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Hotels turn to robots and room cleanings every 4 days to ease staffing shortages

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Re: Hotels turn to robots and room cleanings every 4 days to ease staffing shortages

#311

Post by lotsofpulp »

dalyons wrote: post #276
fein wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The one rule I learned while traveling over the years for work is to only ever book with the hotel directly. You open yourself up to much more annoying problems when dealing with third party booking regarding any sort of problem resolution with the reservation.

It pretty much always costs more going direct though, which is counterintuitive and annoying. Unless you call and negotiate which I ain’t doing.

All the hotel brands offer best price guarantees where they will give you a discount if you are able to reserve with a lower price elsewhere.

The reservation systems are setup so that the pricing that goes out to priceline and Expedia is higher than what is on the hotel brand’s website.

https://www.marriott.com/look/claimForm.mi

https://www.hyatt.com/info/best-rate-guarantee

https://www.hilton.com/en/p/price-match-guarantee/

https://www.ihg.com/content/us/en/customer-care/best-price-g...

https://www.choicehotels.com/deals/best-rate

https://www.wyndhamhotels.com/hotel-deals/best-rate-guarante...

https://www.radissonhotels.com/en-us/best-rate-guarantee

Re: Hotels turn to robots and room cleanings every 4 days to ease staffing shortages

#312

Post by snarfy »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #23
crooked-v wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would assume the reputable but cost-cutting hotels would still be doing a full clean between guest visits, just cutting down on the daily room cleaning while a guest is still there.

Every single hotel or motel should be doing full clean between guest visits, otherwise it should not even be allowed to operate. But if a hotel starts letting people stay weeks without checking their room, they will inevitably end up with hoarders and people that keep food lying around and then comes cockroaches and rats and odors, etc.

This is how you get bed bugs.

Re: Hotels turn to robots and room cleanings every 4 days to ease staffing shortages

#313

Post by matwood »

chrisco255 wrote: post #261
WheelsAtLarge wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is likely true. I just read a report that said that the shortage highly correlates with the reduction of immigrants due to COVID and the tightening of immigration into the US. It may not be the only factor, but it is one that contributes to the shortage of service workers. Like it or not, new immigrants are more likely to take jobs that pay less as compared to non-immigrants.

There has been no tightening of immigration. In particular, illegal immigration is higher than it's ever been [1]. And illegal immigrants are far more likely to work in the hotel industry as cleaners. 1. https://www.wsj.com/articles/illegal-immigration-arrests-hit...

I can't read the article completely, but it's from the summer. What about 2016-2020 plus the covid lockdowns? All that takes time to recover from.

Re: Hotels turn to robots and room cleanings every 4 days to ease staffing shortages

#314

Post by joekrill »

francisofascii wrote: post #304
codazoda wrote: post #2

In some Las Vegas hotels I no longer need to stop at a counter or stand in a line and it’s 1000x better experience. I can walk directly to my room and scan my phone. I can scan my phone for parking. I can grab extra keys at a kiosk, if I need them. I never have to talk to anyone, if I don’t want to. I also select the option not to have my room cleaned each day. I’ll ask someone in the hall for towels if I stay long e…

Hopefully the rental car companies will soon have a similar feature.

They do. And they have for a very long time! At least with Avis I've been doing this for years. The app tells me where my car is located and I just walk to it and the key is in it.

Re: Hotels turn to robots and room cleanings every 4 days to ease staffing shortages

#315

Post by smcg »

joenot443 wrote: post #290
supertrope wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you work for $16/hr with no health insurance? Hotels are notorious for not only not offering steady 40 hour employment but sending staff home if room count is low or calling people in with minimal notice.

My first job was for $8.90/hr and I was beaming when I got first paycheck. $16/h was more than a single person at the whole restaurant was making.

Would you clean hotels for $16/hour right now?

Re: Hotels turn to robots and room cleanings every 4 days to ease staffing shortages

#316

Post by ghaff »

scarface74 wrote: post #303
ghaff wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're essentially saying there are different tiers of travel agents. But you're right. There's no particular disadvantage to me booking Marriott through Amex than directly other than an (expensed) booking fee for work travel.

There is a huge disadvantage. You don’t get loyalty points are status upgrades. In the case of Hilton, that can be worth from 24% to 38% back in loyalty points per dollar spent. When Hilton isn’t running a special, I get 34 points per dollar at around .7 cents per point: - 10x base points - 10x Diamond bonus (automatic for having the Amex Hilton Aspire) - 14x Amex Hilton Aspire card But Hilton ran a 3x special May th…

I guess I don't see the disadvantage with Marriott or United with my company booking agency. I do prefer to book directly in general but I'm not traveling a lot now and also prefer to generally adhere to travel policy when there's not a good reason not to.

Re: Hotels turn to robots and room cleanings every 4 days to ease staffing shortages

#317

Post by smcg »

nly wrote: post #273
supertrope wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you work for $16/hr with no health insurance? Hotels are notorious for not only not offering steady 40 hour employment but sending staff home if room count is low or calling people in with minimal notice.

Man $16 USD/hr is 30% higher than minimum wage in the UK with a similar cost of living. We have the NHS though for what it's worth.

Call up Deepa and Deepak, they need help.

Re: Hotels turn to robots and room cleanings every 4 days to ease staffing shortages

#318

Post by tartoran »

nicbou wrote: post #200
paganel wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I never have to talk to anyone, if I don’t want to. I have seen this attitude at more and more people, where does it come from? Meaning not wanting to talk with other people. It's what makes us humans, talking with other people. The alternative is lots and lots of money paid on psychotherapy and the like further down the road, or worse. Because actively avoiding talking to other people it's like bringing your car f…

I'm concerned about an economy where the different strata never interact with each other. It's all too easy to lose compassion for the people who keep the world running for you if you never see them. If you have a delivery driver brave the elements to bring you food, you should have to face them. However it's nice to do things on your own sometimes. For example I love McDonalds self-checkout because it speaks my lang…

It is concerning indeed, and what’s more concerning is an economy where tech pushes out most jobs. Where will it lead to? What are non tech people supposed to work?

Re: Hotels turn to robots and room cleanings every 4 days to ease staffing shortages

#319

Post by ghaff »

Dma54rhs wrote: post #253
EFreethought wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where does this leave people who do not want to use their phones for literally everything? I do not want a lot of apps on my phone, and I do not want to install something just for one trip.

To the place where it leaves people who don't want to use modern banking - somewhat possible but difficult.

Which itself becomes less convenient in various ways without a smartphone.

Re: Hotels turn to robots and room cleanings every 4 days to ease staffing shortages

#320

Post by dashundchen »

yunwal wrote: post #246
themitigating wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People were working harder for even less a hundred years ago and society didn't collapse.

I’m not sure this is true anymore. The median American will never be able to afford their own home at current housing prices. Sure, we have a higher gdp per capita, but it doesn’t buy us the things we actually need like housing, health care, etc. Perhaps what’s needed is to bring back family homesteads, but that doesn’t feel like much progress.

Do you know what life was like 100 years ago in the US?

35% of households had access to electricity.

About 20% had some sort of indoor plumbing, running hot water would be even rarer.

Most people heated their houses by shoveling coal or feeding wood fires.

Society was even more racially segregated and legally codified and brutally enforced by the government.

In warmer rural areas it wasn't uncommon for hookworm to be endemic due to shallow dug latrines.

1/12 children 10 to 15 were working instead of school.

Most adults did not graduate high school and illiteracy was not uncommon.

This whole subthread is quite strange. I'm still not sure what societal collapse GP is seeing.

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