Posh hotel un-asked for alarm at 6 - compensation?!

[hellsBells246]

Staying in a v posh hotel. Think 900 Swiss francs per night...

Just got woken up by a bloody alarm. Picked up phone and got a recorded message saying we had asked for a 6am alarm. We hadn't!! It woke us both and now we can't get back to sleep.

Rang reception, who were puzzled about the alarm but not v apologetic.

AIBU to think they could offer a small gesture to apologise?? Eg a free bottle of wine?! Or AIB greedy and mistakes happen?!

Blimey, I've paid £500 plus for a hotel nights and I've been woken up by the town bells, I've been woken up by the call for people to go to the mosque and also on occasion farm animals. All unexpected. Who should have bought me a bottle of wine or waking me up.

@hellsBells246

Lots of old fashioned British stiff upper lip on this thread with some people reluctant and even hostile about complaining.

But if people don't complain then service doesn't improve. Complaining can be, and should be done politely and respectfully (btw you are much more likely to get compensation offer if polite about it). Best way is to ask to speak to the duty manager. Tell them about your experience and ask for reassurance that it won't happen again.

That's what we would do.

I have found that this often results in vouchers for money off in the restaurant or bar and / or even upgrades.

That is very different to having a phone call by the bed waking you up.

It's expected in Muslim countries to be awakened early by calls to Prayer, and ditto incidental noises from outside.

In a luxury hotel, I'd be expecting an undisturbed kip in their luxury big beds and lovely starched cotton sheets.

I don't think @hellsBells246 is out of order for having had her sleep disturbed in this instance.

OP you are 100% not unreasonable. If you pay a lot for a hotel one of the reasons for that is typically to get a better standard of service. It's not unreasonable to expect expect that is delivered.
Of course you would typically be offered something to recompense you for inconveniences and most of the people being arses about it would also expect it because it’s normal. You aren’t asking for someone’s head on a pole or anything outlandish just a small acknowledgement that a mistake was made & they are sorry for the disruption to your stay.
I’ve complained about something similar on a few occasions before (mainly when travelling with work) and was immediately offered a round of drinks and additional loyalty points as a gesture.

Last Friday at Premier Inn we were woken up to banging at the bedroom door at 12:30/1am by the receptionist.
He asked me to open the door so he could explain to me that he had given us the wrong room. He knocked again later for another try.
I didn’t. Who would open a door to a random guy.
We were it turns out given the wrong room when I spoke to them the next morning and asked for an official apology in writing as we couldn’t get back to sleep and found ourselves resorting to watching 1970s and 80s top of the pops !
No sleep and a 6hour drive back home the next day.
They compensated us for our room, breakfast and the meal we had the night before. Tbh I was quite shocked.

But no one said sorry.

I’d speak to the manager and see what they offer.

There is nothing wrong with expecting high standards when paying through the roof.

Would you have the same stance had you been staying in a cheaper hotel? Would you still want compensation for a minor inconvenience? Do the more expensive hotels never incur any errors in their running of them? Just because you have paid for an expensive hotel does not mean that nothing will go wrong.

It's obviously an error in the inputting of automated wake up calls to the rooms. It is just that, an error.

Wow, amazing how this post has blown up! I read first thing and was in the YABU camp. I am not jealous and regularly stay in hotels that cost this much and more (for work, not self funded). I just think there is a limit to what the hotel staff can do about an alarm that would most likely have been set via the room phone itself (you can’t usually programme it from another room so unlikely to be the kids). If OP lodges a formal complaint there will probably be compensation of some kind, but they are unlikely to see it as all that significant unless taken further. Lots of people will be getting up at 6AM on a weekday. It is one of the busiest times of day for reception / room service staff and they will no doubt have been dealing with 100 other things at the time of the call.

Coming home from South of France on the night train, we were crammed into the 'Couchettes'...hoping no one would join us at stations along the route.

Too bad! People got on, and an almighty wailing and sobbing started up from the compartment next door.

A cat owner and a dog owner both had the same compartment.

The dog owner was there first, joined by cat owner.

Dog was a sweet little poodle - Cat I didn't see, as it was in. a bag [!] but the guard came in and asked if one of us would mind swapping so either cat or dog could come in with us...We agreed.

That wasn't good enough for cat owner who had massive hysterics - and guess what...she got an upgrade.... to a couchette in first class all by herself.

The guard just wanted a quiet life.

I do think her modus operandi of wailing and screeching was done to get the upgrade, otherwise she'd have swapped with us.

The Dog and his owner really should have got it as his owner was the polite one.

And all completely irrelevant to what happened here.

Why should OP get a grip?

Yes. I thought that too.

She has spoken to the manager. The OP updated at 9.41 this morning.

OP there seems to be a new fashion of piling onto threads because they are not about the latest awful earth shattering thing that is happening. I have no idea why they think that trawling through Mumsnet looking for posters to attack is more constructive than asking innocuous questions about hotel service standards.
If all we could discuss was how terrible we are as a species, we wouldn't want to go on another day.
And @PenguinLord lost the high ground the moment they Karen'd you. Misogyny is never a good look.

The call to prayer was "unexpected" when you were staying in a hotel near......<checks notes>....a mosque?

Do you walk around with your eyes shut?

Well coming on line in a furious tizzy banging on about compensation isn’t going to help you to calm down and go back to sleep for a couple of hours is it?

Crikey some of the replies on here are nuts 😁

I think you have every right to be annoyed and I’d certainly mention again how it’s impacted the quality of your stay. I’ve no idea if wine is a reasonable offering as I don’t really drink it and would probably not accept it for me anyway. You may get something, you may not but I would mention it to reception in person.

I’ve learnt as I get older to be very good at complaining. I am always polite but if something is sub par I will highlight it to the right person. It’s a good skill to have.

I seem to surprisingly be going against the grain. I would be incredibly annoyed and disappointed at being woken at that time whilst on a much needed hotel stay. And I would expect an acknowledgement and some sort of way of apology as ultimately you have missed your much needed lie in...

I don't think it's on @hellsBells246. I'm not sure I would ask for compensatory bottle of wine or whatever, but I'm with you - I'd expect an expensive, fancy hotel to at least comp your breakfast or coffee or something.

I would also absolutely expect an apology - in fact, a proper apology would most likely have salved the irritation; it's more the lack of apology that makes you think they should give you something in return, isn't it?

I think those of you up in arms about "compensation culture" need to also look at the culture of service staff not giving an even singular shit about their work, to the detriment of the people they're supposed to be serving. Sure, I get it, a lot of them probably don't want to be there - but manners and a general willingness to help is generally the way to enjoy your job more.

Anyway, glad the manager was responsive to you and hopefully whatever technical glitch that occurred will not occur tomorrow morning!

No the same at all.

I'm glad you've got a few free drinks at the bar for what is a fairly normal occurrence in hotels. People make mistakes, computer glitches happen....it's all part of being in a hotel, no matter how posh it is.

You are just another customer trying to get a freebie from a non issue.

But hey, you've got your free drinks.

Agree @Doteycat that is outside of the hotel's control. The alarm genuine mistake or not is.

The fire alarm went off when we were at Gleneagles for my 40th. We got a night free which I did not expect but it was such a gesture we went back for DH 41st and DS's 21st!

oh dear
its not a non issue, it could result in a health and safety issue.
But hey, you got your dig in....