Questions and answers about the hotel industry

Guidelines:

Hotel employees, please flair your username with Hotel Type/Your title/# of years in the industry.

Guests, feel free to flair yourself. You can include your usual type of travel (business, conventions, leisure, etc.) and whatever else you want us to know about you.

Reference guide for guests on job titles:

HK- Housekeeper

MN- Maintenance or Engineering

FDA- Front desk associate or agent

NA- Night auditor

GSR or GSA- Guest Services Representative, Associate, or Agent

FDS- Front Desk Supervisor

FDM- Front Desk Manager

FOM- Front Office Manager

GM- General Manager

An 'A' at the front of a title typically stands for 'Assistant.'

This subreddit is for guests and staff of hotels to ask hotel related questions. It is not for people trying to sell things, or trying to develop products for hotels. If you post something and you’re selling something or doing market research, you will be banned.

Everyone else, don’t respond to these posts. Just report and downvote.

For example, a post with a title like “how could AI make your job easier” is market research.

I just started working as a night auditor for a hotel management company part time. After my first week I realized how hard it’s going to be, even my supervisor was sleeping while training me and I feel unprepared to be on my own. The full time night auditor wants to work the weekend and have two days off during the week. I definitely thought I could manage that but I was wrong (and reserve the right to change my mind). The biggest hurdle is getting off from the night auditor position and going to my full time job. There is a position posted for another property with the perfect hours (Saturday and Sunday) which I’m off from my full time job and it’s second or first shift. I don’t have a relationship with the general manager because it’s 3rd shift and I just started. I had good rapport with the recruiter. I am not sure who I would contact first my current hiring manager/the hiring manager for the other property/recruiter? I would even be willing to put in my two weeks notice so that I could apply for the other property…just not sure where to start? Also both properties are under the same management.

Hey everyone, I've been staying at a hotel for the past month while in the process of moving. Throughout the week, I go down daily and renew the booking and security deposit with no issues.

Over the weekend, the front desk agent doesn't take the security deposits properly and instead of doing a hold, she is charging the card. So when they go to release it, it has to go through as a refund. So instead of 3-5 days for the hold to release I have to wait up to 21 days for a refund. This has happened every weekend so essentially I'm waiting on $400 in refunds after it just happened today. The GM of the hotel says I have to keep providing the deposit despite waiting on the refunds or he will kick me out.

I've brought it to the attention of the other front desk agent who is there during the week and she said it happens all the time and they're constant receiving calls about it and the GM knows she's doing it incorrectly and doesn't care.

At this point, is there anything I can do? I don't have the extra $100 to keep providing while waiting for a refund on these transactions. Normally I'd go to management management but he knows and isn't fixing the issue.

We're a small time Inn. Just now, a room needs some repairs and can't be occupied. But the guest is already there. They just checked in a couple of hours ago. The guest is fully aware of the situation. But what should we do? We don't have any rooms available. We only have 10 rooms. Refund is no issue, but is it alright to ask them nicely to go to another hotel because we can't accomodate them?

Soooo I’m a mom currently on a road trip with my daughter and we are planning to stay at a vagabond inn in a quite desolate area at our halfway point. I realized about 4 hours into my trip that the last stop I was at, I likely left my license. The room is already paid for, so I have the confirmation but I know they ask for ID at the desk. I have other credit cards but nothing with me pic (unless you count a costco card). Am I going to be screwed 😭 I don’t want to call ahead because either way we are coming there, I mean I can’t turn around and am not even sure I know exactly where I lost it. I figured they are more likely to let us stay if I show up and tell them what happened in person :(. I’m so anxious I feel like I’m gonna throw up. Planning to get a paper replacement at the first dmv I see but that doesn’t help me tonite 😭 ob i also have a pic of my license but I know that probably doesn’t help. PLEASE TELL ME WE ARENT SCREWED 😭

Edit: we got in 🥹

I need some advice here. I'm trying to apply to some overnight positions and that includes night auditor positions.

However, what if I have no experience working as a night auditor and just in the food industry? Should I lie on my resume? Do I show up in person to apply instead? Can someone give me any advice? I desperately need an overnight shift position as it would work with my college schedule.

Thanks!

I work in management at an independent property and the training materials, onboarding structure, etc. etc. is all pretty abysmal. I started pretty recently as front desk manager and inherited quite a few issues. My team (inherited) is really wonderful but were completely untrained when I took over and I have worked very closely with all of them to bring everyone up to speed.

They are all strong individuals now who I can trust to handle their shifts but I now want to start providing a deeper understanding/education for them. An incident with someone who was trying to check in but was denied due to their behavior has brought to light that my team doesn't have a full understanding of things like liability (😬) and also their own rights in that situation and many others. The FDA had never heard of trespassing someone before and had worked there 2 years. This is in part due to the fact that our location is way out of town and a higher end property so things like that ''don't happen out here". Yet it did happen and because no one out here has thought to prepare for it before my team was blindsided.

I used to work in caregiving and had a wonderful manager who would have monthly trainings going over different topics and givinh us a much deeper understanding of the care we were providing as well as a structural understanding of how the business worked. In short I want to bring something like this to my team, trainings on different situations, the legality surrounding it, their rights, the best ways to respond in the moment and maybe some like fun facts?

The question: Are there any general materials out there that would be a good starting point? I am basically building this from scratch any help is appreciated!

Hi. Hotel guest, and I’ve only booked a hotel one other time in my life. The place I’m staying at is in the middle of renovations and is short staffed. Still, the rooms are $150+ per night, so…. Anyways, I booked on their website and only paid a deposit. The confirmation says to pay the remainder at check in, which I literally had my card out to do, but the front desk associate just handed me two room keys and directed me to the room.

They just have a key drop off at their front desk, so my assumption is that there’s no formal check out process. And they should have my card on file because again, I paid the deposit online on their website.

My question is, should I still try to pay at checkout? Or is that pointless and they’ll just charge my card in the next week or so?

I thought about stopping by the desk because we had some issues with our room. Visibly dirty tiles in the entry, no TP or hand soap, only one lamp in the room worked, shower wouldn’t drain and left 1-2 inches of standing water when we tried, and the toilet clogged at one point.

I mentioned the clog and the shower to the front desk three times before they sent someone to fix it, and they only unclogged the toilet and left the shower as is, which I only discovered when I showered.

What would you suggest I do?

What should I even put in this? Is it important to put some sorta specific keys or items in it like the city mandated lock box on the front of the building does? 🤔

All the hotels I've worked at has one.. but I never needed to break the glass or ask for the combo... So I really don't know what it's used for if master or housekeeping keys work anyway. o.o

Looking to do their English MBA program in International Hospitality and Tourism Management. Still deciding if I should go. If anyone has attended the school in general I'd like to know your thoughts and if you're able to get a good internship studying at the school.

Hey mates !

How are you doing ?

I've just started my career in hospitality with Hilton. Atm I'm working in a franchise hotel as Guest relation officer.

Everything is doing well, I love the job the hotel and the management. Guests trust me as well as my team and colleagues.

I'd like to pursue my career in this industry, Hilton is giving (I believe) great opportunities to work all around the world.

But I'd like to try and the end of the next season an hotel and not a resort.

For whom as workd in both, what are the main differences?

Let's say if there's a situation where you went to a hotel with a guy, obvious. Room booked in his name however, the hotel still asks for both of your aadhar cards physically and photocopies them. This raises two questions primarily: 1. Is the hotel allowed to do this in the first place? Esp when the second person didn't even book the room in their name. & 2. Can the hotel in the future disclose this information in the future given they have both the exact original aadhar photocopies. I think the higher end hotel chains have strict policies in place against this but what about mid and low tier hotels?

Will this be an issue for checking in? For example it looks like this: James SmitH

How do I properly check out a reservation paid for by points in Fosse? My GM told me one time I had to post like a “free night” charge on their reservation but is never at the hotel or answers my calls? Does this sound familiar to anyone?

I 19M am a hospitality management major and will be graduating this spring. I am trying to gain some experience in the hotel industry so I may actually have a chance one I get my degree. However, no one wants to hire me because you need to have experience, and then anyone that will hire me wants to pay me less than the local fast food joint which unfortunately is not enough money to live off of. I just need to find a job where I can make enough money to live. I live with roommates and still cant make enough money to live off of. I have tried everything from applying, to walking in the hotel, to calling their HR department to try and get in contact with the hiring manager. I am very eager but it seems they would rather hire ANYONE else. am I doing something wrong? I have heard that sometimes you can be too qualified as well, is that it? What is going on?!

I have an interview as a front desk agent next week, and went online and looked up questions that they might ask during the interview. I would like some answers to these questions that i might get asked.

1. If you're on an important phone call with a customer and another customer walks up to the front desk, how would you serve the customers?

2. How would you handle a situation in which you suspected a guest of stealing hotel property,

3.What strategies would you use to communicate with many guests at once?

Also, what do you wear during the interview? Is it just a nice shirt,or anything specific?

Recently it seems like my property I work at *generally upscale* has started having expedia calling prior to arrival and asking for complimentary upgrades if available. Have never heard of them doing this prior, is this an actual thing?

it should be mandatory for people to do a 3-course before theyre allowed to stay at a hotel? And they have to redo it every year... Dx

Hii I'm new to reddit and english is not my first language so sry for any grammatical errors.

So, I'm not from aus but am planning to study there (melbourne) for my undergrad degree. I looked into a lot of articals and reddit and was thinking to persue hospitality management but the opinions are such a hot take. Some are saying that the degree is bs while others say it helps. So i was asking for any advice on the field and opinions if you have. It would help me a lot if you know a good uni for it. And what experience should i be looking forward to and what pros and cons are there. And any info of living in aus would help. 🤗

I recently started working at a hotel FD for the first time and honestly it’s much more chill than i expected it to be… but the hotel itself is actually in horrible condition. everyone is very kind and it’s an extremely friendly workplace so my days are okay for the most part. the state of the hotel is bad though; almost every room has appliances broken in them, housekeeping isn’t the best at keeping up with cleanliness, 3rd party websites are very very misleading about the property which can include a bunch of additional fees for the guests, and as the FD i get a shit ton of complaints to deal with cuz the manager isn’t around that much. i’m a little conflicted on what to think about working here cuz everyone i work with is delightful. i really feel for the guests tho and fundamentally disagree with the place’s false advertising tactics and poor upkeep. now, i only got paid half of what i was expecting to get paid since i started working.

Hi guys, hope you're doing well :)

So I recently graduated with a bachelors in biochemistry, but I wanna take a year off to work, save some money before maybe getting into a masters degree.

I applied for positions as a waitress in 3 Marriot hotels in my city and sent in a cover letter. In that letter I talk about my degree and how i wanna take a break before masters. My question is, is this a bad idea? I'm not sure if maybe this would prevent them from hiring me since they know i might quit after a year.

Note I have about 2 years of serving experience in a small family style restaurant. The rest is all not really relevant experience (research lab, which i tried to say is relevant since it takes a lot of attention to detail but I digress)

Thank you!

I ask as someone who has been in hospitality for about 2 years at 2 different small hotels as a front desk worker. At both properties, the baseline level of competence, both for staff and management was fairly low. If I broke down all the issues for each property, it would take a while so I will generalize.

Issues like management not being proficient in use of the property management system, management not entering payroll correctly or not getting workers their paystubs even when asked until sometimes over a month later. Workers and even management not being competent with property management system, not charging guests correctly, being rude toward guests or dismissive of valid guest complaints, not knowing what's required for a tax exempt reservation, not knowing how to distinguish between service animals and emotional support animals. Co-workers who have been at the property for several years not knowing how to fold laundry or being so bad at it that they are "not allowed" to do it.

All these issues are considered acceptable I guess because these hotels stay in business. I mean, I know a hotel job is entry-level with mediocre pay so it's not exactly going to attract the best and brightest. But other entry level jobs I've worked, people either learned how to do their job or they were fired.

I just hit my 2-year anniversary at a Hilton Garden Inn, and I'm waiting on my raise, but I don't think that I'll be satisfied with what I'm going to get. If anything, it'll be $18, but I'd want at least $18.50. I started working in hotel at age 19 in 2020, and I'm about to turn 24 later this year. They hired another FT PM shift agent who has no experience who I had to helped train, for $17.00

I make $17.16, so it's safe to say that I'm not pleased.

I'm planning on going to school full time this coming Fall. What I know about my property is that they will accommodate my schedule and I can comfortably do homework at work. I know this place like the back of my hand. But I also want more money. I'm putting myself through school, so things get expensive.

I'm a Mathematics major, so hotel will not be my career, but I was considering stepping foot in luxury hotels until I graduated, just so I can have it on my resume and for the good pay. I applied to a JW Marriott and got offered the position working at the front desk, but I ended up saying no so that I could work at my current property. I wasn't confident in myself at the time, and I was afraid of working in luxury.

The OPs manager gave me his card and reached out to me 6 months after our interview, to which I said that I appreciated his reaching out, but I was comfortable working here.

They're hiring another FT FD agent at that same JW, and I was considering emailing that OPs manager to see if they'd be willing to allow me to work 24-30 hours this coming Fall. They're offering $20, and I believe it's Marriott corporate, so I could get benefits at 24 hours, as opposed to having to stay at a 30-hour minimum at my current job to get benefits.

As the years have gone by, I've improved immensely in my customer service skills, but I know that I can't compare clientele at a casual hotel to clientele at a RESORT. Me and the other FD agent who I trained are carrying the FD in our scores, and we get namedropped positively in a lot of our reviews, and we always get a lot of Honors Enrollment. We rock the desk, and our hotel is #1 out of 49 hotels in our city.

Despite all this, I'm afraid that I'd regret leaving this hotel to work somewhere where I'm treated like shit by the guests because of the high standards they have for these expensive rooms. I'm afraid that I won't excel and that I'd be stuck there for the money, something I know that I could not justify leaving, even if I am unhappy.

In short, TLDR, I am asking for advice and for similar stories of those who went from casual hotels such as HGIs, Fairfields, and Home2s, to top-tier hotel luxury like the JW.

Thank you!

Hello,

Long story short, broke a window at the Marriott on accident.

We were originally told 1.2k for the payment which we were fine to pay but then got sent an invoice for 4.4k. Is there any way to reduce this? Is there any hotel damage coverage? Please help I cannot afford this and I'm so scared

I have a question ( it might be a silly one). Im travelling alone this summer and was planning on getting my parents to book my hotel for me under their credit card; would i be able to check into the hotel despite the booking & payment information being under their name ?