u/ru-yafu0820

Are we even surprised at this point.

Saw someone on this sub call this particular OTA crooking com, henceforth that is their name.

Well, there is a guest let's call her Karen. Karen had stayed with us before and had some issues with her stay, mainly being that she booked a reservation that came through with a virtual credit card(VCC).

This virtual credit card was swiped-over by one of our newbies at check in. Needless to say Karen was not happy with the authorization the system put on her card. Understandably, that auth was over 400$.

She decides to give our hotel another try by booking the exact same reservation type that comes to us as a VCC. Now, we are usually a fairly lenient hotel when it comes to advance deposit, non-refundable reservations IF they are booked through the official webpage for our hotel chain. But when it comes to VCCs/OTAs, our hands are tied. A lot of them we do not give that courtesy of.

Why is it, tell me, do the OTAs have to question our policy, rather than sticking to their own?!

So Ms. Karen messages us through crooking's website to cancel due to "unforeseen circumstances."

When she doesn't get a response, instead of calling the hotel to confirm, she decides to just... not show up to her reservation instead of cancelling it. Well, it's processed as a no-show which incurs ALL charges for her entire reservation, as it was booked as advance deposit, non-refundable. WITH a VCC which we take very seriously. (If we don't, they can/will come at us with all sorts of chargebacks and no one wants to deal with that.)

The next day, she calls, FUMING, saying that she was charged and she didn't even stay in the room. She asked to cancel the day before checking in (We have a 48hr cancellation policy) and never got a response so she assumed she wouldn't be charged. Well, I was the one that took this call. I inform her that unfortunately we never got confirmation to cancel that reservation penalty free, and that she did not show up to her reservation, so it was processed as a no-show, AND it was a non-refundable reservation, so there was nothing else I could do. She gave me the whole story about how her work moved her elsewhere and that she booked using her personal card and because she never stayed at our hotel, the company wasn't going to reimburse her for it. I apologized, and advised that next time she books, she book directly, as that gives us a LOT more leeway to make any sort of modifications, even to non-refundable reservations. She was not happy with that response.

Well, I thought that was the end of it. Hung up all angry, I figured it was over. Next day, crooking calls and asks that we process a refund for this guest. She said "I understand it was a non-refundable reservation, we are hoping you can make an exception in this case." I told her no. It was a GNS, not a cancellation. We held that room far past 2AM as we process GNS around 4AM. We would not be offering a refund.

This lady proceeds to tell me that this guest is "Loyal" to our property, and we still won't make an exception for her?

I just repeated myself, laughing on the inside that "Loyalty" to them is one night, "I'm sorry, it was already processed, she was not approved for a cancellation, she did not show up to check in to her reservation, there will be no refund." The employee simply says Thank You, and hangs up on me.

I'm sure she was giving these poor employees a run for their money, because holy schnitzel were they FUMING the next day.

My AM associate had it in her notes that a different person called regarding the same reservation, and upon getting the same kind of answer, started poking and prodding at the price that we charged, saying that we should have only charged for one night (hotel policy) she had to explain to THEM, that THEIR POLICY, is fully-paid-for-in-advance, non refundable, and that Karen would not be getting a refund. They asked to speak to the higher manager, AGM/GM, who was not in that day because it was the weekend. They were told to call back between 10AM-12PM the next day as our GM had very important meetings on Monday.

Well, they called back, and were just as pushy as before, but at 2PM in the afternoon, right in the middle of her meetings. They were told to call back later, or to email to get a response sooner, and they did. Sent us an email asking for a refund for the cancelled reservation. It was promptly denied by our GM.

They call again like a few days later, and are even more pushy than usual. The employee that called was an absolute asshat and kept interrupting me, asking me what my position was, asking to speak to the manager, refusing to be put on hold, ETC, so GM comes around the corner hearing the annoyance and the curtness in my voice, takes the phone.

This man goes off on my GM for this reservation. Says that the guest is loyal and had to cancel for unforeseen circumstances, again, asked for grace, but did not stop talking and interrupting and arguing. It was an absolute mess. Eventually, my GM had to say, "I have already responded to your emails. My associates have already given three different people the same answer. If you call me again regarding this reservation, my associates have been informed to hang up. This is harassment. Do not call my establishment regarding this reservation again."

I didn't get the full details of what he said to her, but she was mad. Luckily, they stopped bothering us for a while after that.

But guess what they decide to do?

Sent us an email for an "unknown charge" for Karen's reservation, showing that the card was only supposed to be charged for one night, (This email had her previous reservation's confirmation number, that was weeks ago, mind you) and showed that the full amount for the second reservation was charged. Saying that if the card was not refunded or if they were not provided receipts there would be a chargeback.

I almost feel bad for the poor crooking associates, as I can only imagine this lady gave them hell, too. I've never had an OTA be so persistent before. Not only to glaze over our policy, but over their own!

Truly appalling.

TL;DR, guest gave crooking com hell, they gave us hell, guest still did not get her refund.

For context, a little bit about me and her.

We have know each other our whole lives. We were home schooled together, did everything together, etc. She has always had a completely different family dynamic and I can understand from a psychological perspective why she is the way she is.

She was told basically since she hit puberty that she was always "showing too much" and her mother, let's call her Terry, even had the audacity to call her own daughter a "whore" and "slut" because of how she presented herself in school, claiming that she would get pregnant in high school because of the way she acted. Terry was CONSTANTLY on her about her appearance, how much she weighed, how pretty she was, etc, and this affected literally everyone around her, because I have some self image issues as well because of Terry specifically.

She was always flirtatious, always had a bubbly, very friendly, outgoing personality. She was also very pretty and was always popular with boys. That, and she is a HARDCORE people pleaser.

My issue now is this. She has expressed concerns about her lifestyle well... her whole life. Since getting out of school, she's been surrounded in bad influences and unsupportive, toxic people. I have always been the best friend I knew how to be, but I live hours away from her. It's extremely hard to be a "good influence" when I can't be there in person. (She is NOT a technology person. She has to be spoken to.)

over the past couple of years it seems to just get worse. Understandably, her value ​in herself comes from sex. Being wanted by a male partner.

This eventually did lead to her getting pregnant. She was 19. Now, she has a beautiful baby boy that I think was the right thing, it made her grow up a lot and definitely gave her a reason to rethink her personal decisions. But it's not working.

She is still consistently sleeping around with guys. I am not judging her for this. But she is also traveling to other places (literally did a 16hr overnight drive to CA to have an orgy with her friend) WITH her child, and I cannot get past that.

I somehow talked her out of any kind of that activity and they ended up just having a nice vacation. I was so proud of her. And we ended up getting into a deeper conversation about how that made her feel.

She said she wants something real. She wants something she can trust, something consistent. But she doesn't think she can trust herself. Someone had talked to her about "exploring possibilities" and marriage being something that she gets "stuck in" and "what if you get stuck with someone who is shit at sex" and I had to ask her what her priorities were.

"Do you want a pleasure farm, or do you want a father to your child? Because there is a possibility that you will not get both, and it's not just about you anymore."

She thought about it for a long time. She told me, "I want a man who will love me and my boy, but I love the freedom of doing whatever I want. And I can't just stop doing this"

I told her: "I know you can't. This is a form of addiction. You do not have to just stop. Ease yourself out of it. Say no ONCE, like you did on that trip to California."

"But I can't say no. I can prevent myself from initiating, but I can't prevent myself if he initiated first."

I told her again, "All you have to do is practice. Say no once, that will be hard. Say no twice, even harder. By the third time it will be easier."

I can only hope that made it through to her. But then she told me the other week that she and her friend did another 7hr drive to meet up with some guys.

And I feel hopeless. When I talked to her, she seemed to really think about my advice. She seemed to take it the way I wanted her to.

I have mentioned that her other friends are a bad influence to her. I said it directly. She said I was right, and she doesn't know how I do it. She was the bad influence on me.

I told her I am not influenced by her. I don't let myself do things just because she does. And she seemed to believe that wasn't something possible for her to adopt from me.

So I told her I will continue to be a good influence on her. Give her the support that she longs for but isn't given by other people.

But after that long conversation, and then her going to do that exact thing we talked about... shamelessly? Consistently? With the same friend?

Regardless of the activities those two do together, I cannot ask her to drop this friend. She has been supportive and has been a good friend in person when I cannot. She has gotten my friend out of bad situations and all I have is respect for her. But she is also the kind of person that will continue with her lifestyle WITHOUT judging my friend for not joining her. This friend invited me to an orgy too, and I said no, but she told me she just wanted me to be included and figured she'd ask. I don't feel like dropping the friend here is the answer, (i know reddit, i know) but i would like any advice anyone can give.​

I don't know what to do anymore. It might be fine now, but her son is soon at an age that he will remember things. I don't know the extent he is exposed to. All I know is that this spiral is a trap, a hole that is hard to get out of, especially for her. How do I support her in ways that gently guide her out of that lifestyle? Not just because I want it for her, not just because of her son, but because she has expressed that she feels hollow because of it?

Recently we have had really nice weather. It's been cold at night, (getting down to about 30-40 degrees F) but a nice 60-70 during the day.

Well, apparently, this one family wanted the windows open to let in a little warmth, as it gets pretty cold on third and second floors. (Despite heat rising? Idk why)

The windows only open MAYBE 4 inches, and there are screens in place, but the screens will not protect any innocent person from the plague that is gnats/teeny tiny moths.

Well I get a call, around 7-8PM, saying that there's BED BUGS in this guest's room. Immediately, I offer a room transfer, but they refuse - telling me that they're going to check out instead. I was like... Okay? Let me come up and get pictures for my manager.

I go up there, they're all FREAKED TF out, and the father pulls back the bed sheets to show a teeny, tiny moth. A moth.

I said, trying to make it funny/less serious, "Well, it's certainly a bug in your bed! But this is not a bed bug. This is a moth." I took a picture with my macro camera to show them. So, exasperated, father dude points at the wall directly next to the AC/OPEN WINDOW, saying the bed bugs are investing the AC unit.

It is gross, I will admit. Walking in to a hotel to see bugs all over the wall is certainly not fun. I cannot fault them for this.

But these little guys, there were a bunch of tiny little bugs, (flying bugs, gnats or fruit flies?? I get them in my house when I leave my windows open, they're annoying but completely harmless) hanging out on the wall/by the air conditioner. Which is placed conveniently underneath the window.

That is open.

I apologize, saying that we take bug infestations very seriously, but explain that they must have come in through their open window. They are not bed bugs. It is not common for this to happen. In fact, in my 3 years working here, we've never had bed bugs.

This man goes ballistic. "They are bed bugs! You see this?!" Shows me a picture of a bed bug( clearly from google) from his phone. I sigh. It is not worth arguing with this person that these bugs are harmless, and he was certainly not in the mood to be told they're in the room because HE LEFT THE WINDOW OPEn.

So I tell him it is fine that he checks out. But we still have to charge him, because they are not bed bugs, and he is the one that left the window open. You can assume how things went from there.

He proceeds to have a screaming match with my manager the next morning, which (unfortunately) ended with him getting one night for free, but we still had to charge for the first nights. After all that happened, I talked to my manager about how he left the window open, and she goes:

"Well, he certainly didn't think to tell me that part. No, but he did tell me that you were rude, dismissive, laughing at him, acting like it was a joke and that no one should work in hospitality with that frame of service."

Of course he did. That got him a room night for free!!