I work the night audit shift at a small family-owned hotel. This woman was having a birthday party for herself with her husband and three kids ranging from about ten to about fourteen.
I first noticed them because [Guest] and [Husband] were out in their car drinking. I thought that was better than drinking in the hotel, so I left them to it. Their kids were still up in the room.
I locked the doors, put up a sign stating very clearly that the doors must remain locked, and tied the handles together with a ribbon for those who didn’t read the sign, so they’d think twice before just opening the deadbolt without telling me.
The couple carried on drinking and smoking in their car for about an hour while I watched the camera out the corner of my eye and chipped away at my audit. At one point, I realized they were downing wine out of our hotel glasses that they’d brought out there with them.
Risking a security walk at around 12:10 am, I went past [Guest]’s room and heard the three kids up in the room stomping, laughing very loudly, and screaming along to “Dora The Explorer”. How do I know it was Dora, you ask?
Through the door, I could hear:
Kids: “Swiper, no swiping!” *Giggles* “SWIPER! Nooooo swiping!” *Laughs* “SWIPER! NO SWIPING!” *Stomp, stomp, jump, fall, laugh*
They had paying guests trying to sleep on either side of them.
I headed back to the desk and was beginning to form a plan when I noticed that the parents were coming back in. I unlocked the front doors, but the phone rang before I could head them off, so they proceeded to their room. It was, naturally, the room next to them saying that there was a commotion in the room next door. I promised to look into it.
I tried calling up to the room. Of course, nobody answered. I started getting a written warning prepped and printed.
Five minutes later, I heard stomping from above me and went out to investigate, and the entire family came out of the elevator.
Me: “I heard some banging. Is everything okay?”
Guest: “Well, I mean, look at how many people are coming out of this elevator, dear. Of course there’s going to be some noise.”
She looked down at me, somehow, despite being shorter than me.
Me: “I understand that. I heard enough banging to cause concern; I just wanted to make sure everything is okay.”
Guest: “We’re fine. It’s my birthday. Or it was. It is.”
For a moment, she glanced around. Her husband, who looked completely exhausted, spoke up.
Husband: “We haven’t been to bed yet. It’s the same day… as it was.”
Guest: “My birthday.”
She brushed past me, through the front door, with her family following.
Guest: “We’re just going for a smoke.”
Me: “…uh-huh.”
So, they went outside. I watched on camera for a few minutes as her children tore around the parking lot, kicking rocks and chunks of ice. Then, I decided to make my move. I went out to [Guest] with the written warning.
Me: “Soo, I just got off the phone with one of the rooms next to yours…”
Guest: “Uh-oh!”
Husband: “We’re being too loud…”
Me: “You’re being a little loud. The guest complained about stomping and loud laughing and something about somebody screaming, ‘Swiper, no swiping’?”
The children burst into giggles.
Guest: “Oh, that would be this one. It’s just Dora.”
Me: “Yes, I know.”
Guest: “Look, it’s my birthday. This is what I wanted. This is what I love: seeing my kids have fun.”
Me: “Right. And I love Swiper, too. I get it.”
Guest: “It’s just Dora!”
Me: “And it’s also nearly 1:00 in the morning. So if we could just… bring this to an end…”
Guest: “But this noise complaint—”
Me: “—is just a warning.” *Looking at all of them* “Please, it’s nearly one. Can we just… just shut it down and go to bed?”
I went back inside, optimistically thinking it was over. When [Guest] came back in, though, she waited at the desk. Her husband cowered behind her awkwardly.
Me: “Hello.”
Guest: *With the creepiest smile* “Hello. Listen. I have very honest children. And they weren’t even being that loud.”
Me: “I understand, and I will try to be in your corner, but—”
Guest: “I mean, I literally asked them how loud they were being, and they showed me. They said, ‘Swiper, no swiping! Swiper, no swiping!’ See? I’m not even being that loud.”
Me: “I understand. It was probably some old, persnickety couple that—”
Guest: “They weren’t being loud. The other people are lying.”
Me: “Look, I’m just ticking a box here.”
Husband: “Yeah, he’s just doing his job.”
Guest: *To her husband* “OKAY!” *Looks back at me, hard* “And in order to ‘tick your box’ properly, you also need to hear my complaint. So…” *puts the written warning on the desk and slides it across to me* “…this is my response.”
Me: “Fine. I’ve been responded to.”
Guest: “Great.”
She walked away. They went back up to their room. I continued my audit, fuming a bit. [Guest] and her husband came back downstairs a half-hour later to go back outside.
I thought to myself, “F*** it. I’m not opening the door for her after the way she spoke to me.” And I was not expected to, either. At my little property, people could exit through any door — all of which locked behind them. The front door, locked from the inside, was itself used as a control point. To re-enter, guests had to go through the automatic main doors into a vestibule with a phone where I could screen them before admitting them through the locked front doors. It was a poor solution to the immediate issue of many, many homeless on my side of town.
I chose not to get up and go above and beyond this time. [Guest] encountered my note on the door, read it, and attempted to open the deadbolt. It got stuck. She sighed dramatically at the door and then, with her husband, went out a side door and back to their van, presumably to drink and smoke more.
I went to the side door they had just left to ensure they hadn’t propped it open — they hadn’t — and then I decided to go do pool stuff, as they were out in their van for an hour the last time.
As I got back from doing the pool, I saw [Guest]’s car door open, so, being the nice guy I am, I opened that locked front door — opened it wide — and propped it open with the foot. [Guest] couldn’t see me from her car, but she would easily be able to get in once she went through the automatic doors. I didn’t particularly want to interact with her again, so I went back into the office.
The show started on the camera almost as soon as I sat down. [Guest] and [Husband] exited their car, which was right next to the main entrance, and then began walking AWAY from the main entrance. After a second or so, I figure out what was going on: she couldn’t, in her mind, go through the main entrance because she would have to speak to me and ask me for help! Oh, the horror! So, she was looking for a different way in — a way that did not exist because, remember, the front door was the only control point.
I watched the other doors to see if she could somehow get them open… but no, it gets better.
A minute or so later, the eldest child came down in the elevator, talking rapidly and anxiously on her cell phone. [Guest] was trying to get the kid to let them in. She went all the way down to one entrance at the end of the first-floor hallway and looked out. Wrong door.
For two or three minutes, she paced up and down the hallway, trying different doors, flapping her hands anxiously, and speaking very stressfully into the phone. No luck.
Finally, she was smart enough to try going to the front entrance, where she saw that the door was wide open. She walked out, starting to yell into her phone and make very righteous slashing movements with her hands. She turned on her heel and went back into the elevator.
A minute or two later, [Guest] and [Husband] came through the front door. [Guest] was a good car length ahead of her husband, speed-walking with intent to murder. She cast a hateful glare at both the front door and the front desk as she passed them and then stomped into the elevator. [Husband] didn’t make it and had to get the next elevator.
I checked up there periodically to make sure the room wasn’t unreasonably noisy, and, curiously, the room was dead silent after that point.
The next step would have been to boot them all out, which is exactly what the written warning I handed her said in nice, plain, scary font. In the end, I didn’t have to go there, though, both because the kids did actually quiet down, and because [Guest] gave me an opportunity to mess with her. And then she took it.
