not able to extend your reservation and I do apologize about this.”

Guest: “Well, I think my status can change things.”

Me: *Confused pause* “We are completely sold out. I do not have any rooms available.”

Guest: “Surely you have a room available. You guys are never truly sold out.”

Me: “I’m sorry, but I do not have any rooms.”

Guest: “Don’t you guys have a manager’s room available for me?”

Me: “No, I do not. I do not have any rooms available tonight. I apologize for the inconvenience.”

As you can tell, this goes on for some time, and after a while, I start to sound like a broken record. I am tired of him and I am tired in general.

Me: “Sir, if you would like, my managers will be in at any moment. You are more than welcome to talk to them about this. As for right now, the only thing I can do for you is give you a late checkout.”

Guest: “Fine. I’ll take that, seeing as you are no help whatsoever, and I know you are lying about not having rooms. How late can I check out?”

I go and schedule him a four-pm checkout since that’s the latest his rewards tier will allow. He leaves in a big huff and goes back to his room.

I never heard if he came down to talk to the managers, but I did find out that he ended up leaving around one pm. I’m not quite sure what he wanted me to do about not having any rooms for him. Did he expect me to deny someone else their reservation for that night due to his poor planning? Who knows? Do they actually do manager rooms at other hotels? I don’t think so. At least, they didn’t in the two big-name brand hotels that I’ve worked with before. What I do know is that I hate when high-tier guests think they can bully us just because they are “loyal members.” It really grinds my gears.