Anyone worked in a hotel who can answer this?!

[isitwinetimeyet16]

Am really baffled. We're staying in Greece and have been to two different hotels. I realised after a few days in the second that I had left my jewellery case in the safe at the first hotel. Called them and very luckily they had it and I was able to arrange to collect. But I'm really baffled as to why they waited for me to get in touch?

It's not the first time it's happened either - I've left stuff at hotels before in the UK and other countries and they have without fail waited for me to contact them rather than proactively getting in touch to arrange collection.

Anyone who's worked in a hotel know why this is? It seems so weird!

Either they never checked in it till you mentioned it or they quite honestly can’t be bothered running after everyone who leaves something and will only return the things that people want back so much they ask for them. I work in similar business and I would contact someone if it’s something expensive or precious looking to them but honestly having to mess about sending back someone’s favourite pair of skanky socks? So many other things I could be doing with my time!

If you called everyone who left anything behind in a hotel you'd never be off the phone, well only to go to the post office anyway.
Though hotels I've worked in if something was obviously of high value or for example a child's teddy we'd call when HK found it and brought it to reception, when we had time, ours used to leave around 3pm, and bring things to reception and sign them in before they left, 3pm was start of check in so it depended how busy we were.
You'd be amazed at what people leave, don't respond to voicemails about and we then donated to local charities. Phones, MP3 players, iPods.
Though I did once get a request to check the ball room for an earring back - after a wedding with party poppers and glitter/confetti balloons - and no I didn't find it!

I worked in the hotel and what I remember we never contacted the guests if they forgot something after they checked out. But mostly they contacted us back later if it was something expensive

An earring back!!! Amazing. Totally get that it's pointless chasing for things like socks but they'd obviously found a jewellery case as it was in their HK's office so just v weird that they hadn't thought to contact me....they'd have assumed it was valuable as it was in the safe?!

I recently left my phone charger in a hotel room. I phoned about an hour after check out, stating exactly where it was plugged in. They said they’d look into it.
About 5 hours later they contacted me to arrange for it to be posted on. I was baffled why it took so long to locate it.

@Beebumble2 probably because they were busy doing other jobs and finding your charger and then contacting you wasn’t the highest thing on their list of priorities??

Do people honestly think hotel staff have nothing better to do than sit round waiting for the next dim wit to phone to say they have left............

OP how about making sure/checking round before you leave the room that you have everything, you seem to be a repeat offender.

If they’d contacted you, they may have very well got through to someone else and arranged to send the very expensive jewellery box to a different address entirely (going by the amount of times you stay in hotels and manage to leave something behind).

The way I understand it, best practice is for the hotel to wait to be contacted.

Imagine if they phoned home and spoke to a wife who didn't know their DH had been staying in that hotel. Or that the item found was something clearly belonging to an unsuspected companion.

way.too.complicated.

@Beebumble2

I recently left my phone charger in a hotel room. I phoned about an hour after check out, stating exactly where it was plugged in. They said they’d look into it. About 5 hours later they contacted me to arrange for it to be posted on. I was baffled why it took so long to locate it.

Very odd, you would imagine it would be high on their priority list

@Beebumble2

I recently left my phone charger in a hotel room. I phoned about an hour after check out, stating exactly where it was plugged in. They said they’d look into it. About 5 hours later they contacted me to arrange for it to be posted on. I was baffled why it took so long to locate it.

5 hours 🙄 could have taken housekeeping that long to get to your room to clean it and reception have got better things to do than run up to each room that someone has left something in. A gold bar? They might have gone up, but a phone charger? No.

@Beebumble2

I recently left my phone charger in a hotel room. I phoned about an hour after check out, stating exactly where it was plugged in. They said they’d look into it. About 5 hours later they contacted me to arrange for it to be posted on. I was baffled why it took so long to locate it.

Do you think they downed tools and spent the solid 5 hours looking for your phone vharger rather than having other things to do and other guests to attend to in that time?

@Beebumble2 doesn't sound like it would take much to baffle you then. They were BUSY.

You'd be amazed at what people leave, don't respond to voicemails about and we then donated to local charities. Phones

How did you expect them to pick up the voicemail?

Yes most hotels will only sort lost property if you contact them. Too time consuming and fraught with potential issues of mistakes otherwise. Check your rooms people

I would imagine that they have a lot more to be doing than checking up on every left item.

Absolute liability nightmare if they proactively contact everyone. What if the safe wasn’t swept after the previous guest and you claimed what was their jewellery? What if the call reaches someone it shouldn’t? The amount of stuff they must get too, and it’s not for them to decide what is valuable enough to follow up and post back.

You made the mistake here so I’m not sure if picking holes in the (perfectly standard) way the hotel dealt with it is some sort of deflection technique.