A fee for lighting up in our room? But we don’t smoke!

Yeah, a voucher is an easy out–it costs them nothing upfront, they get to keep the $250 cash and there’s a significant chance the voucher will never be redeemed. And even if it is redeemed, they’ll have the opportunity to get some income off them. I’d call that a win for the hotel.

“I wonder if more cash-strapped hotels will start charging non-smokers for smoking, like rental car firms charge for phantom ‘damage’.”

I’m wondering this too. The hotel was very much in the wrong to fail to produce evidence of the smoking and to stonewall their guests with flat denials when they cannot possibly be certain of their facts. (“I was told in no uncertain terms that none of the employees had smoked in the room.”) At every hotel I’ve frequented, I’ve seen groups of housekeeping staff outside, smoking. For the hotel to brush off the possibilility that the housekeeping staff were smoking in the room is bizarre and unsettling, given that they KNOW that there are smokers among them.

The hotel doesn’t say how they discovered the ashes. Does management do a walk-through right after guests leave, or did the housekeepers report the ashes at the end of their shift to a manager who never leaves his office? Did the housekeepers or management have any corroborating evidence, like a photograph of the ashes, or is the hotel satisfied that a note on the housekeeper’s worksheet is worth $250, especially given how much money $250 is? Did a manager visit the room after the discovery of the ashes to confirm that it had the odor of smoking? If not, why not? And if someone had smoked in the room, why didn’t the staff report an odor?

It sounds like this hotel has found a way to extract $250 dollars extra out of every guest on the basis of “cuz we said so.” That’s contemptuous and dishonest – as contemptuous as telling a previous guest ANYTHING in “no uncertain terms.”

I have mostly given up traveling, in part because of the tiresome hypervigilance required to keep from getting scammed by rental car companies (who have made a specialty of it, as the recent interview confirms), by airlines and now by hotels. (Fortunately cruises are completely optional for any kind of travel, which makes their frantic attempts to join the rotten-service, auxillary-revenue-collecting crowd more humorous than frustrating.) I guess I need two more items on my travel checklist: 1. At check-in, ask about the procedure by which management determines that a room has been smoked in. Does management do a walk-through before rooms are cleaned? How do they determine that those $250 lovely auxilliary revenue dollars should be charged? Do they photograph physical evidence that smoking has occurred, or is any schmutz good enough, given how much money $250 is? 2. Carefully double check for anything that might be construed as cigarette use in the room and bring it to the attention of the desk staff at check in. Follow up with an immediate email, insisting that the report of smoking be added to the room file.

I would strongly urge the OP to have her sister review this hotel on every online travel forum, laying out all the evidence in detail that the hotel scammed them. At the very least, other travelers deserve a warning that this hotel isn’t holding itself to very high standards of service OR honesty.

Gerry

@Rich: I hope not, but it’s definitely a possibility. Any time a business wants to impose a penalty based on subjective evidence (so-and-so said that she found cigarette ashes, etc), it opens the door for unscrupulous management to make fraudulent claims.

Having said that…I have *zero* problem with charging a $250 fee for smoking in a non-smoking room as long as the fee is disclosed (and every hotel at which I’ve stayed has disclosed it) if someone actually smokes in it. My problem is that the onus seems to be on the guest in these cases to prove that they didn’t smoke in the room, and you can’t prove a negative. Which is why it’s equally ridiculous for the hotel to insist that no employee smoked in the room. The only way for them to legitimately make that guarantee is if they have security camera footage indicating that after the guests left, no one entered the room until the employee who reported the ashes – and that said employee left the room quick enough that he/she couldn’t possibly have lit up before reporting them. Outside of that, there is a possibility (however slim) that the employee smoked in the room.

Unless the OP is a frequent guest of Best Western hotels, I think that the $ 250 voucher is ‘worthless’ because there is a good chance that the voucher could be lost, will never be redeemed, etc. Get cash!!!

I am a non-smoker and I always reserve a smoke-free room. There have been a few times that I have walked into a room that had a odor that smelled like smoke…the first thing that I do is to call the front desk (I ask for their names so that I have a record of my call) to report that there is a smell and it could be cigarette smoke…then I will look for ashes; open the windows and/or run the AC. If the smell doesn’t go away in 15 minutes, I will call the front desk to report it so that if I am not switched to another room, i will not be charged for smoking in the room.

OK, before someone jumps on me, Marriott’s NORTH AMERICA smoke free policy, since 95% of our travel is in North America!

This is the third story of this type I’ve heard in the last year or so. In all cases, the hotel swore that the guest smoked in the room and the guest swore he/she did not smoke. In one case, I knew the person. I know this person does not smoke. But, the hotel had “photographic evidence” it was not willing to share with the guest. Because that was a conference event, my friend had to get the conference organizers involved to get refunded the cleaning fee she was charged.

@KD: Good point. I’m a light smoker and one of my pet peeves is people who leave cigarette butts on the ground. If I’m smoking outside and there’s no ashtray, I put it out and then throw it away somewhere. I would probably not put one in the garbage in a non-smoking hotel room, both to avoid any suggestion that I had smoked in the room and because there would probably be a garbage can outside anyway…but throwing away a cigarette butt is not the same as smoking.

On a similar note, when we were in Las Vegas we booked a nonsmoking room (my wife doesn’t smoke, and doesn’t particularly like it when I do, so we always book nonsmoking rooms). I had a empty pack in my pocket and almost tossed it in the garbage in the room before deciding to take it down to the casino floor with me to throw away…why give them a reason to suspect I’d been smoking in the room when I hadn’t?

I smoke, and even *I* can’t STAND the smell of stale cigarette smoke. It makes me totally ill (weird, yes, but true). As much as I roll my eyes at people making insane rules for those of age engaging in a totally legal (and profitable, for government anyway) habit, there really isn’t any reason to smoke in a hotel room. I mean, you’re gone most of the day anyway when you’re away for business or vacation, so you can pop out once or twice in the evening. Sheesh. (And I was a majorly heavy smoker, it’s gross, so if I could do it anyone could.)

Anyway, the first thing I thought of was the older “kids” as well. Speaking again from personal experience, uhh . . . this is the oldest trick in the book. ;-) I could actually WRITE the book on “How to Hide Smoking from Your Parents.” I wouldn’t be surprised if a travel-sized bottle of Febreze and taking turns keeping watch at the peep hole played a role.

But in all serious, despite my own thinking it was the kids – I actually DO think ashes on the windowsill would be a pretty good objective indicator. I mean, even just a vague smell of smoke isn’t good evidence, as going out for a smoke leaves it on peoples’ clothes, which may “infect” the room. I don’t know what more we could ask for, if we want hotels to be strict about finding people smoking and charging them for cleaning. I doubt many readers would be okay with a hotel employee banging on their door because they think they might be smoking on it, and that’s what it seems a lot of commenters believe is the “only” evidence possible (i.e., catching them red-handed in the act – how is that possible?).

Anyway, it comes down to either taking our lumps and just gritting our teeth about the fact that jerks smoke in non-smoking rooms (and hotels have little to no way to charge them for it), and just changing rooms, or accepting pretty basic evidence that people have done so and having them pay up. Naturally I’d feel for the family if they truly are innocent, but it seems rather silly to say, “Employees could’ve smoked in the room!” Well, anyone could have, sure. I could’ve snuck in and done it myself. Could have. But probably not. I would guess most employees wouldn’t risk their job for a smoke break.

I think we need to have another CSI investigation. Ashes on a window sill. How long where they there? Is there any proof that the window sills are cleaned every night? Granted, this family stayed only one night, but if there’s no proof that they were cleaned before the family arrived, well, reasonable doubt allows for them to be exonerated. And, yes, a voucher is not the same thing as a refund. I would demand a refund. But maybe the family stays at other BW’s?

I am staying at the same hotel (same room even) for the duration of the project I am working on. The first time I was in that room I did not really notice the smell but I could not fall asleep either.

Some hotels even charge less for that, I’ve seen $100 tag on it but it is hard to prove someone actually smoke inside a room.

The hotel can say it has photographic evidence to induce the guest to ‘fess up but if I disputed it then I would expect that the hotel has to prove that I smoked in the room before it was entitled to charge me the fee or penalty.

Once I stopped by an (auto) accident scene I saw and gave my name as a witness. No one contacted me later. I suspect my showing up induced the parties in the accident to be honest.

I had a similar thing happen at a Courtyard Marriot in San Diego last month.  I am a certified NON smoker.  I was there for a singing engagement (Opera and Broadway). I later saw on my C Card that they charged me $280 for smoking in the room.  I called their management and they have refused to remove the charge saying that they had “evidence” that I did.  Really?  I am avid traveler and have traveled and stayed hundreds of nights in hotels.  I am appalled at this kind of white collar crime.  It’s like being slammed by the cell phone companies in the mid nineties.  I am still pursuing this as it now has become a matter of principal.