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That at least in this Waldorf Astoria hotel, even housekeeping staff on their first day are equipped with master keys that can override the deadbolt on the back of your room door.
Look, it could have been worse, but neither reception nor the housekeeping manager seemed to realise that this was actually how the master keys worked….
So if you want privacy in a Hilton hotel, DnD sign on the door, deadbolt on, security latch/spy-lock in place and they can still peer into your badly designed bedroom.
Am genuinely struggling to unpack this. Has been a long day, am sure it’ll blow over, but there’s still a “WTF” thought in my head here.
“…and that, kids, is how I met your Mother.”
I stayed at Peckforton Castle (don’t bother) just pre pandemic and there are no dead bolts or chains on the doors. My wife and I had a staff member just unlock the door and start to walk in without knocking while we were in the room!
It’s the only hotel I have ever walked early from (after a litany of errors).
Am genuinely struggling to unpack this. Has been a long day, am sure it’ll blow over, but there’s still a “WTF” thought in my head here.
How did you think Housekeeping entered the room when a guest isn’t responding and has expired during the night? Or you’ve just dialled reception and told them you think you are having a heart attack? Even the installed physical secondary flip locks or chains are designed to be released with a sleight of hand.
There are third party devices that can be used to secure hotel doors, have a look on your favourite online store.
When I’m travelling, I usually simply put a pair of jeans behind the door. Not only does it block light from under the door, it’s a bit like having a rug caught behind the door and makes it more difficult to open. Gives you a few moments to interrupt the person entering anyway.
Am genuinely struggling to unpack this. Has been a long day, am sure it’ll blow over, but there’s still a “WTF” thought in my head here.
How did you think Housekeeping entered the room when a guest isn’t responding and has expired during the night? Or you’ve just dialled reception and told them you think you are having a heart attack? Even the installed physical secondary flip locks or chains are designed to be released with a sleight of hand.
You think the housekeeper is the only person working at the hotel so if they don’t have a key the expired guests corpse will wait there forever? I assume pretty much all hotel staff have the capability to enter a room regardless of deadlocks etc, but that doesn’t mean that’s the way it should be.
I’ve never actually experienced something like Tony’s DND on, deadbolt set staff member entering anyway, I’ve had it a couple of times where DnDs were ignored to knock and maybe if I hadn’t answered they would have come in eventually. IMO entering a deadlocked DND room without an extremely good reason, literally safety of the guest, is a major service failure and I’m pretty sure Tony could arrange some compensation for it if that way inclined.
Yep, I think this is the point. It’s not the fact they can’t override the deadbolt at all, but that every member of housekeeping seems to have a master key card that can do this. I was told by head of housekeeping that it was this member of staff’s first day – perhaps that was an attempt to gloss over the matter.
Housekeeping also explained that they have a policy of entering a room every 48hrs if the DND sign is on – fair enough, but I’d been in there about 50 minutes!
If the deadbolt is on, then 99.999% of the time the guest is in the room and has locked the bolt for privacy.
The other thing is whilst I could/should have engaged the security “latch” thing as well, because of the layout of the room, it still gives a direct line of sight to the bed!
The idea of putting something behind the door certainly makes sense and I’ve done that in hotels where I’ve been a bot concerned about the security, but it’s not what springs to mind at a WA…
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