Hotel has told us there will be no power from 11am-5am

[Geometry88]

OH and I have booked a night away at a 5 star spa hotel in a few days' time (£400 for bed and breakfast including spa access).

The hotel have emailed to say due to an emergency they need to re-boot their power systems so there will be no power throughout the hotel from 11pm to 5am. They say they have selected this time in the hope guests will be asleep.

They are being very casual about it but IMO we are paying a lot of money and I don't expect there to be a 6 hour power cut ! We are rarely asleep before midnight, will be wanting to charge our phones overnight, and I don't expect to be stumbling around in the dark if I wake up in the middle of the night needing the toilet.

According to the T&Cs it's too late to cancel but I think we should have the choice to given the circumstances? I'm thinking as a minimum we should be offered some form of compensation on point of principle? Or even being able to reschedule to the following evening (which might work ok for us) at the same cost?

How much of a pushover do you have to be to accept not having fucking electricity for 6 hours out of what, a 12 hour stay and paying £400 for the privilege?

Being able to see your way to the toilet is a pretty basic requirement.

All the people saying 'But I don't use any electricity after 11pm' are missing the fact that the hotel building uses electricity after 11pm. For the fire safety systems; heating/air con; bathroom extractor fans; water heating; water pumping; lifts; the phone system; keeping the pool up to temp so it's ready for the morning; door locks; lights and power for those cleaning the kitchen, bar, restaurant, spa and pool areas while they are closed to guests overnight; the overnight room service cooks; breakfast prep that will start before the power comes back on; other staff on the night shift who can't just tuck themselves up in bed with a film on their ipad ...

When the power comes back on at 5am lots of things in the room will beep and alarms go off, and many of the things in the above list will take several hours to catch up or restabilise. It's not just the night - most of the next day will be affected.

There are unexpected blackouts. I know some people need it and it can be annoying I do think it's getting a bit dramatic

Using up your phone when with your DH? The horror! How common!

Before mobiles I'd have been trying to find a phone box (because of sky high hotel phone charges) to call my kids, carting around some magazines and a novel or two and juggling a massive map in the car to navigate to the hotel. But no one would have come on with their faux concern judgement about how could I possibly spend time trying to get to my destination, check on my kids, or read when I was with my husband! Heaven forbid! How sad!

Such outright snobbery over phone use.

Damn right my phone needs charging when I'm away from home - that's when I use it most.

The point of going away for a relaxing weekend is to use the full facilities soak in a bath, watch TV in bed, drink in the bar not to relive the 70s power cuts...unless you booked that experience. An emergency or unexpected power cut is not the same as a planned maintenance power out. It's not acceptable

Yes, I am extremely snobby about phone use and I am perfectly happy to own it. I see people glued to their phones everywhere I look - it's like the Matrix, everyone being controlled by a machine and it frightens me how reliant we have all become on them.

With the exception of being able to contact dc easily, the old fashioned versions of everything you mention above are better - being able to read a map is a dying skill and reading from a device that emits blue light will fuck with your sleep. I expect your mobile phone costs you significantly more than the hotel phone would have cost you too.

It is sad - very sad. I wish more people could see it.

@BigMadAdrian and yet here you are posting on mumsnet rather than interacting with people in real life. Sad really.

In fact, they have posted 222 times just since the start of 2023 on this website alone. Hilarious.

At no point did I say that I was perfect - that's why I said 'we' have become reliant - I've been sucked in too. But I am aware and I am working on it.

Being able to read a map is a skill that may be useful from time to time. However, when it comes to navigating roads, a map that’s updated with traffic information is far superior to a paper atlas (especially if that atlas is 12 years old and doesn’t show the new road configuration in the middle of your route - I’m looking at you, mum).

Reading a novel in paper form doesn’t make the story better written, it just makes it less accessible to a lot of people. And you don’t have to do it later in the day if the blue light affects your sleep.

There are certainly things you can access through a phone that aren’t good for your mental health, but you can avoid those things if you want to and many people do. Being engrossed in something isn’t the same as being controlled by it.

Your ignorance is kind of sad. But it’s also nasty to push your irrational judgement on to others the way you did here.

I'm stunned that anyone would accept this tbh

🤣

Tell them your vibratory is mains powered.

I cannot imagine a hotel of any caliber to not offer a discount (and a decent one) for inconvenience. I know my mother always did. It did not happen often, but some things are beyond control.

OP could have a lovely sleep at home and have power if she wants it after 11. Why would she pay out £400 for the privilege of staying somewhere where the second of those won't be available?

11pm is not late. And I would want lights to go to the bathroom.
Electricity is a very basic requirement.

Charge your phone earlier, not during the night. If you need to pee in the night, use your phones torch.
They have given you notice, take a book and torch, so you can read after 11. Or use the time for some adult entertainment, you can do that in the dark.
I often get up in the night to pee, I don't put the lights on, so it doesn't wake anyone up, in a hotel it's easier, as the toilet is off the bedroom.

Charge your phone earlier, not during the night. If you need to pee in the night, use your phones torch.
They have given you notice, take a book and torch, so you can read after 11. Or use the time for some adult entertainment, you can do that in the dark.
I often get up in the night to pee, I don't put the lights on, so it doesn't wake anyone up, in a hotel it's easier, as the toilet is off the bedroom.

This seems reminiscent of the whole culture of (usually) women being socialised to 'not be any trouble' i.e. be a doormat and then helpfully turn yourself over when the one side is fully caked in mud.

That's the kind of behaviour you'd expect whilst camping or maybe in a spartan student house-share with a highly dodgy landlord. I've never paid anywhere close to £400 a night for camping or student digs.

Again, why would anyone pay £400 for the privilege of doing that? Would you?

Or maybe just go on the night that they have rebooked for (OP updated on the afternoon of the 20th) and not have to worry about any of the above.

If electricity after 11pm is such a trivial, frivolous amenity that nobody really cares about, I'd be interested to see if the hotel would prominently include this lack of availability in their regular advertising - even just as an experiment - and see if their bookings decrease at all....

I still remember years ago, when we were looking for accommodation for a week in Blackpool (yeah, we enjoy the finer things in life, us) and there was one place with pretty much a bullet-point list of all the negative stuff of staying with them (although I'm guessing they just saw it as 'sensible'):

All guests must arrive within a very limited window of time and quickly unload their cars before moving them to the hotel's barrier-controlled car park;

There will be a £10 fee every time you need somebody to come and raise the barrier to let you in or out (it seems like they hadn't heard of electricity either - "we find that most of our guests are happy with walking or using public transport during their stay")

All guests must be back at the hotel and quiet in their rooms by 10pm every night;

This is a quiet, peaceful hotel, so if you have come to Blackpool for a fun 'knees-up', please book somewhere else as this is NOT the place for you.

Basil Fawlty would have seen their list of rules and though "Bit harsh" - I can only assume that the 'hotel' was a front for money laundering and their worst fear was that somebody would actually book to stay and give the game away. Either that or it was a full-on BDSM-themed place (that advertised for its real customer base in 'specialist' magazines) for those who weren't out and proud about their fetish.

Or maybe just go on the night that they have rebooked for (OP updated on the afternoon of the 20th) and not have to worry about any of the above.

But clearly the wider issue still exists for other guests - if a very expensive hotel is persisting with charging full-whack, even though they drop it in there at the last minute that, by the way, they aren't going to be offering the most basic facilities overnight that you would still get in a youth hostel.

@WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll

I would (maybe foolishly) assume that the other guests would also have the common sense to realise that paying £400 a night to have no electricity is just stupid, and rebook like the OP has or cancel their stay.

As usual, posters are twisting themselves into knots trying to find "solutions" to something that nobody in their right mind would even consider accepting in the first place.

GMOOH2023

Not a lot of use if you're not able to change the day when you need the accommodation, for whatever reason - and if everywhere else is booked up.

I wonder if they deliberately sent it by email in the hope that people would just ignore it, assuming it was one of the pointless 'we're looking forward to seeing you soon' messages that a lot of places seem to send out these days.

For such a crucial and exceptional thing as this, I would expect a reputable place to call the guests and make sure that they got the message and understood, rather than using a method that relies on inertia to get away with not providing an acceptable level of service, but still hoping to charge for it anyway.

@WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll

Away with your sensible, logical and measured response.

This is MN dontcha know? 😁