jewel of the pool (mildly disgusting)

thehippie777 · #1 03-30-2008, 11:52 AM

Our hotel has a pool. It is a great selling point for our hotel, but our pool is open 24-7. This leads to absolutely no downtime in case there is a santitation or maintenance issue. So...

If for some reason the pool is shut down, guests get irate...even if they would have never used the pool in the first place. I have seen people demand a discount for not being able to enter the pool right away, tell me they would be back in an hour when it's open again, but never show. It happens quite often.

Our pool has signs all over, clear as day. There is no lifeguard on duty...etc etc Parents are required to accompany their children under the age of 13, but do they? No. So, they kinda run amok. The pool area gets destroyed. Like any business, we dont just have a person available 24hours a day just to sit around take care of things like van runs and pool maintenance. The Front Desk gets to do IT ALL. So, sometimes...they just can't babysit guests &/or their spawn.

Out of the 6 years I have worked here, the pool has been randomly shut down a couple times because some child has vomitted in the pool. There is no way in hell we are letting people in there...for what I would assume are obvious reasons. Try telling people that the pool had to be shut down out of the blue for an emergency....yeah right... It's amazes me how many people freak out. And we are told to tell people how sorry we are, but not the actual reason other then for "maitenance". That theme NEVER worked for me, people seemed to think we did things just to piss them off. Cuz, I adore having guests angry & so angry they never come back...my dream! No please don't give us your money! So dumb...I have been accused of doing things on purpose and it just simply shocks me.

So, I started telling people exactly why the pool was closed. Most of the time the actual reason made people a little more understanding. Some of the time it was all the hotel's fault someone puked in the pool.

I dispise this, just like I dispise the fact I have to tell grown adults to quiet down past midnight & if they don't choose to listen...all the guests being disturbed take it out on the hotel (I want my money back!). Most of the time people choose not to complain until the next day, even though the issue could have been fixed right away.

Of course, it doesn't simply take 10 minutes to clean out such a mess in a pool. Usually it takes all night or at least at couple hours. The entire night happens when other guests, not the perp, discover the vomit before hotel staff gets a chance to find it first (meaning it has time to disperse). It is sooo embarassing.

On the topic of these people who get very angry about the pool needing to be closed for this reason...well I wonder how they would deal with the situation if somone vomitted in their personal pool? Would they be happy to swim anyway? How long would the cleanup take them? Doubtful it would take less then 24 hours... So, what do they expect from this?

freaktard · #2 03-30-2008, 02:42 PM

I used to enjoy going to this particular swimming pool, until one day I was floating on my back in the water, and I happened to look to my left and saw a giant turd floating lazily next to my head.

I never thought it was the pool owner's fault, but I could never bring myself to go to that pool again.

Imogene · #3 03-30-2008, 04:15 PM

Quote:

Quoth thehippie777

Most of the time people choose not to complain until the next day, even though the issue could have been fixed right away.

I can kinda see that... if it's the middle of the night, say, and they're trying to sleep? If the noise isn't loud enough to wake them up fully, they may be too groggy to actually coherently make a complaint?

Tireana Dorcha · #4 03-30-2008, 04:18 PM

Oh, I feel your pain. I worked as a lifeguard for five years. So many angry people

One of my favorite incidents: I came in to open the pool one bright weekend day and lo and behold the pool was green and cloudy. Greeeeat. For whatever reason our pumps decided to stop pumping chlorine. So I logically close down the pool. I mean, I can't even see the bottom of the 3ft. section!

Here comes my least favorite lap swimmer. I've just dumped 5 gallons of chlorine into the pool (it's still green and cloudy mind you) and he wants me to let him swim.

SuckySwimmer: Why can't I swim?
Me: Because I can't see the bottom of the pool.
SS: Well I won't be swimming at the bottom!
Me:

No, I can't let you, sorry. We should be open no problem tomorrow.

amphrite · #5 03-30-2008, 04:53 PM

Yay! Another Lifeguard!

But people can get really tetchy when they cannot get into the pool THIS INSTANT. Sometimes when we are doing school board lessons during the day, or saturday morining lessons, people get mad that they cannot swim lengths. They have been know to steal instructors lanes if they get out with the class to get PFD's or go to the Dive tank for 10 min. Otherwise they sit on the pool deck and glare at you and the kids because you are in their way.

At my pool, the Deep water workout people are so nice though. They get there early, but know thay cannot go in, and sit and watch the kids while thay wait. Because, really, Kids can be damn funny during lessons sometimes.

Bright_Star · #6 03-30-2008, 07:06 PM

A pool has to be maintained or it'll soon become a great green glob of muck. SOMEBODY has to do that job-it doesn't happen by magic.

wagegoth · #7 03-30-2008, 07:14 PM

We'll let the kids swim at the gym my in-laws belong to, but we normally won't let them swim at public pools anymore.

A few years ago, we spent a week in San Diego. My husband and the kids were in the pool daily. They were all sick with flu-like symptoms within days. The kids were throwing up on the trip home (by car). So gross. Apparently, it's pretty common to pick up viruses and bacterial infections and such from even fairly clean, chlorinated public pools. After that, no more public pools.

Think about the people who think it's okay to piss in a pool, who let their kids in pools with diapers on, and who swim with who knows what infectious disease. No thank you.

Irving Patrick Freleigh · #8 03-30-2008, 08:58 PM

Quote:

Quoth freaktard

I used to enjoy going to this particular swimming pool, until one day I was floating on my back in the water, and I happened to look to my left and saw a giant turd floating lazily next to my head.

Spaulding! NO!

dah dum dah dum Dah Dum DAH DUM DAH DUM....DOODIE!

karath · #9 03-30-2008, 09:16 PM

Quote:

Quoth wagegoth

We'll let the kids swim at the gym my in-laws belong to, but we normally won't let them swim at public pools anymore.

A few years ago, we spent a week in San Diego. My husband and the kids were in the pool daily. They were all sick with flu-like symptoms within days. The kids were throwing up on the trip home (by car). So gross. Apparently, it's pretty common to pick up viruses and bacterial infections and such from even fairly clean, chlorinated public pools. After that, no more public pools.

Think about the people who think it's okay to piss in a pool, who let their kids in pools with diapers on, and who swim with who knows what infectious disease. No thank you.

Wow, that could explain a family situation I had a while back. The fam was visiting my grandparents in norcal, so we were staying at a hotel that had a pool. We'd used it before, had no problems...but this particular time it felt hotter than usual, and everyone who swam wound up getting sick afterwards. I don't recall the exact symptoms (it was a few years ago and was not something I wanted to remember) but that infectious thing makes a lot more sense than the theories we came up with while half-delusional

RetailWorkhorse · #10 03-30-2008, 10:10 PM

Quote:

Quoth wagegoth

We'll let the kids swim at the gym my in-laws belong to, but we normally won't let them swim at public pools anymore.

A few years ago, we spent a week in San Diego. My husband and the kids were in the pool daily. They were all sick with flu-like symptoms within days. The kids were throwing up on the trip home (by car). So gross. Apparently, it's pretty common to pick up viruses and bacterial infections and such from even fairly clean, chlorinated public pools. After that, no more public pools.

Think about the people who think it's okay to piss in a pool, who let their kids in pools with diapers on, and who swim with who knows what infectious disease. No thank you.

I used to live in a campground that had a pool, and during the summertime EVERYONE would be in that little dinky pool. The water was hot and it smelled funny and who knows HOW many people got sick when they finally returned home. Chlorine doesn't really do well in hot water and it's very likely the pool was the perfect place for some nasty stuff to breed.