There are great room, good rooms, and then there are the truly horrible.  We all love the great ones, get by with the good ones, but no one should be stuck with a truly horrible room.  What do you do when that’s the one that you’re sent off to?

On a recent trip to Las Vegas, I caught a cab, and was off to my hotel, arriving there around 10:30 pm.  I had a reservation at a major hotel, and my credit card had already been charged for one night.  At the front desk, I was told that I could have a choice of a room with a king sized bed near the elevator, or a room with two double beds a bit further away.  I haven’t slept in a double bed since high school, so opted for the king room closer to the elevator.

Las Vegas Boulevard, also known as The Strip

Off I went to the room, only to get there and find that the room wasn’t “near” the elevator – it shared a common wall with the elevator.  The noise was deafening.  I called down to the front desk to ask for a different room, and was surprised that the front desk could hear me over the elevator noise.  They were actually very nice and sent someone up with a key to another room.

The other room was just two doors away, and I expressed my skepticism to the guest services person who had brought me my key.  He assured me that it would be quiet, so off I went.  At the door of the room, I realized that I could still hear the elevator.  After going inside, I could still hear it.  And I’m not talking about the little dinging noise that lets you know the elevator has arrived.  I’m talking about the roaring and whooshing noise of the elevator in the shaft.  This room was only slightly less noisy, and I knew that it would be a miserable place to sleep.  In fact, I doubt there could me much sleeping at all.

This brings us to the dilemma.  Horrible room, totally unacceptable, and it’s now after 11 pm at night.  What do you do?

There was a point in my life where I would have just made do with the horrible room, figuring that my complaint was trivial or that I would resolve the issue in the morning.  First, the complaint isn’t trivial.  A room with that high of a noise level is simply unacceptable.  Yes, I know someone will probably be forced to sleep in these rooms, but it didn’t have to be me.  The hotel needs to do some soundproofing and bring these rooms up to an acceptable level, but until it does, no one should feel bad about complaining.  Second, by waiting till morning I reduce my leverage in getting a different room.  Absent an express commitment on the part of the front desk, staying overnight makes me a problem that has gone away.  If I accept it for one night, who’s to say that I won’t accept it longer.  I was staying for 4 nights, and it wasn’t going to be in a noisy room.

So back to the front desk I went with a new mindset.  I needed a new room, a quiet one, or I was prepared to leave and go to a new hotel.

When presented with these options, the hotel began “looking” for another room.  Now I happen to know that while this is a major conference and convention hotel, room occupancy rates in Las Vegas are pretty low right now.  I knew that it was extremely unlikely that the hotel was full.  In fact, based on the rate that I got for a Friday night, I knew darned good and well that they were not full.  In other words, I knew there was room inventory available, and the front desk staff  just needed to dig a little deeper.  More importantly, if this hotel couldn’t dig deeper and find me a decent room, there were lots of others that would, and I was prepared to make a call and move to another hotel.

Sure enough, the digging worked, and another room was found.  This involved giving me an upgraded room, a not unreasonable or unusual way to solve the problem.  Everyone was happy!

When requesting a room change, keep these things in mind:

• Be reasonable in your room expectation.  Quieter is reasonable, but absolute quiet is not.
• If the first person that you speak with can’t help you, ask for someone who can.  Often times employees are only authorized to make limited changes.  Don’t get angry with them, let them know that you understand and will make your request to someone who can help you.  “I’ll go over your head” may very well backfire, so just be polite, firm, and understanding.
• Be nice.  It’s not the front desk clerk’s fault that the room is noisy.  People want to help people who are nice to them, and no one wants to reward bad behavior.  Keep your cool and present your issue in a calm fashion.
• Don’t make threats.  Be prepared to move if that’s what you might do, but most people can see when you’re just being a bully.
• Don’t make false complaints.  Stories are rampant about people who complain about silly things in order to get an upgrade.  Rather than rewarding bad behavior, front desk clerks will upgrade someone other than the complaining party.  Be honest about your complaint.
• Accept a reasonable alternative.  While I would have preferred a king size bed, I wound up with a mini suite with two beds.  This is a reasonable accommodation.
• Be prepared to go elsewhere.  It may not be convenient, but staying in a horrible room is worse.  If you’re not prepared to move hotels, don’t say that you are.  You’ll look like a fool if they call your bluff.  And if the town is sold out for a special event (think CES), saying you’ll go somewhere else may be an empty threat.

What do you do when you get a horrible room?  Do you speak up or suffer in silence?

Photo credit:  http2007 @flickr

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