I worked at a popular hotel chain for 3 years. Here are 10 common mistakes I saw guests make.

07.03.2024 - 02:39 / insider.com

I worked at a hotel chain that was always busy — during peak tourist season, we were sold out most nights. 

Having such a large number of guests all the time meant I witnessed countless people make the same mistakes over and over.

Here's what to avoid so you can save money on your next hotel stay and ensure everything goes according to plan. 

If you've had a good experience booking third-party, congrats, you're very lucky. But I've had countless people call me (sometimes crying) desperately trying to get the money they spent on a booking website back. 

Although the customer-service department for the site told the person we could help them, we usually couldn't. They were the ones who had their money, not us. How are we supposed to refund money we haven't even received?

Often, these websites will even sell rooms that the hotel doesn't actually have available, fail to communicate your accessibility requirements to the hotel, or book you in for the wrong date. That's just a short list of ways things can go wrong. 

If you want to guarantee you'll have somewhere to stay during your trip, I strongly recommend booking directly through the hotel by visiting its website or calling its phone number. Some hotels even price-match third-party sites and have way more flexible cancellation policies. 

If you book third-party and purchase the fully refundable option, I applaud you for having enough foresight to realize that things can (and often do) go wrong. But these policies can tack on as much as an extra $50 to the cost of your room. 

Many people don't realize that most hotels have super flexible 24-hour or same-day cancellation policies for no additional cost.

I cannot stress this enough: Book directly through the hotel. 

If you travel a lot, I recommend choosing a hotel parent company and signing up for its loyalty program.

Companies like Marriott, Hilton, Choice Hotels, and IHG have thousands of hotels worldwide that you can earn points to redeem for free hotel rooms and gift cards at popular retailers. 

Our hotel staff was also encouraged to treat loyalty members like VIPs, which means you could receive perks like discounted rates, free suite upgrades, or free early check-ins/late checkouts.

If your hotel room has a Bible in it, there's a chance the last person to read it may have left some money in there.

I think the intention with this is probably to share the wealth with other Christians, so I'm not going to tell you to take that money if you don't feel like it was meant for you. Just know that this is a common practice.

Do with that information as you wish. 

Hotels only allow you to use someone else's credit card if the card owner has provided the hotel with a credit-card-authorization form.

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