Things I don't understand

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Don Draper

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We have a frequent guest (comes twice a year, 4-5 days each time) who is recently married. He is usually here alone but brought his new bride this time and stayed for 4 nights. They booked late so weren't able to get the same room and had to move twice. The first time they had to move the new room was unoccupied the night before so I told them they could either move their things over or let our housekeepers do it for them. They wanted to do it themselves. Fine, no problem.
Yesterday when they were moving, the room they were moving TO had been occupied the night before so I asked them to just leave their things and once the girls had cleaned the new room we would move everything over for them. They said ok, but an hour later when I saw the wife she told me "We didn't want to be a bother so we just moved our things into the new room". Well I wasn't happy because I knew the girls would now have to clean around all their stuff but I just said ok thanks. I specifically went and told our housekeepers what had happened and apologized, told them to just move the stuff out if that was easier for them to flip the room. Ok. They knew it was a flip and they would just deal with the stuff.
Today, the couple just checked out and she paid. She asked me if she could add a tip for the housekeepers to the cc bill. Sure, what amount do want to add? $50. I said thank you for taking care of our girls, I appreciate that. Then she tells me "You know, they never changed the sheets in that room yesterday". I just looked at her dumbfounded. I said I was so sorry, I had clarified with them what they were supposed to do and I was surprised, we do have sheet sets that are identical so it's possible they just looked like the same ones? No, they were wrinkled and there was a hair when I pulled back the sheet. I said "Then you shouldn't be leaving them $50". She said No, no it's fine. We should have just kept their stuff out of there.
We went to dinner with them last night...I don't know if they knew at that point that the sheets hadn't been changed (I actually don't know if the sheets WERE changed, need to ask my housekeepers) and were here after they had retired for the evening. Why wouldn't they come tell me? I appreciate her being so nice about it but honestly why make the point of both leaving the $50 tip AND mentioning the sheets???
I am mortified.
 
I can't imagine not telling you about it last night, especially when you know them so well. If they were going to mention it anyway, they should have last night so you could have the problem handled. I would be mortified, too.
 
Housekeepers just in and insist they changed everything...they remember because it was a pain to move around all their stuff. So maybe that set got really wrinkly, or there could have been a hair (they do stick, but when the housekeepers make the bed they will usually do a spot-check for stuff like this). I honestly would put my staff up against the pickiest guest, they are so good...I just don't know what happened.
As an innkeeper this is one of the things that frustrates me so much. You can do 99.44% of all things perfectly, but one little detail like this can derail an entire stay for someone. There's just really no way to recover from something like this with the guest...they're gone, they probably will come back and stay again, but it's always out there.
 
Here's my thought: Unless you iron your sheets, then yes, sheets will be wrinkled and no matter how hard you try there is always that stray hair that gets unnoticed. When I am making up a bed with clean sheets and notice something like that I am always glad that I noticed it cos what if a guest saw it!? I'm sure a lot get by my inspection also! Will your housekeepers tell you the truth if they, in fact, didn't change the sheets?? I'd hold the $50 as a reward for telling the truth!
 
Will the housekeepers be honest and tell you now? Just write it off as a bad experience. Since they come there often they will want to know if the housekeepers got the gratuity, and really they shouldn't if they didn't change the sheets. If they didn't, I would personally not give them that $, but the guest is the one who said to give it to them, so then you have to.
I FIND HAIRS on sheets when I put a new set on, someone who sheds much before I washed them, and the sheets go round and round in the washer then cling in the dryer...I pull hairs off - more than I would like to admit. I make the beds, so I see them.
Let us know what you end up doing...
 
Wrinkles vs slept on wrinkles are two diff things, not sure a guest could spot the diff, but we can.
Every hotel I have ever been in has the worst wrinkled sheets on the bed, with a few exceptions. The place near Harrisonburg VA, just a family hotel, had pressed sheets and you could immediately tell!!
Sorry but the arrogance of pushing the $50 tip and telling you that, really, just makes me mad. I would be mad, a sick feeling and mad.
 
My staff are honestly like our family. They all treat this house like their mother-in-law was coming to visit. And I posed the questions as if I just wasn't sure "Do you remember if the ABC room was a check-out or a stay-over yesterday?" Both immediately said "Check-out, that's the one the people had moved all their stuff into."
An honest mistake could have been made but they wouldn't lie about it. Sick feeling, like you said Joey. But I gotta let it go, new bunch coming in today...it's Parent's Weekend...please keep your fingers crossed for me!
Edited to add: There were two different sets of housekeepers taking care of them and I will split the $50 between them all.
 
My staff are honestly like our family. They all treat this house like their mother-in-law was coming to visit. And I posed the questions as if I just wasn't sure "Do you remember if the ABC room was a check-out or a stay-over yesterday?" Both immediately said "Check-out, that's the one the people had moved all their stuff into."
An honest mistake could have been made but they wouldn't lie about it. Sick feeling, like you said Joey. But I gotta let it go, new bunch coming in today...it's Parent's Weekend...please keep your fingers crossed for me!
Edited to add: There were two different sets of housekeepers taking care of them and I will split the $50 between them all..
I would give them the benefit of the doubt. Hair gets stuck, sheets wrinkle. No big deal.
 
You know, I went and thought about this for awhile. You say he always comes alone and now he has brought his new wife. You went out for dinner with them. She raised the issue of the room not being done. Do you think any of this could be jealousy on her part? Here you have a long standing relationship with her new husband. Maybe there were jokes or conversations she felt excluded from?
It's an awfully passive-aggressive way to get at you, but it did. 'Here's $50 for your housekeepers who didn't do their jobs.' You don't want to take it, she insists. And it is enough money to stick in your craw that she did it. She's the guest, you kind of have to do this even tho it goes against your beliefs.
If she IS 'like that' she scored points off you. You will always be wondering now every time she returns. Is everything perfect?
Anyway, it's something to think about.
 
I know, I can't stop thinking about it either! She really didn't seem like that, I liked her a lot. Truth be told I do not like the husband all that much (he was very close with the PO's and they gave him all kinds of special treatment which we do not...discounts, late breakfast, etc.). When he's here by himself he's a PAIN...he's very talkative and sits for hours at the breakfast table, doesn't vacate his room until noon so the housekeepers have to hang around and wait for him. It's weird, I'm not trying to be a big old B but it gets old after 4-5 days, he's nice but cloying.
He was not like that at ALL with the wife here, she had never been here before so they were up and out every morning and not a problem at all. They asked us to go to dinner and other than briefly at breakfast each day that's all we saw of them. So I was happy!
Maybe she thought the housekeepers weren't doing their job properly and we needed to be aware of it. I just discussed this with my restaurant owner friend and he gets guests like this, they'll complain about everything but then leave a 30% gratuity. He feels they do it so they come off like the "bigger person".
Who knows? If we could guess/predict people we'd all be millionaires and not worried about innkeeping!
 
They may have changed the bed - because we have a russian wolfhound (long silky hair) Chris is always worried that I'll bring hairs into the room with me when I change beds, so I have a lint roller in the room closets. This is both for the guests who want to see Sasha so that they can roll him off of themselves, but mainly for me. when I make the beds and change the rooms I roll the sheets and the bed covers, and the sofa and stuffed chair.
I ALWAYS get lots of hair.
Riki
 
They may have changed the bed - because we have a russian wolfhound (long silky hair) Chris is always worried that I'll bring hairs into the room with me when I change beds, so I have a lint roller in the room closets. This is both for the guests who want to see Sasha so that they can roll him off of themselves, but mainly for me. when I make the beds and change the rooms I roll the sheets and the bed covers, and the sofa and stuffed chair.
I ALWAYS get lots of hair.
Riki.
That is a really great idea.
 
My sheets get wrinkled in folding and I shed like Riki's dog. I try to get them and HOPE I do get all that fall. I think you just had a "pot-stirrer" who was letting your know "I can afford to leave a $50 tip for housekeeping and most of your guests cannot and will not."
 
My staff are honestly like our family. They all treat this house like their mother-in-law was coming to visit. And I posed the questions as if I just wasn't sure "Do you remember if the ABC room was a check-out or a stay-over yesterday?" Both immediately said "Check-out, that's the one the people had moved all their stuff into."
An honest mistake could have been made but they wouldn't lie about it. Sick feeling, like you said Joey. But I gotta let it go, new bunch coming in today...it's Parent's Weekend...please keep your fingers crossed for me!
Edited to add: There were two different sets of housekeepers taking care of them and I will split the $50 between them all..
I would give them the benefit of the doubt. Hair gets stuck, sheets wrinkle. No big deal.
.
True, no big deal but if the guests really do think those sheets weren't changed, the damage is done. And the really terrible thing is, you can't keep talking about it to the guest, ya know what I mean? I am one of those people who fixate on things until they are resolved to my satisfaction, hehe. But this one cannot be resolved with the guest. That would bumm me out to no end.
 
Maybe she is the type who it really doesn't bother her to sleep on someone else's unclean sheets so it didn't "bother" her as much as she wanted to let you know....???? Maybe she's the lady who owns the vacation house that SS mentioned didn't want the sheet's washed after she slept on them knowing a paying customer was going to be coming in???
wink_smile.gif
 
Maybe she is the type who it really doesn't bother her to sleep on someone else's unclean sheets so it didn't "bother" her as much as she wanted to let you know....???? Maybe she's the lady who owns the vacation house that SS mentioned didn't want the sheet's washed after she slept on them knowing a paying customer was going to be coming in???
wink_smile.gif
.
GeorgiaGirl said:
... Maybe she's the lady who owns the vacation house that SS mentioned didn't want the sheet's washed after she slept on them knowing a paying customer was going to be coming in???
wink_smile.gif
huh?
omg_smile.gif

 
Maybe she is the type who it really doesn't bother her to sleep on someone else's unclean sheets so it didn't "bother" her as much as she wanted to let you know....???? Maybe she's the lady who owns the vacation house that SS mentioned didn't want the sheet's washed after she slept on them knowing a paying customer was going to be coming in???
wink_smile.gif
.
GeorgiaGirl said:
... Maybe she's the lady who owns the vacation house that SS mentioned didn't want the sheet's washed after she slept on them knowing a paying customer was going to be coming in???
wink_smile.gif
huh?
omg_smile.gif

.
IrisoftheWayfarer said:
GeorgiaGirl said:
... Maybe she's the lady who owns the vacation house that SS mentioned didn't want the sheet's washed after she slept on them knowing a paying customer was going to be coming in???
wink_smile.gif
huh?
omg_smile.gif
www.innspiring.com/node/4422
 
Maybe she is the type who it really doesn't bother her to sleep on someone else's unclean sheets so it didn't "bother" her as much as she wanted to let you know....???? Maybe she's the lady who owns the vacation house that SS mentioned didn't want the sheet's washed after she slept on them knowing a paying customer was going to be coming in???
wink_smile.gif
.
GeorgiaGirl said:
... Maybe she's the lady who owns the vacation house that SS mentioned didn't want the sheet's washed after she slept on them knowing a paying customer was going to be coming in???
wink_smile.gif
huh?
omg_smile.gif

.
IrisoftheWayfarer said:
GeorgiaGirl said:
... Maybe she's the lady who owns the vacation house that SS mentioned didn't want the sheet's washed after she slept on them knowing a paying customer was going to be coming in???
wink_smile.gif
huh?
omg_smile.gif
www.innspiring.com/node/4422
.
GeorgiaGirl said:
IrisoftheWayfarer said:
GeorgiaGirl said:
... Maybe she's the lady who owns the vacation house that SS mentioned didn't want the sheet's washed after she slept on them knowing a paying customer was going to be coming in???
wink_smile.gif
huh?
omg_smile.gif
www.innspiring.com/node/4422
Which is to say some people don't mind used sheets so much...
=)
Kk.
 
They may have changed the bed - because we have a russian wolfhound (long silky hair) Chris is always worried that I'll bring hairs into the room with me when I change beds, so I have a lint roller in the room closets. This is both for the guests who want to see Sasha so that they can roll him off of themselves, but mainly for me. when I make the beds and change the rooms I roll the sheets and the bed covers, and the sofa and stuffed chair.
I ALWAYS get lots of hair.
Riki.
Love the lint roller idea!
KathleenM
 
Housekeepers just in and insist they changed everything...they remember because it was a pain to move around all their stuff. So maybe that set got really wrinkly, or there could have been a hair (they do stick, but when the housekeepers make the bed they will usually do a spot-check for stuff like this). I honestly would put my staff up against the pickiest guest, they are so good...I just don't know what happened.
As an innkeeper this is one of the things that frustrates me so much. You can do 99.44% of all things perfectly, but one little detail like this can derail an entire stay for someone. There's just really no way to recover from something like this with the guest...they're gone, they probably will come back and stay again, but it's always out there..
Yes. We were invaded by "lady bugs" a month ago. Their first day and they were SWARMING the house! THOUSANDS! As far as I knew, they did not enter the house, at least the guest quarters in this one room, but by morning, I found out differently. Nothing I could do about it, but keep cleaning them up. One guest said she found one under her pillow. I only charged them 1/2 price for the suite, but I DID call them ahead of time that afternoon and told them of the problems we were having. Sigh...
 
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