(To members who subscribe to the motto "let's keep the subject
matter on VP": PLEASE IGNORE THIS POST)
In Las Vegas, maids belong to a union. Don't know about the
situation in Reno.
In any case, it's a low paying, tedious, and thankless job.
Maids are paid not by the hour, but by the number of rooms they
clean; the usual number of rooms cleaned per day is around 15.
On a slow day, to make up for lost pay, a maid will ignore the "Do
Not Disturb" sign you hanged on the door-knob by first calling you
(and wake you up after your all-nighter in front of a VP machine);
if there is no answer, some will have the courage to actually enter
your room, and clean it if no one is there.
My counter-measure is to put a hand written sticky-note (or hotel
stationery with a piece of scotch tape) on the door that says "To
House-keeping : Services Not Needed Today, Please Do Not Disturb,
Thanks!" before I retire, in addition to the standard issued sign on
the door-knob. In fact I use the same sticky note over and over
again. This has always worked for me. No more phone calls, and no
more intrusions.
On a typical 2 or 3 night stay, I almost never need the services of
house-keeping.
To rectify my guilty conscience about robbing their pay, whenever I
see house-keeping cleaning a nearby room (or even a not so nearby
one down the hall), I would take one used towel and a waste basket
exchange the towel, tip her a couple of dollars AND announce that as
far as I'm concerned, she had just cleaned my room. To make this
work, you have to invite the maid (some are too timid to ask you,
especially after the tip) to use the phone in your room to call in,
because standard procedure REQUIRES the maid to call a special
number from YOUR room and enter her code to confirm that the room
had been serviced.
I feel that maid service is included in the price of the room, but
the level of service is for me to determine and I don't think that I
have conspired with the maid to cheat the hotel.
Upon departure, I also leave behind a standard tip: $2 for the first
day, and $1 for each additional day; more if I messed up things more
than usual like leaving behind a soap-ring on the hot-tub.
L. Wluiki
···
from my room to the maid, have her re-line the waste basket and
*********************************************************************
--- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, "Mark" <mark_my_words_again@y...>
wrote:
Speaking of housekeeping: I got woken up TWICE my last trip to
Nevada by
housekeeping. They IGNORED or could not read the DO NOT DISTURB
sign.
This happen to anyone else ? I usually cancel housekeeping every
other
day: as I spend about two waking hours in my room total per day.
Next time I'll
call & complain.
~Mark P.