News and notes from around the interweb:
- Whenever I get late check-out at a hotel, housekeeping knocks incessantly or tries to enter the room to turn it over. One guest came up with a solution, though in many cases I’d write the note in more than one language:
- Hawaii moves from paper agriculture forms (that were collected by flight attendants prior to arrival) to digital forms with what is surely among the least user-friendly URLs I’ve ever seen https://soh-agr.my.site.com/akamaiarrival/
- I told you three months ago that Delta would ditch $4 champagne for Taittinger in long haul business class so it feels a bit anticlimactic that they have finally announced it (also because since then United trumped them with broader wine program improvements).
- New Sydney airport first class check-in suite in use by Emirates and for Singapore Airlines PPS Solitaire passengers on one flight only.
- Qatar Airways will open new Bangkok lounge with sit-down dining
- Qantas will install larger overhead bins, remove seatback entertainment screens, from Boeing 737s not for nothing, but retired American Airlines CEO Doug Parker is a Qantas board member. Meanwhile, Qantas will finally do the Sydney and Auckland lounge refreshes they announced in 2018.
The current Qatar lounge in Bangkok is a very long haul to the terminal where the actual flight departs from so relocating the lounge makes a lot of sense.
This housekeeping thing is legit. Pretty much anytime I’ve been provided a late checkout at ANY hotel other than a true 5 star, housekeeping tries to bust in and acts totally surprised when I tell them I have a late checkout. I need to start traveling with post-it notes, though I wonder how much heed these notes will be given in practice.
You need to write note also in Spanish
Hawaii moves from paper agriculture forms (that were collected by flight attendants prior to arrival) to digital forms…
I wonder how they are going to enforce that?
Guaranteed 4PM checkout via status, FHR, or equivalent means is the best benefit around. You know that owners, management, housekeeping at these properties must *hate* it. Tough shit.
Will there be kiosks for ag declaration forms? Will the flight attendants have devices to do the declarations on the airplane? Phnom Penh Airport now has customs declarations online but also has kiosks for those without a working smart phone (or in my case, I also found the directions to be less than clear.) Fortunately the lady helping at the kiosks was able to get the right boxes checked quickly.
@jns — I last visited in Cambodia in 2019, and it was honestly the *single worst* immigration process I’ve ever experienced. Even with prepaid, pre-printed visas in-hand, the wait was 2+ hours. So, if it’s better in Phnom Penh these days, that is good, because they really need it there. Sheesh!
Isn’t that what the Do Not Disturb sign is for??
@1990, I have flown into Phnom Penh at least twice a year for the last 15 years, except for 2020 and 2021, and have never had a two hour wait to get through immigration and customs. That includes one time having to take a rapid Covid-19 PCR test in 2022 and wait for the results (about a half hour wait after testing). I think you may have just been unlucky. Maybe several large airplanes came at once and there were not enough agents on duty to rapidly process the crowd. The Phnom Penh airport is not very busy most of the time but there are a lot of visitors from China. The new airport south of Phnom Penh is supposed to open this year.
@David The Do Not Disturb sign is frequently ignored which is somewhat justified as people may leave at 11am even though they requested 4pm checkout and leave the Do Not Disturb sign out.
I recently stayed at the Thompson Seattle and needed the room until 4pm. I’m pleased to report that I wasn’t disturbed until 3:30pm. This is perhaps the latest first housekeeping knock I have ever received after requesting 4pm checkout.
@jns — That is good to hear. My experience was at the old Siem Reap airport—though, now there’s supposedly a new one there, too. I believe the ‘backup’ was due to all the visitors who flock to see Angkor Wat, which is incredible and worthwhile. Phnom Penh maybe more for business and familial visitors. Either way, glad to hear Cambodia is doing better. I’ll have to get back there again sometime.
@ Teresa Henning
After mass deportations that won’t b a problem. Getting housekeeping at all will b the problem.
@morno — Or we can just enforce the law and have employers use eVerify–oh, wait–I get it, now–it was all just performative demagoguing–they don’t actually want to ‘fix’ anything–got it. Sheesh!
morno — I’m sorry for your loss of under the table slave labor.
@jesda gulati — No worries, soon, all us formerly ‘middle’ class folks, who inevitably will be ‘DOGEd,’ will soon pick the crops, process the meats, do housekeeping, and construction labor. After all, we keep telling each other to ‘go outside’ and to ‘touch grass’ so we should finally do it… for ‘efficiency!’
@1990, I have never flown in or out of Siem Reap airport (old or new) but I went to Siem Reap for five days in the summer of 2023. It was my second trip there. It was an expanded visit. Three days were spent visiting Angkor Wat, Bayon and other temples. One day was spent going to the military museum (up close to a MiG with a lot of tanks, a helicopter and a few artillery pieces, all in disrepair), a boat trip to a stilt restaurant over the Tonle Sap and a ride on the tall, slow Ferris style wheel to view the surrounding area (Angkor Eye). Another day was spent on a trip to Kulen Mountain (Phnom Kulen), visiting the temple at the top and playing in the waterfalls. Fun and interesting.
@jns – You were in Siem Reap in summer? Brave. It’s plenty hot and humid enough in January during the dry season. I flew into and out of Siem Reap a year ago and it was surprisingly easy.
@Christian, in at least some of Southeast Asia the hottest time of the year is April with March and May coming in as close seconds. Due to the tilt of the Earth’s axis, that is the time when the sun is most directly overhead and it is also a time that there is less cloud cover. June, July, and August in order have increasing cloud cover and increasing chances of rain. July and August are definitely cooler than April in Cambodia. Someone who has not acclimatized may not notice the difference. I am acclimatized to the point that California weather seems cold except during hot spells. The Wikipedia entry for Phnom Penh has a good climate data table to show this. The weather around the country varies but not by a great deal except near the coast where it is somewhat moderated. The worry about sight seeing in July and August was the occasional several day rainy spell and not the heat and humidity. Of course, air conditioning at the hotel is a necessity.
I always have sticky notes in my bag. I use them to inform the staff that I don’t need the daily touch up of the room. A “service not needed today” notes is better than a do not disturb sign, which might mean I want service, just not yet.
Just got off the plane lax to hnl. First day of new ag forms. The flight attendant held up a QR code, took a photo and filled it out. Pretty easy..in response to the question of how they will enforce it; don’t know, but I had been stopped years ago with fruit. I assumed that they got it off the form and they will have somebody reviewing them now. They used to have beagles that went through baggage claim sniffing luggage who were super cute.
On the late checkout thing, I, too, have been doing that for a few years. I’ve been both Marriott Platinum (Titanium at one point) and Hyatt Globalist, both of which get guaranteed 4 pm checkout; I’ll confirm my 4 pm checkout with the front desk, either at check-in or by calling down to the front desk at some point. In Hyatt’s case, the app usually even shows my late checkout time on the reservation page… And yet housekeeping would ignore the DND sign and knock ~one minute after checkout time (or even *before* checkout time in some cases!), and when I’d tell them I have a late checkout, they’d look at their list and say they don’t see me on the list.
So I started traveling with sticky notes, and just writing a short note like “4 pm checkout confirmed w/ front desk (Globalist), thank you!” Sometimes I add something like “Trying to sleep before a long drive” if that applies (which it frequently does for me). Since then, I’ve only gotten one knock (wasn’t sleeping that time, thankfully), and when I answered the door, I saw her reading the note and she immediately apologized and said she knocked before seeing the note. Worked every other time!
I really wish this wasn’t necessary. I assume that housekeepers can see a guest’s elite status on their list. Housekeepers should be trained to *never* ignore a DND sign if it’s before checkout time, and if it’s a chain with guaranteed late checkout as an elite benefit, they should be trained to automatically consider the guest’s status when determining their checkout time (2 pm for Hyatt Discoverist/Explorist, 4 pm for Hyatt Globalist and Marriott Platinum or higher), *even if they don’t see that specific guest on the late checkout list*, since communication breakdowns seem to happen so often between front desk and housekeeping. But as long as they don’t, the Post-its will remain necessary.
On the multiple languages thing: honestly, even if the only words they understand on my note are “4pm checkout,” that should be sufficient. (And if they’re working at a hotel in the US or Canada, even if their English is minimal, I hope they at least know “checkout”!)
It does raise the question of whether some guests might start doing this disingenuously, like writing a note saying they have a certain status/late checkout when they really don’t, causing housekeepers to eventually ignore such notes. And around this time of year, there’s always the edge cases where a guest has (e.g.) Globalist status when they check in, so they request their 4 pm checkout…but by their checkout date, their status has dropped lower due to less activity the previous year, since Hyatt and Marriott status are good through the following February and start dropping in March. What happens if the front desk didn’t properly record their 4 pm checkout when they checked in, and they have to argue for it the day they check out, as a mere Explorist/Discoverist/member? “No, no, I was Globalist when I got here, I swear!” But worst case, I assume the front desk should be able to verify that, if it really comes down to it – and I imagine only frequent travelers who’ve had the appropriate status would even know to write such a note anyway, so there shouldn’t be much fraud with it, if any. Either way, it’s certainly the best option we have for now.
(Wow, this got way more in-depth than I expected it to – but I care about this benefit a lot, lol. Having a history of sleep issues (hypersomnia/excessive tiredness and an unpredictable circadian rhythm), it’s honestly the main reason I choose Hyatt and Marriott as my main hotel programs. So when there are failures, it affects me a lot and makes me feel ripped off. Natural that I’d have a lot to say about it, I guess!)
I should also note (hah, no pun intended) that the sticky-note thing only works for those with late checkout as a guaranteed benefit. For non-elite members, or hotels with no guaranteed late checkout (e.g. Hyatt resort/casino hotels, Marriott resort/convention hotels, any Hilton, any IHG except InterContinental for Ambassador members), it’s anyone’s guess how it would work if you call down and get, say, a 2pm checkout from the front desk, and then housekeeping has no record of that on the day you check out. I’ve had this happen a few times (without a sticky note), and thankfully, they usually take my word for it, but it still makes me feel like they think I’m lying or something. Like they truly don’t understand just how often this happens (i.e. literally more often than not).
One more reason to stay as exclusively as possible at hotels that honor *guaranteed* late checkout, I guess. (*Really* wish Hilton and IHG would add that, even if it was for top-tier members only. With how inconsistent Marriott can be, it’d be a good way for Hilton or IHG to become my 2nd-place pick behind Hyatt – especially if there was no vague exemption for “convention” properties like Marriott has. Hell, with their superior footprint, add in space-available suite upgrades to the T&C and they might even surpass Hyatt!)
Cute. I collect those post-it notes on the way to my 7am coffee.