Forcing guests to close toilet lid before flushing

[MerryBlimminXmas]

In our house, we close the toilet lid before flushing. Reason being is that the poo/wee water spray will go absolutely everywhere if the lid is left open (lots of videos available online if anyone is interested).

The issue we have is that pretty much ALL guests don’t do this. Now, I don’t mind what people choose to do in their own homes and appreciate that the majority of the population are happy for everything in the vicinity of their loo to be covered in urine and faeces don’t bother to close the lid. However, I would much prefer it if they closed the lid before flushing in our house.

How can we make it happen? In a previous home, the flush button was literally behind the toilet lid, so it should have been easy to close the lid just to get to the button and people STILL left the lid up every time.

Don’t really want to put a sign up (would be annoying the majority of the time when we don’t have guests), nor to speak to people about it (cringe). Any ingenious ideas that could work? Surely we’re not the only people who prefer the lid closed - how have others made it work with guests?

Upgrade your lavatory lady. If you have high needs, you need to pay to meet them.

Don't invite people. Case closed.

A composting toilet and a vegetable patch....two birds, one stone.

Oh this is an easy one.

When your friends and guests rejoin you after they have peed or pooed then you

a) ask them very loudly if they remembered to put the seat down before they flushed

b) have those links you mentioned lined up to show them on your tv to both inform and entertain

After a few interventions like this you will find that friends and guests no longer visit. Job done.

Yes exactly. Most people don’t bother about this kind of thing. OP lighten up, this won’t kill you or even make you ill. Something else will.

Frankly, you're more likely to get sick from your guests themselves (infectious illnesses, not washing their hands properly) than them leaving the lid up when flushing. Yes, there will be some water spray when they flush. How do you think this will actually make you ill unless you start licking the area around the toilet. This is a really odd thing to get hung up about.

Glad to hear it’s not just us!

We have quite a lot of visitors and having the conversation with each one or multiple conversations with the same person (MIL wouldn’t care to remember for example) is just not practical.

I suspect that signs would sometimes be ignored too, even if we went with one, certainly by kids.

How can we make it happen?

You can't.

Get a grip and deal with it.

And strangely after 10 years, you're still not dead.

Amazing.

I do always put the lid down but also, it's never occurred to me to monitor what guests do in our home.

I love the telepathy suggestion above but if that doesn't work for you, then I would just blame the loo. If needs be, invent that it's just had a new flush, but say that it's a bit too strong and to stop themselves getting splashed, put the lid down before flushing. No one wants to come out looking like they've wet themselves, they will put the lid down.

Actually I think you should invest in one of those electric musical Japanese toilets that are all singing and all dancing. A good one will have a self cleaning system and a closing lid. It will also give you a good clean if you have the right settings on.

Your guests will naturally be terrified of using it because it will have too many buttons.

Are you this uptight about other things too? Because if so, I'm curious how you even have visitors who come a second time.

I'm with you that I want everyone to close the lid before flushing and the lid being down ought to indicate to everyone with half a brain that they should put it down too but there is not a way to inform people of this without coming across as overly precious.

I wasn’t brought up to do this -by my parents who have never closed the lid to flush in their lives and are now in their mid 80s, still in good health. So my conclusion is that leaving the lid up is not a harmful practice.

OP I think the same as you - close the lid but no one else who comes over does however there's not much you can do. It's another reason I can't wait to get a downstairs loo then no one will be using our family bathroom!

What I do if I know someone is about is put away the toothbrushes etc and then I can clean after they've left and nothing is contaminated.

I do have mild OCD.

Thank you, something like this could work. Aren’t self-close lids quite slow though? I suspect that guests won’t wait for it to close before flushing. Perhaps a combination of this and some sort of delay mechanism to the flush… like a puzzle with a lock 😂

They will just pee in the sink……😄

Well, the men and the more athletic and flexible women will.

The pooers and the not so bendy will make their excuses and pop down to the nearest Tesco to use their loo.

I think I’d be terrified of using it too!

I now have to wonder about when a male pees in the loo. From such a height there must be splashing from that alone. Putting the seat down wouldn’t stop this after the fact. So, I guess maybe you need to rethink the whole thing. Your alive, it’s Not that bad.

It says a lot about your family and friends! All my family and friends put the lid down except one.

How would you police this? How do you check?

and if your kid is so mazing at preventing spray, the inside of it must be absolutely saturated in urine and faeces - do you bleach clean it every time before using the loo again, to prevent any of that soaking in to the back of your clothes?

Lol

Another day another way to die added to my list

You can’t force guests to lower the lid 😂 Is this a family bathroom? I’d make sure toothbrushes are not left out.

I’d quite like visiting men to sit down to piss, but we can’t enforce that either. We just resign ourselves to pissy splashes and clean our downstairs loo as soon as the splashy bastards visitors leave.

No guests to use the toilet. It’s the only answer. So, probably no guests.