Services for accommodation-providers and travellers

Issue #002

Left-behind belongings

In March we had an email booking from a chap in Zambia. After exhaustive enquiries to ensure that he was bona fide we took the booking. (We're mindful that many scams come from the African continent.) He turned out to be a nice, but slightly eccentric, South African chap who was a joy to accommodate.

After he checked out we found he had left his jacket behind and some other things. Having got to know him, this was not surprising. Fortunately we managed to track him down before he left our locality and he promised to pick it up. "Is it a nice jacket?" he asked. "Eh?" we thought.

Of course he never did pick it up before he left UK. Six months later, out of the blue, he booked in again. We were able to re-unite him with his jacket.

My thoughts turn to another South African - a high flying businesswoman who got a job here and stayed with us during the working week, Monday to Thursday night. I use ‘high flying’ both descriptively and literally because she flew back to South Africa for weekends.

One Monday morning she checked in early and went off to work. Early evening she phoned us from her mobile whilst she was driving (naughty!). She said she had resigned her job and was going to Heathrow airport to try to catch a plane and we should hang on to her things (loads of stuff.) We never saw her again.

Her stuff is still in the loft. As the clothes were bought in the last millennium they are certainly no longer in fashion!

Here's how colleagues in The Forum solve this type of problem:

If it's something big I ask them to send me a box, stamped and addressed, more often than not I never hear again.
I put the item in a plastic bag with the name and date on it and store it away. If the guest asks me to post the item I usually ask for the postage to be sent first as we had several guests not send the postage. It's usually a phone charger which costs about £3 to pack and post. If the item is still here after 3 months we take it to the charity shop.
I phone them first and if they want it I usually just send it in a jiffy bag. It happens so rarely that I figure this is just a small cost and just 'the way the cookie crumbles'. I usually get the postage back when they receive their package anyway.
Happens all the time, and with 90% of guests overseas tourists it can be an expensive past-time to post things on without recompense. We just ask for £5 or £10 depending on size of item and then forward on. We take unclaimed things to the charity shop after six months.

Riddle

What's the connection between saucy underwear, adult toys, mobile phone chargers and a lion's head? - They were all amongst 1800 belongings left behind by guests staying at the Royal York Hotel over a 12 month period. (See York Press for full article.)

Article submitted by the editor.