A Christmas Meltdown

[Moirae]

The housekeeping department just imploded.

1. One housekeeper walks off the job on christmas day giving her GM the finger on the way out because she was told she needs to do a better job cleaning the rooms.

2. The second housekeeper decides she only needs to work 5 hours,knowing that the other one walked out, and she can clock out whenever she wants "because I have to go cook christmas dinner" (making sure she did this JUST after management leaves on christmas day) and leaving a bunch of rooms dirty on a sold out night which meant that we had to walk some guests. Oh and did I mention that she was arrested for drunk driving that same night?

3. Laundry decides that only 3 hours of work and leaves is needed leaving housekeeping without enough linens to do all the rooms on boxing day.

4. We have to call in two housekeepers and hope to hell they can work today.

5. One shows up about 10 am and gets her behind royally kicked trying to do all the work.

6. We manage to get another housekeeper to work a few hours but that's it.

7. We have to get the maintenance man pulling linens because there's so MUCH work left undone that management is cleaning rooms, public areas, AND doing laundry, and we end up with a bunch of rooms we can't sell.

So yep, OUR christmas got ruined due to selfish asshole employees. Thanks guys. You're fired.

Why the hell can't we get people who are actually willing to work? We don't have a problem paying for 8 hours so long as the work gets done.

[Food Lady]

And yet people complain there are no jobs out there. There are no jobs for lazy people, no.

[eltf177]

So sorry to hear this, getting competent help seems all but impossible today.

I'm glad these assclowns are getting the sack. Of course, now cue the inevitable whining that "it's so UNFAIR!" and "right at Christmas!"

[Marmalady]

Why the hell can't we get people who are actually willing to work? We don't have a problem paying for 8 hours so long as the work gets done.

I wish your hotel was near me, Moirae; I'd come and work there, and what's more I wouldn't bring my co-irker X with me.

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

Why the hell can't we get people who are actually willing to work? We don't have a problem paying for 8 hours so long as the work gets done.

Because the pool of people who are actually willing to work is shrinking every day, and the pool of people who think they should have things handed to them just because they exist is growing larger every day.

And I'll leave it at that.

[Moirae]

Me too Marmalady. Anything has to be better than the current crop we have working for us.

And yes, it's the "its right at christmas" thing. How dare we think they actually have to do their jobs because its the holidays. What a shock that we expect they will work to get paid. Most of them want to leave after only 4 or 5 hours EVERY SINGLE DAY. One of them keeps saying "This place is just too much work". It's one of those wth things. That one wants us to hire ANOTHER housekeeper so she can work even less. You'd think they have bills to pay, but noooo, apparently its better NOT to make money so they can go home and sit on their behinds.

[bhskittykatt]

I feel your pain. At the motel we had trouble keeping housekeepers, and having started in housekeeping, I've been screwed by CWs walking off the job too.

Fortunately it wasn't during Christmas (it was during peak summer season when we were selling out nightly), but one day the entire rest of the staff no-showed/walked off. We had 56 rooms (60, but 4 were down at that time). 4 housekeepers were originally scheduled, which would have been a perfectly manageable 14 rooms a piece.

One-person called in sick. 18-19 rooms a piece for 3 housekeepers is still manageable, though, so GM didn't try calling anyone else in.

As the shift begins, we discover another housekeeper no-showed (again...). So now it's down to two housekeepers at 28 rooms a piece. Sucks, but at that point still manageable...just a long day.

Other housekeeper apparently was not in the mood for a long day and was tired of getting screwed over by housekeepers no-showing. So she walked off.

So it was me. With 56 rooms. At that point GM tried to call others in. One didn't answer and the other one was in a city three hours away.

I spent five minutes collapsed on one of the beds crying. And then I got up and fucking knocked out those 56 rooms. Maint Man and Laundry Lady made my beds upstairs and Other MOD stayed after her desk shift and helped me out (I still cleaned the entire first floor all on my own), and we were actually done by about 6pm which was amazing (shift started at 10am, iirc). Lots of our stayover guests heard about our plight and were kind enough to say don't worry about cleaning the room just get us towels, which also helped tremendously.

But yes....I have been there....I have been there so hard....

[taxguykarl]

Glad to see that the deserters were canned. Good luck hiring replacements.

[Marmalady]

Me too Marmalady. Anything has to be better than the current crop we have working for us.

Not to blow my own trumpet, but when the deputy manager at the store asks any of the cleaners at work to do a special job for her, she always checks afterwards to see if we've done what she's asked... except if it's me, because she knows she can trust me to have done it.

[MoonCat]

she can clock out whenever she wants "because I have to go drink christmas dinner"

Seems more accurate.

And, holy hell, how many rooms apiece?? Even doing 14 in one day seems like a lot to me. And you had to do 56 IN ONE DAY? You're amazing!

[Shyla]

I guess I must want things handed to me. There's no way in hell I could clean 56 rooms in a day. I couldn't clean 28 either. I'd die of exhaustion.

[Moirae]

I feel your pain. At the motel we had trouble keeping housekeepers, and having started in housekeeping, I've been screwed by CWs walking off the job too.

Fortunately it wasn't during Christmas (it was during peak summer season when we were selling out nightly), but one day the entire rest of the staff no-showed/walked off. We had 56 rooms (60, but 4 were down at that time). 4 housekeepers were originally scheduled, which would have been a perfectly manageable 14 rooms a piece.

One-person called in sick. 18-19 rooms a piece for 3 housekeepers is still manageable, though, so GM didn't try calling anyone else in.

As the shift begins, we discover another housekeeper no-showed (again...). So now it's down to two housekeepers at 28 rooms a piece. Sucks, but at that point still manageable...just a long day.

Other housekeeper apparently was not in the mood for a long day and was tired of getting screwed over by housekeepers no-showing. So she walked off.

So it was me. With 56 rooms. At that point GM tried to call others in. One didn't answer and the other one was in a city three hours away.

I spent five minutes collapsed on one of the beds crying. And then I got up and fucking knocked out those 56 rooms. Maint Man and Laundry Lady made my beds upstairs and Other MOD stayed after her desk shift and helped me out (I still cleaned the entire first floor all on my own), and we were actually done by about 6pm which was amazing (shift started at 10am, iirc). Lots of our stayover guests heard about our plight and were kind enough to say don't worry about cleaning the room just get us towels, which also helped tremendously.

But yes....I have been there....I have been there so hard....

Holy shit. 56 rooms. At 15 minutes a piece, it would still take days to do all of them. OMG, I'd be crying too. You poor thing.

The most ours ever has to do is 26 because that's the total number of rooms we have. Usually if our housekeepers have more than 15 rooms to do, we give them a piece of paper for the stayover guests that says the equivalent of "we will do towels, garbage, and vacuum. If you need anything else, ask the desk".

28 rooms would make a 10-12 hour shift depending if they had to do the public areas too. Our people can't even seem to handle 8 considering all their whining and walking off. And these are experienced housekeepers too.

Yeah, its been a couple days and I'm still angry. Luckily I had today off, but my husband had to go in to do interviews to try to get more housekeepers. He did hire one and she started immediately. We're still looking for a second.

The ONLY reason it was all done is because we gave permission for 5 rooms to be left undone, our maintenance man pulled the linens off the beds, put towels in the rooms and did garbage, while I did all the public areas, the laundry and cleaned a whole crapload of vacuuming and dusting while my husband watched the desk. I have experience in housekeeping while he doesnt. It's just mind boggling why people would do this. I know housekeeping is a hard job but the ones in this city just don't want to work, period. I've never seen anything like it. They think I'm enemy number one if I check up on their rooms to make sure they're clean.

[wolfie]

she can clock out whenever she wants "because I have to go cook christmas dinner" Oh and did I mention that she was arrested for drunk driving that same night?

What was the main course of the dinner she needed to cook? Wild Turkey?

[XCashier]

I guess I must want things handed to me. There's no way in hell I could clean 56 rooms in a day. I couldn't clean 28 either. I'd die of exhaustion.

Some people don't have a lot of physical stamina. Those people usually know it and don't apply for heavily physical jobs like hotel housekeeping. I would think experienced housekeepers know what the job entails, and not be surprised by it (apart from the occasional completely trashed room, and unless all of the rooms were totally trashed, which isn't very likely, the housekeepers really don't have any excuse.)

[Marmalady]

Those people usually know it and don't apply for heavily physical jobs like hotel housekeeping.

The trouble is, I think that a lot of people really don't know just how physical a job it is. Saw it time and time again at the motel - someone would apply thinking that all they'd have to do was whisk a feather duster here and there, plump up the pillows and glide out of the room. So many times they'd last about a week, if that, and then we'd never see them again.