Bed bug compensation from work

[BedBugMotel]

Name change for this.

I work in a large multinational that makes billions in profit every year. I had to travel to Paris for work. They were being very stingy with the budget, and I could only afford the cheapest hotel on their "approved" list and had to take public transport. The hotel had reviews from the past saying there were bed bugs there.

I now think I have bedbugs - I'm going to the doctor for a diagnosis. If it turns out I do have bed bugs, could I get some kind of compensation from work? What evidence would I need? Who would I need to talk to?

Bedbugs typically bite in lines. You often will have three bites in a diagonal line - that’s probably the easiest way to distinguish them from mosquito bites. The bites themselves do look like mosquito bites but they tend to bite the part of your body that is in contact with the bed. I really hope that it isn’t bedbugs OP. So distressing. In future I would refuse to stay anywhere with poor reviews that mention bedbugs.

A friend caught scabies at work years ago. She brought a successful case against her employer with a solicitor provided by her union.
It really affected her badly.
Took a very long time to get rid of with multiple reinfections and enormous effort disinfecting/ cleaning her home. Some of her belongings had to be thrown away because she couldn’t clean them well enough and couldn’t bear to risk reinfection yet again. Her poor elderly cats actually caught the mites from her and needed vet treatment.
There is of course the difference in your case that it was the hotel not your actual regular workplace but I would still think their listing the hotel as one of their approved places to stay makes them at least partly responsible.
I think you need to get legal advice if you want to pursue this and can’t reach an informal agreement with your employer.

The key difference here is that it was at their place of work for which the employer is directly responsible. OP was at a hotel, and so the hotel (if anyone) is directly responsible. But after an entire month there’s no case to bring to anybody.

OP do you genuinely think that someone in your company should be online, regularly checking google/tripadvisor/trustpilot and every other review site for the most up to date reviews on every single supplier they use? If if they see a negative review, then what, cancel the contract on the say so of a disgruntled customer? The supplier's lawyers would have something to say about that.

The above sounds completely impractical to me, but if you're suggesting they're liable for anything negative that happens to you which has been previously mentioned in a review, what's the alternative? (Notwithstanding the fact that you DID read the review, and didn't take any action yourself. )

I might be a lone voice here but there might be a potential exposure if you were travelling for work and the hotel was on an approved list. “Approved” has to mean something. What checks do they do before they stick a hotel on the list? How often is the list reviewed? Are there cleanliness standards the hotels have to abide by to get this approval? Do they check reviews or hygiene ratings or whatever the equivalent is before saying a hotel is approved for use by staff? If they can prove that they’ve taken all reasonable steps to ensure that hotels selected for use by staff are of a good standard then you’ll have no luck.

You’d also be on firmer ground if you checked the approved list, found only one in budget, saw someone online complaining about bed bugs and then went back to your employer advising them of the situation and asking for additional budget or to go for an alternative hotel. If that all happened and your request was refused then you’d have a better argument.

I have dealt with bed bugs cases for luxury hotels, so I wouldn’t get too fixated on the budget issue. If you get no joy from them it might be worth speaking to a personal injury solicitor, if it is bed bugs they can be very, very difficult and costly to get rid of.

But it’s an interesting query!

This happened to me. I was lazy and stayed in the closest (and cheapest) hotel on my works travel system in central london. It had bed bugs and I got bitten. They came up the next day in the classic three bite line. And on the train home I spotted one in my laptop (it dashed across my screen and was apple pip shaped)

I sent my travel desk pics of my bites and expensed bug spray, powder and a massive plastic box to put things in plus a new suitcase no problem. I had a chest freezer so got undressed in the garage when home and put everything in vacuum bags in the freezer. Then I washed my clothes and tumbled dried everything.

Work didn't replace my laptop but I fashioned a plastic tub with a wire hole after a weekend in the fumigation box. I never saw a bug again and they are not in my house.

I now check hotel rooms and choose hotels with a bit more discretion. It was uncomfortable and itchy but no real bother.

I was in Paris on a work trip during the hysteria last year. I checked the bed, sofa, curtains, etc. before moving my suitcase into the room, and this was a 5 star hotel. They are relatively easy to spot so if I were your employer I'd probably say if you were worried and had read bad reviews, why didn't you check the room first.

You seem quite litigious tbh. It wouldn’t even cross my mind to bring a case against my employer for this. They did nothing wrong and it’s a month later…

Not a chance even with your catering example. If you told your employer about the bad reviews and they forced you to still use that catering company telling you you would be sacked if you didn't eat their food, possibly. But you'd still have to prove that the catering company's food caused the issue even though you only started to suspect food poisoning a month later and didn't make any complaints at time.

I think you misunderstand what 'approved hotels' means - normally it means the employer has done a deal for special rates, or gets some form of commission. It's not about them saying these hotels are 'good' .

In my company we're only allowed to book hotels via the internal booking system.

Well that's pretty normal for big companies.

I'm not clear how that makes a difference? Did you notify them of the concern in advance, and they then say you'd be sacked unless you stayed in that hotel? Even then you'd need to prove the bedbugs came from that hotel - pretty hard given you've left it for a month before saying anything.

If it's a big company they've probably outsourced all that (the booking system, choosing and contracting suppliers) to a corporate travel agent.

Yes, I think I am litigious in this instance, but not in general. I've never sought compensation before in my life.

Part of this is down to my employer's attitude re budget. For example, during several recent work trips, my colleagues have had to stay at other colleagues' houses because they haven't had enough budget to cover a hotel for every night of the trip. Other people have been left with the equivalent of £10 per day to pay for food. This is probably why I didn't mention anything at the time re the budget and the hotel. They genuinely don't seem to care.

However, I see from this thread, (assuming it turns out to be bed bugs) there wouldn't be a case.

I haven’t rtft but a friend recently had this exact situation. Hotel booked for a conference through work, she is v confident that she got bed bug bites there. She arranged and paid for a home pest control (spraying of extermination stuff) of her home, at great personal inconvenience (!), and together she and her employer were successful in getting full refund from the hotel, which enabled employer to cover cost of the home pest control. However, I think this was employer “goodwill” rather than a right. Sorry it sounds horrid x

Terrible, terrible things bed bugs. They carry a bacterium, compensatus ludicrous. It affects the brain and turns people into insatiable, unreasonable compo claimers. There is no known cure.

I think you’ve been infected, OP.

Genuinely funny.

But I'm not sure why some people are so triggered by questions about occupational health and employer obligations. Surely that's what an Internet forum about "legal" is for? I have no experience in this area.

I've been suffering with bites and itchy skin for a month. Bed bugs are a known mental health issue. I have a bunch of people saying "why did you wait a month? Why didn't you say something earlier", while others paint me as someone who would do anything for compensation.

Occupational health has nothing to do with the fact you may have picked up bedbugs from a hotel during the course of work.
Your also saying you feel there's no evidence of them in your home to warrent pest control?
Speak to your employer about it if it is bed bugs, but I'd imagine it would be down to you seeking compensation from the hotel. But the employer could be embarrassed into paying you a bit for the inconvenience and obviously remove that hotel from their approved list. Or draft their own complaint. If I was an office manager I'd be complaining on my staff members behalf. But I'm not a big corporation!
I wouldn't frame it in a way that blames your employer, more that it would look bad if they sent clients or colleagues there if they had the same experience.

In Australia there was a notorious case where a woman received compensation from her employer when she was travelling for work and injured herself in her hotel room during a particularly athletic hookup with a bloke. So I guess anything's possible if you have the right legal team.

Have another look at your mattress and bedframe OP. It's going to be the quickest way. Check all the bedframe including all the crevices and the underside. If you have them, you'll spot one.

I’m going to ask where you kept your suitcase during your stay?

Have you actually checked your bed for bed bugs? That would seem to be the obvious first step here. If you have them, you will find them.

OP, stay in your room on your bed for 20 mins and then check the walls and ceiling around the bed, the sides of the bed and the bed frame. They are attracted to the CO2 we give off, hence your presence in the room is required.

I don't know why you're getting such a drubbing here - although you can pick up bedbugs anywhere including posh hotels you are MUCH more likely to pick them up from hotels which don't have a regular inspection/fumigation schedule - that's expensive, and cheap hotels don't want to pay it.

It will definitely have taken a month for an infestation to develop so i think the amount of time elapsed is irrelevant. Also, if they have fed recently, they become inactive for a certain amount of time. So it can often take a month to notice.

I'm crossing everything for you - we had them and it was absolutely nightmare-ish, I still feel anxious about it. If we got them again I would go striaght for heat treatment - it kills both bugs and eggs instantly.

All other forms of treatment require you to wait for the poison to take hold, so you will still see them for a few weeks afterwards. You have to stay in the infected room/s or they will come to find you. I found that aspect of it really awful, terrible for mental health as you feel like bait. I barely slept.