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Tonight was *SUPPOSED* to be a quiet night without a whole lot going on... and it was until around 2am.
I hate employee Friends and Family Rates!
Our property does a nice deal for friends and family of employees. In short we cut their room rate to the lowest possible rate (lower than anything else we give, which tonight ended up being an over 60% discount on the room rate.)
The catch is that the employee needs to get an approval letter for the guest's stay before they can claim that rate. They are pretty much ALWAYS given out when requested, except when the property is oversold.
Cut to tonight.
The daughter of the employee and her friends who will be staying in the room, roll in at 2am. I inform them that I need their approval letter for the rate and a credit card to pay for the room. The daughter GOES APESHIT, starts calling people, yelling in the lobby, carrying on about not staying here, etc. She gets a hold of her mom, the employee, and I tell her, that we don't charge for the room until the guest checks out, that I will put the room in at the normal rate, but we can adjust it to the proper rate in the morning, once we've found the paper. She doesn't seem to care, and continues having her temper tantrum in the lobby. Finally she says, "Well I don't know what we're going to do now!" and storms out into the parking lot.
A few minutes pass and the people who are staying in the room come in, I explain again that its not a big deal, getting the approval shouldn't be an issue, especially if they've already got it once, and, if we have the paper the employee who they insisted that they gave it to was in at 7am and would resolve the whole thing. The guest himself seems understanding passes over his credit card and gets checked into the room. While I am helping him, I get a call from an outside line, knowing its now the employee calling to hear the exact same thing I told her daughter, and to tell me the exact same thing she told her daughter to tell me, I put her on hold and finish checking the guest in.
While I am finishing with the guest, another guest approaches the front desk and will star in the next bit of wonderful.
I grab the phone, thank them for holding and ask how can I take care of them. Like I guessed its the employee calling in, we do the wash, rinse, repeat, thing and by the third time we've run through it, I have 2 other lines ringing, and the other guest waiting. I put her on hold again so I can... you know... help actual customers.
How is it possible for you to work in a hotel and not have keys for a vending machine?!
I quickly answer one of the calls waiting then turn to the guest, who, to this point has been patiently waiting for me.
I ask what I can do for him, and he tells me that the soda machine wasn't accepting any of the $1 bills that he has, and he's hoping that he can get some quarters that will work in the machine. I apologize for his problem and ask how many quarters he needed (my management *WON'T* get change so we've been out since I came back from vacation, and since its 2am, and the bar/restaurant staff are all long gone, I can't call them up to beg change off of them either) he tells me that he needs $5 in quarters. I look at him and say, that I don't have $5 in quarters, but that I could give him $1 if that would help.
And... this is where it all goes to hell.
He can't understand why I don't have quarters. (Me neither, but I am betting it has something to do with the 6 busses we've had through in the last 2 days and they ALL want change for the big bills they carry.) I tell him that we're out of them. He wants to know why the machine won't take his $1 bills, I tell him that I don't know, the machines don't belong to the hotel, they are serviced by an outside vendor, who would be the only one able to answer that question. He then informs me that he can't understand "HOW" I work in a hotel without knowing how to make the vending machines work. (I just kinda stared at him for a second... because I *STILL* can't fathom how understanding soda machines has ANYTHING to do with running the night audit) I explain again that they aren't the hotel's but an outside vendor's and that I don't have any access to the machines. He then *DEMANDS* that I give him $5 in quarters. I inform him that I still don't *HAVE* that many quarters.
And then we start with the abuse. Apparently, I am a particularly unintelligent person because when he DEMANDS quarters I should just start pooping them out on the floor. He also informs me that because the machines are in the hotel, I should have access to some kind of beverageomancy to summon sodas from said machines. (Maybe if I'd tried "Accio Soda!" he'd have been happier...) He informs me that I am all kinds of subhuman life, and certain body parts, and that I should perform certain acts on myself that are anatomically impossible. He tells me that I "Won't" give him change. To which I try to remind him that the problem isn't won't so much as I don't HAVE it to give, and I'd be happy to give him the $1 in quarters I promised earlier, which just lead him to more abuse. Finally, I just asked if there was anything else I could help with, and turned around to pick up the phone.
You're still here?
The employee is still on the line, wondering if I'd found the paper yet. (I'd not even had a chance to look, so I said no.) I told her the same things I told her daughter, the guest in the room, and her, AGAIN. We did the wash, rinse, repeat thing again. Until finally she tells me that she "guesses" she'll just have to call her daughter back and tell her that she couldn't fix it. (You know, by calling and repeating everything over and over again... that usually makes papers appear, right?)
Afterwards...
So... to make matters better for me with Quarter guy, because we'd been so short on change lately, I brought in a bunch of change from home thinking that I could maybe swap some of it out for larger bills and help alleviate the change shortage at the same time.
I hadn't had the chance to actually swap the coins out yet though, so they were still all mine, in my bag. I didn't want to completely deplete all the change I'd just brought (come on $5 in quarters is HALF a roll, I brought maybe $7 more in, so I could have swapped them, but that would have just wiped us out again.) Of course, if he'd been nice about it, I might have gone back and swapped anyway, but you know... calling me stupid and swearing at me?
Maybe I'll go buy myself a soda later to help me calm down...
I hate employee Friends and Family Rates!
Our property does a nice deal for friends and family of employees. In short we cut their room rate to the lowest possible rate (lower than anything else we give, which tonight ended up being an over 60% discount on the room rate.)
The catch is that the employee needs to get an approval letter for the guest's stay before they can claim that rate. They are pretty much ALWAYS given out when requested, except when the property is oversold.
Cut to tonight.
The daughter of the employee and her friends who will be staying in the room, roll in at 2am. I inform them that I need their approval letter for the rate and a credit card to pay for the room. The daughter GOES APESHIT, starts calling people, yelling in the lobby, carrying on about not staying here, etc. She gets a hold of her mom, the employee, and I tell her, that we don't charge for the room until the guest checks out, that I will put the room in at the normal rate, but we can adjust it to the proper rate in the morning, once we've found the paper. She doesn't seem to care, and continues having her temper tantrum in the lobby. Finally she says, "Well I don't know what we're going to do now!" and storms out into the parking lot.
A few minutes pass and the people who are staying in the room come in, I explain again that its not a big deal, getting the approval shouldn't be an issue, especially if they've already got it once, and, if we have the paper the employee who they insisted that they gave it to was in at 7am and would resolve the whole thing. The guest himself seems understanding passes over his credit card and gets checked into the room. While I am helping him, I get a call from an outside line, knowing its now the employee calling to hear the exact same thing I told her daughter, and to tell me the exact same thing she told her daughter to tell me, I put her on hold and finish checking the guest in.
While I am finishing with the guest, another guest approaches the front desk and will star in the next bit of wonderful.
I grab the phone, thank them for holding and ask how can I take care of them. Like I guessed its the employee calling in, we do the wash, rinse, repeat, thing and by the third time we've run through it, I have 2 other lines ringing, and the other guest waiting. I put her on hold again so I can... you know... help actual customers.
How is it possible for you to work in a hotel and not have keys for a vending machine?!
I quickly answer one of the calls waiting then turn to the guest, who, to this point has been patiently waiting for me.
I ask what I can do for him, and he tells me that the soda machine wasn't accepting any of the $1 bills that he has, and he's hoping that he can get some quarters that will work in the machine. I apologize for his problem and ask how many quarters he needed (my management *WON'T* get change so we've been out since I came back from vacation, and since its 2am, and the bar/restaurant staff are all long gone, I can't call them up to beg change off of them either) he tells me that he needs $5 in quarters. I look at him and say, that I don't have $5 in quarters, but that I could give him $1 if that would help.
And... this is where it all goes to hell.
He can't understand why I don't have quarters. (Me neither, but I am betting it has something to do with the 6 busses we've had through in the last 2 days and they ALL want change for the big bills they carry.) I tell him that we're out of them. He wants to know why the machine won't take his $1 bills, I tell him that I don't know, the machines don't belong to the hotel, they are serviced by an outside vendor, who would be the only one able to answer that question. He then informs me that he can't understand "HOW" I work in a hotel without knowing how to make the vending machines work. (I just kinda stared at him for a second... because I *STILL* can't fathom how understanding soda machines has ANYTHING to do with running the night audit) I explain again that they aren't the hotel's but an outside vendor's and that I don't have any access to the machines. He then *DEMANDS* that I give him $5 in quarters. I inform him that I still don't *HAVE* that many quarters.
And then we start with the abuse. Apparently, I am a particularly unintelligent person because when he DEMANDS quarters I should just start pooping them out on the floor. He also informs me that because the machines are in the hotel, I should have access to some kind of beverageomancy to summon sodas from said machines. (Maybe if I'd tried "Accio Soda!" he'd have been happier...) He informs me that I am all kinds of subhuman life, and certain body parts, and that I should perform certain acts on myself that are anatomically impossible. He tells me that I "Won't" give him change. To which I try to remind him that the problem isn't won't so much as I don't HAVE it to give, and I'd be happy to give him the $1 in quarters I promised earlier, which just lead him to more abuse. Finally, I just asked if there was anything else I could help with, and turned around to pick up the phone.
You're still here?
The employee is still on the line, wondering if I'd found the paper yet. (I'd not even had a chance to look, so I said no.) I told her the same things I told her daughter, the guest in the room, and her, AGAIN. We did the wash, rinse, repeat thing again. Until finally she tells me that she "guesses" she'll just have to call her daughter back and tell her that she couldn't fix it. (You know, by calling and repeating everything over and over again... that usually makes papers appear, right?)
Afterwards...
So... to make matters better for me with Quarter guy, because we'd been so short on change lately, I brought in a bunch of change from home thinking that I could maybe swap some of it out for larger bills and help alleviate the change shortage at the same time.
I hadn't had the chance to actually swap the coins out yet though, so they were still all mine, in my bag. I didn't want to completely deplete all the change I'd just brought (come on $5 in quarters is HALF a roll, I brought maybe $7 more in, so I could have swapped them, but that would have just wiped us out again.) Of course, if he'd been nice about it, I might have gone back and swapped anyway, but you know... calling me stupid and swearing at me?
Maybe I'll go buy myself a soda later to help me calm down...
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