I work for a resort in a very tourist-heavy area. I’m not at the front desk, but I’m basically your dial-zero-and-ask-for-extra-whatever person, and I delegate it out to whomever.
Guest #1: “Hello, can I please get extra towels, about four?”
This guest is staying in a room where only two people can stay, according to Virginia fire code laws; therefore, they can only get two towels per day without an upcharge. I don’t want to upcharge them, because the guest who’s currently calling has been very polite with me.
Me: “Let me see if I can do that for you. Normally, we can only give two towels a day and others are an upcharge. What’s the reason for needing so many towels?”
Guest #1: “Ah, well, there’s a lot of water on the floor in my bathroom because of my son taking a bath.”
It’s a bulls*** excuse, but it is enough to placate a manager if the need arises, so cool! I’m good!
Me: “All right, no problem. I’ll have them up right away, no charge.”
The call ends. Not two minutes later, the same room calls and I get another guest. She is very rude, very irate.
Guest #2: “How dare you question why I need towels?! It’s my birthday weekend! I live locally and I don’t have to spend all this money to stay. I could just stay home but I chose to come here, and you’re such a horrible person for not giving me customer service! We should have more towels in the room, anyway! You do not want to go there with me!”
I try my best to calm her down, again reiterating that I’m only asking because I admitted that I’m supposed to charge for towels beyond the daily amount, and that we give two towels for her room type because of the Virginia fire code law.
Also, I just want an excuse to cover myself while still providing them towels without charging them. When you work in customer service, you cling to those corporate policy excuses and laws to try to get you off the hook and pray and hope an irate guest understands you are only trying to do your job.
The fire code law sets her off, and she goes on again, this time calling me a b****, saying I’m the worst customer service ever, she wants to speak to my manager, she’ll be on her way downstairs, and it’s none of my d**** business how many people are in her room.
Me: “Yes, ma’am, okay.”
I was not apologizing or trying to defend myself anymore. She commented on how I obviously didn’t care that she was upset — she wasn’t wrong — and called me a b**** again. I honestly believe she was looking for anything to report me on, and I wasn’t giving her the satisfaction. You work in customer service long enough, you learn when s***ty customers are trying to bait you for free stuff and want to use how “rude” you were to them as the excuse.
Finally, I got off the phone and checked her reservation. She was a Groupon customer; she had not spent lots of money AT ALL. Not only that, but she had apparently been absolutely horrible to everyone she’d come in contact with. Yeah, we record in comments and notes under your reservation any time we interact with you if it gets ugly or you had a complaint. This is pretty standard at any resort or major hotel.
She got her karma, though, because I immediately emailed my superiors, explained EVERYTHING, including me trying to get away with not charging her towels and my kindness apparently being what set her off. She had gone downstairs and went off and was given a complimentary dining card to basically shut her up.
Later that night, she got evicted for multiple noise complaints from other guests, playing music way too loud, and smoking weed. Groupon reservations are also non-refundable.
Her room was totally trashed to the point we had to charge her for damages and, of course, the weed smoke in the room; we had to use special machines to get the smell out. We charge on that ALONE $250 for smoke damages.
To be honest with you, it’s normally let go because the paper trail involved is a headache for upper management — incident reports, pictures to be taken, witness statements, etc.
Not for her, though.
