Hotel Mania #1
by Ted L Glines
You have stayed at hotels, motels, inns, and your experience was, hopefully, nice and restful. You know its facade; the smiling and helpful front desk person, perhaps a valet who makes you feel special, and the comfort of your air-conditioned room. Underneath this hospitable facade is a world of turmoil.
Night before last, the Region Five Best Western Inspector checked into my hotel, stating he would be doing a property inspection on the following morning (yesterday). It was like a large boulder had been dropped into a quiet pool. Our owner went crazy. Our veteran front desk and housekeeping people joined him in his madness. They all commenced to jumping around like mice in a box. All of the then-vacant rooms were blocked so that our crazed employees could carefully inspect each room and fix any bad things like holes in blankets, mildewed shower curtains, stains on drapes or carpets, and the purely awful things like hairs on tiled floors or vanities. Our in-house guests, quietly snoozing or watching TV, never noticed the frenzy of staff activity taking place in rooms all around them. And our front desk person was all smiles and helpfulness, as always.
Best Western properties are inspected twice per year. Usually, you have notice seven days before an inspection, and this gives you plenty of time to correct any bad details in your rooms. The inspector caught us by surprise this time! You start out with 1,000 points, and points are deducted for every detail found wrong. For example, if an out-of-date Best Western logo is found in a room, this will penalize you 250 points. Lord have mercy if a hair is found in a vanity sink, or in a tub, or on the bathroom floor! How about 50 points per hair! At the end of the inspection, you must have at least 750 points to pass.
If your property receives 749 points, or less, you will have failed the inspection. If you fail the inspection, your property is placed on probation. This means your property will be inspected again within 60 days. If you fail this second inspection, your property will be kicked out of Best Western International; you will lose your Best Western sign and you will lose your Best Western brand identity. It will cost you somewhere in the neighborhood of $70,000 to re-brand your property as, say, a Comfort Inn or a Budget Inn. Considering these details, you can see why an owner and key staff people will go blitzoid when they are hit with an unexpected Best Western inspection. It is a traumatic event.
We had our surprise inspection yesterday. Our property passed the inspection, just barely. We lost points on many items. The most flagrant items were two rooms where beds had blankets with holes, and one room where the shower curtain was mildewed. No hairs. No out-of-date logos. No carpet frays or stains. But there were other things.
Meanwhile, you came in off the road, and you tiredly walked into a welcoming foyer with a front desk person who made you feel special, and then you went to your room, a comfortable home-away-from-home. Perhaps you watched TV and went out to dine at one of our Southern restaurants (they know how to cook and portions are huge). When you departed, the next morning, you felt rested and pampered. And you never knew the insanity being experienced by an owner and his veteran staff.