I travel.  A lot.  And you should too.

I truly believe travel broadens the mind.  Admittedly, it also shrinks the wallet, but mine is pretty big.  And so is my wallet.

But on the whole, I’d rather be living the scratch and sniff lifestyle of the world traveller, rather than being stuck in upper suburbia worrying about what the Reserve Bank will do next with interest rates, what to pick up from grocery store on the way home, or working out “which fucking night is bin night again?!”.

However – travel does have its little nuances and nuisances.

So I thought I would present Gaz’s Top Ten Tips for the world of Hoteliery.  Airline Tips will follow.

These tips are free (unless you want to pay me for them).  They are also not rocket surgery.  These are small changes, for big results.

Right, here goes.

Gaz’s Top Ten Travel Tips – for Hotels

1)     Train your fucking staff. 

This is the toughest of my tips, so let’s get it out of the way first.

Good customer service is not free.  Invest in your people.  They are your lifeblood.

Nobody likes stumbling out of a cab in the pouring rain, after travelling for 24-hours across the globe, only to be greeted by pimply teenager with attitude, telling you “your room isn’t ready yet, you’ll need to come back in a few hours”.

Do that to me, and I won’t be back in a few lifetimes, of that I assure you.  Anticipate your guests’ likely problems, and come up with appropriate, pre-planned solutions to suit.  Simple yeah?  You’d think so, but far too many hotels fail this one, horribly.

 

2)     Free Wifi

In-room WiFi should be fast and free.

I reiterate.

In-room WiFi should be fast and free.

Do it.  Do it now.

If you don’t know why, you should not be in the hotel business (or indeed any business at all, full stop).

Alright, fine.  Here are a few of the more obvious reasons.

• You will increase repeat business.
• You will give guests fewer reasons to leave your premises, thereby improving your room service, mini-bar and on-site restaurant returns.
• You will attract more business clientele, Gen X’ers, Gen Y’ers and Gen-Whatevercomesnext’ers.

In turn, you will make more money.  If you don’t like money, you should not be in the hotel business (or indeed any business at all, full stop).  Capiche?

3)     Bed Runners

Ditch the grubby bed runners across the foot of the bed.  We don’t use one at home, and we sure don’t need one in our hotel room.  We always just kick them off onto the floor.  Besides, we know you rarely wash those manky things between bookings.   A black light would flare up like the Aurora Borealis when waved over one of these stinking cessrags.

 

4)     Towel rails. 

It’s a rail, for hanging towels.  Google it if you must.  Every bathroom should have one, or indeed several.  Hooks don’t cut it.  Rest assured, if a towel drops on the floor, I will not re-use it.  Install towel rails, and you will save a fortune on laundry, and you will thank me for it.  Well, you should thank me.

5)     Air Conditioning / Heating

Thermostat of choice?  The simplest one.  If it requires a manual, dump the fucker.

What should it have?

It should have an on/off switch (for turning on and off) and a dial, which if I turn one way will make the room warmer, and which if I turn the opposite way and you are still reading this to find out what comes next, you seriously have no place in the hotel trade either, you imbecile.

Seriously, you don’t want us calling reception every time we’re feeling a little bit chilly or toasty.  Your Duty Managers will also welcome the fewer distractions from crushing Candy Crush.

6)     Blackout curtains

Install them.

Enough said.

 

7)     Changing Technology 

Keep up-to-date with changing technology.  For example, if you have a sound dock, make sure you have adaptors to fit.

There is nothing worse than trying to crank out some Feargal Sharkey only to find that your iPhone 5 won’t fit in the “antiquated” speaker dock.  Okay, maybe a jalapeno enema is worse, but this is right up there.  Actually, a japapeno enema is right up there too, if you get what I mean?

8)     Pillows

This is a tricky one, because not all people are the same, and not all pillows are the same.

For example, I’m awesome, and most hotel pillows are not.

So please provide a smorgasbord of pillows in the cupboard, or at least offer a “pillow menu”.

A well-rested Gaz is a lot less likely to quibble over the number of adult “special interest” films that show up on the final bill at checkout.

9)     Don’t touch my stuff!

Seriously, so not cool.  I know that maids are instructed to return the room to a pre-set order, and I accept that within reason, but there needs to be an overriding ethos.

Let me explain.

Examples of things not to be touched:

a)     My stuff!

b)     My fucking stuff!

c)     All of the (fucking) above!

If I leave my toothbrush on the vanity, work around it.

If I leave my laptop on the table, work around it.

If I leave a glow-in-the-dark, rechargeable, battery-operated, therapeutic “massager” on the night-stand, yeah you probably don’t want to be touching that anyway.

 

10)  Power Outlets

Seriously, throw us a fucking bone here.

I have a laptop.  I have an iPad.  I have 2 iHones  I have a rechargeable therapeutic massager.   Please, more outlets, and in convenient places too – I am not crawling under that bed, even if my giant wallet falls under there.  I’ll consider it collateral damage.

Give us a couple adjacent to each night stand, a couple dotted around the room, and at least a couple at the desk.  That shouldn’t be so hard (that’s what she said).

GAZ’s BONUS TIP!

11)  “Do Not Disturb”

If I have to explain this one, please stop wasting my precious oxygen.

At the risk of sounding like a broken record*, these tips are not revolutionary.  They are common-sense.

Get your house in order, hotels of the world.  Provide the level of services your customers expect, and they will pay you (repeatedly) for it.  It’s that simple.

Put in a little effort and those Trip Advisor reviews will start to have more little gold stars next to them.  You’d like that, wouldn’t you?

You will also make a simple Gaz, very happy.  I assure you, this is a good thing if I am staying at your (expectedly) fine establishment.

If you have any other hotel tips for my good readers, please throw your thoughts in the comments section.

If you don’t have any hotel tips, you seriously need to travel more.  Go on, off you go then.  The world is your oyster.  And you know what they say about oysters…

 

* For the Gen Whatevercomesnext’ers, a broken record is a flashback to the heady days of vinyl records, where sound waves were created by a needle on a stylus that traced the spiral grooves in a spinning vinyl disc, transferring the vibrations to a diaphragm in a speaker which then amplifies it to an auditory level.   If one of these grooves is corrupted, the needle no longer tracks inward along the spiral, and instead follows a continuous circular loop, causing the music to cyclically repeat – hence the term, “sounds like a broken record”.  Okay, I probably lost most of you GenW’s (attention span of a fucking ADD goldfish) but for any still reading, it’s like your iTunes getting stuck on repeat.