Checking in, checking out

A frequent traveller's audit of hotel facilities

I write this column while travelling through Egypt and living in a succession of hotels. Both the St Regis in Cairo and the Oberoi resort in Sahl Hasheesh (on the shores of the Red Sea) were amazing properties with high levels of service and an attention to detail that many other high-end properties get very wrong. 

So here, in the hope that some of them may be reading and paying heed, are just some instances of when hotels get it completely wrong. 

• The placement of the in-room safe: This is one thing that every guest will use. And it astonishes me that more hotels don’t pay attention to their placement. Sometimes they are near the floor so you have to crouch down to access them. At others they are so high that you have to stand on a stool to use them. And in my favourite hotel in Bangkok the safe is placed in such a way against the wall that the only way you can take things out is by contorting your whole body. 

• Light controls: I have written earlier about how, no matter how hard you try, there will always be one light for which the switch will be completely elusive. I have sometimes, in total frustration, unscrewed the bulb so that I could sleep in peace. Nowadays hotels have tried to make amends by putting a master switch by the bedside. There is just one problem. This switch also turns off all the lights in the bathroom. So god help you if you want to go to the loo in the middle of the night. You either put on all the lights and risk waking up your partner or you risk stubbing your toe — or worse — as you blindly grope your way to the loo. How hard can it be to make a different master switch for the bathroom lights? And yet, rare is the hotel which has done so. 

• Moving your things around: Sometimes I feel that housekeeping staff gets special training to hide your things in the unlikeliest of places. I have lost count of the times I have failed to find my spectacles because some vigilant housekeeper has placed them inside a drawer. And there have been instances when I have actually left things behind in hotels because housekeeping has arranged them in a cabinet that I chose not to use. I have now taken to giving special instructions when I leave the room that my things should be left exactly as they are. Sometimes it works. At others it doesn’t. It really is the luck of the draw. 

• Farewell gifts: Don’t get me wrong. I truly appreciate the sentiment and the effort that a hotel has gone to find me a memento. But here’s a thought. How about you place it in my room the night before so that I can pack it in my suitcase? Handing a bulky package to me as I am getting into my car to go the airport is really the worst idea. I now have two choices. Either I open my bags and repack to find a place for this farewell gift. Or I hand carry it through the airport along with my hand luggage. Neither option is ideal. And yet, nobody in hotels seems to realise that what they given me is not a gift but a problem. 

The tipping point

To tip or not to tip: that is the question. And often, there is no good answer

 

I have to confess that the recent brouhaha about the service charge that restaurants tag on to their bills (and whether consumers are bound to pay it) left me rather unmoved. And that’s because it’s an entirely different minefield that occupies my mind when I eat out: tipping. 

 

As a concept, it is simple enough. If you have eaten a meal and enjoyed it, then you leave a little something to thank the service staff. But how much do you leave – and how do you leave it? It’s a tricky business because the answer varies widely from country to country. In some places, ten per cent is a perfectly acceptable tip. In others, anything less than twenty per cent is a virtual insult. In some places, you can add the amount on to your bill and pay by credit card. In others, it is expected that you tip in cash only. In some places, you are not expected to tip if a service charge is added. In others, the waiters will chase you outside into the street if you don’t top up the service charge with a little extra.

 

As I said, it’s a veritable minefield. And no matter what choice I make, it invariably turns out to be the wrong one (at least, judging by the look on my server’s face!).

 

What’s worse is that it’s not just restaurants that leave you struggling to make sense of this business. The entire hospitality sector joins in to make your life miserable. Checking into a hotel abroad and need help with your bags? How much should you tip the staff member who carries it up? It sounds like a simple question but it can be challenging if you haven’t quite worked out the exchange rate. And what if you don’t have any small notes in the local currency, having just arrived in the country? Do you apologize for the fact that you aren’t sufficiently organized or just brazen it out with effusive ‘thank yous’ while the staffer hangs around ostentatiously looking for a tip?

 

It can be even more complicated in Indian hotels, when you are escorted up to your room by assorted staff members, all of them in uniform. All you can do is take a guess as to which one of them you are expected to tip. And the chances are that he or she will leap back with indignation from your proffered hand and say with great dignity, “Oh no, ma’am, I am the manager!” leaving you all red and flustered.

 

Some hotels make it easy for guests by mentioning clearly that they have a no-tipping policy. And that if you want to leave a little something for the staff then you can put it in envelope and leave it at reception, where it will be put in the general pot for everyone to share. But most hotels don’t follow that eminently sensible policy. So, you are left wondering if you need to tip every time you order something from room service; whether you need to give the woman making your bed and cleaning your loo a little extra something (or will you end up offending her?); and if a tip is mandated for the doorman who snaps forward to open your car door for you. And what about the spa operator? Does she get a tip as well? And how do you do that when you have left your wallet safely locked in your room?

 

I don’t know about you, but questions like these run constantly through my head when I am staying at a hotel. So, what should be a restful vacation turns into a stressful exercise in second guessing.

 

It doesn’t end even when you leave the confines of your hotel. Does your taxi driver expect to be tipped? Well, that depends on which country you are in. Is a 10 per cent tip enough for the hairstylist who gave you that very expensive haircut? Or does his tight smile mean he was expecting something around 20 per cent? And what about the porter you hired to help with your bags at the airport? You’ve paid his fee but he’s hanging around, looking like he expects a little more for his trouble.

 

Honestly, it’s quite enough to make you reach your own tipping point!