George and Lynne are checking into a hotel. The receptionist welcomes them and George confirms their reservation by saying that they won second prize in this very hotel. The receptionist asks what the first prize was. Lynne replies that it was only one night in this hotel in which there are cobwebs and an asleep porter.A simple 'I'm George, I believe we have a reservation' would have sufficed. To which the receptionist might have replied 'Oh our competition winners, how lovely to see you.' But maybe it wouldn't have sufficed as reservations are usually made in the surname. Although George and Lynne's surname still remains a mystery it is sometimes common place for couples to book a romantic retreat in a fake name in order to spice up the weekend. This may not have been on George's mind when he entered the competition in the local paper or a local raffle.
This hotel should know that they have offered up prizes in a competition. This receptionist may not be the proprietor, although it is usually the case with small hotels that the receptionist does own the hotel, but the hotel is a little silly to offer up two prizes in a raffle and have the one night stay as the first prize. It is not really the right way to drum up business. Unless of course the organisers of the raffle knew how bad the hotel was and decided to switch the prizes so the winners would only have to spend one night. If that was the case the other prizes must have been pretty poor. Wouldn't the free cut and blow dry have been a better prize? We can only imagine the third prize must have been a broken record player.
To be fair, the hotel does look pretty run down. There are cobwebs everywhere. The hotel really should clean those, especially as they know they are expecting at least two guests this weekend. The porter is asleep and what looks like the lift is out of order. This hotel should be ashamed of themselves. But I suppose it's a vicious circle. They can't the guests in because the hotel is in a state and they can't sort the hotel out because they don't have any money from guests. That said, a feather duster and a cup of coffee for the porter doesn't cost much.
Strikes me they should sack the porter if they haven't got any guests. After all, they would have grounds for sacking him for sleeping when he should have been working. Then, they could afford to have the place cleaned up, the lift fixed and put some adverts in magazines. Obviously these people have no idea how to run a hotel.
ReplyDeleteLynne is just disappointed at the quality of the accommodation being offered as a prize in the competition, and so is being snide. No real hotel, cobweb-ridden or not, would offer 2 nights as second prize, but only one for first (assuming the quality of the room on offer was equivelent - if first prize was for the master suite, it may be a different situation)
ReplyDeleteIf I were the owner of a shoddy hotel, I would spruce it up before competition winners arrived and make sure their stay was perfect. They'd tell their wide social circle (all of whom enjoy regular mini-breaks), bookings would increase and you could then implement a rolling schedule of renovation as well as bringing in more dedicate staff. A little work to make sure G & L have a good time would go a very long way here.
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