This past weekend, we booked rooms at the Sheraton in downtown Atlanta. Our nightly rate bought us more than we expected.
Front Desk Follies. When Clyde approached the desk, the night manager turned him away because Clyde wasn’t “Mark McElroy.” The Visa card number for our joint account is identical, and Clyde pointed out that his credit card number matched the number used to pay for the room. This didn’t impress the night manager, who insisted that the room could only be released to me.
When I arrived at the counter, the manager grinned and said, “So … your buddy was trying to check in.”
It was late; I was tired. I said nothing and handed the guy my Visa.
The manager tapped a few keys on his keyboard. “One room with two double beds. Here you go.”
I shook my head. “I’ll need a room with one king bed, please.”
The manager frowned and gave me a look. “Just one bed?”
I would have expected this sort of reaction in Albertville, Alabama … but not in Atlanta, Georgia. I mean, let’s face it: there are more gay people per square inch in metro Atlanta than in any other city in the USA. I sighed. “Yep.”
The manager frowned harder. He punched a few keys. He nodded at a knot of giggling school kids in rented tuxes and pastel prom dresses. “Sorry. Lots of couples here tonight. We gave all the king rooms to them.”
Phone Message Mania. In our room, the phone message light was blinking. Clyde picked up the phone, figured out the voicemail extension, and retrieved the message.
As it turned out, our “message” was really just voicemail spam: a canned “Welcome to the Sheraton!” announcement from some corporate uppity-up. Clyde realized this and hung up … and so the voicemail light kept blinking. With some fiddling, we discovered that, in order to turn off the message indicator light, we had to let the message play in its entirety (it’s thirty seconds long!) and delete it.
A card on the desk saying, “Thanks for choosing the Sheraton” is one thing; a half-minute canned voicemail from a faceless manager that has to be listened to in its entirety before the voicemail light will quit blinking is quite another. For something that was likely conceived as a “nice personal touch,” this bit of business comes off as impersonal and annoying.
Word to the Sheraton: from a customer service standpoint:
a) night managers whose world can be rocked by the appearance of a same-sex couple don’t need to be working the front desks of a hotel in downtown Atlanta, Georgia.
b) forcing weary new arrivals to listen to a mandatory thirty-second ad before they can black out the bright, blinking message light on the phone by the bed is bad form.
I am not a gay guy, also I am not (much) homophobic I guess, I try not to be.I understand that some people feel weird around gay people I honestly do at first if the guys are very direct-I am being totally honest here.
On the other side, I cannot tolerate anyone being pushed around, being mistreated, misinformed or disrespected.
I was curious about this story, I was wondering what I would have done if I was the front desk guy because you could be just two straight guys sharing a room.
Most heterosexual guys will feel very angry (some people can even become violent) if you offer them one single bed.
On the other side it is very upsetting that a gay couple have to deal with these small things all the time.
I am a little disappointed at myself because I think I would have done some of the same mistakes, except if you guys were very clear about your sexual orientation from the beginning.
In any case, if I was the guy at the hotel I would apologize and think about anything I could do to overcome the situation, maybe offer a free brunch, rental, etc.
Any suggestions for a customer service representative?
PS. I read your story about you lying to your best friend. Man, it was not your fault, we live in a sad, strange world, and people are not always free to be who they are. In many ways we are prisoners who cannot be with the people we want to be, do the things we want to do, be in the places we want to be.If there is a God and (he/she) created the world and the people living in this world, he made us all, he made you gay, and if he did so there must be a reason for it, you guys have a mission in this planet, make the world more tolerant and happier.If I was that friend I would have forgiven you since a very long time, people cannot always tell the truth even if they want to.
Nice blog!
I am not a gay guy, also I am not (much) homophobic I guess, I try not to be.I understand that some people feel weird around gay people I honestly do at first if the guys are very direct-I am being totally honest here.
On the other side, I cannot tolerate anyone being pushed around, being mistreated, misinformed or disrespected.
I was curious about this story, I was wondering what I would have done if I was the front desk guy because you could be just two straight guys sharing a room.
Most heterosexual guys will feel very angry (some people can even become violent) if you offer them one single bed.
On the other side it is very upsetting that a gay couple have to deal with these small things all the time.
I am a little disappointed at myself because I think I would have done some of the same mistakes, except if you guys were very clear about your sexual orientation from the beginning.
In any case, if I was the guy at the hotel I would apologize and think about anything I could do to overcome the situation, maybe offer a free brunch, rental, etc.
Any suggestions for a customer service representative?
PS. I read your story about you lying to your best friend. Man, it was not your fault, we live in a sad, strange world, and people are not always free to be who they are. In many ways we are prisoners who cannot be with the people we want to be, do the things we want to do, be in the places we want to be.If there is a God and (he/she) created the world and the people living in this world, he made us all, he made you gay, and if he did so there must be a reason for it, you guys have a mission in this planet, make the world more tolerant and happier.If I was that friend I would have forgiven you since a very long time, people cannot always tell the truth even if they want to.
Nice blog!
Our hotel in Las Vegas did the same thing not once but twice. The first was a welcome and such. The second was telling us to buy tickets for one of their shows. Very annoying.
Barbara