jysting

Is there a role for small fees to encourage ecoconscious travel habits?
Numerous fees aim to “nickel and dime” the traveller to generate additional income streams for airlines, resorts and hotels. However there could be an unintended benefit of several hotel service fees to encourage compliance with eco-beneficial practices. By charging for towels used, travellers are inclined to re-use them each day by hanging them up to dry on bathroom racks for the duration of their holiday. This reduces laundering and housekeeping costs. Charging for all but the first bottle of complimentary water encourages travellers to reuse the bottle to refill with fresh or boiled tap water suitable for drinking. The time is ripe that the eco-aware tourist be rewarded for their effort by not being charged these fees.

MmePerdu

Are you CRAZY? Those of us inclined to conserve do it because it's the right thing to do. More fees will not make believers of the rest.

Don't give anyone a reason to inflict more fees on us. Next thing you know airlines will charge us to check our bags in the name of the environment. Oh, wait a minute...

anyegr

Most of the hotels I've been to have either a sign saying that towels will not get changed daily OR a sign that says towels will only get changed if they are put in a specific place. Maybe it's only budget hotels doing this. People who stay in five-star luxury hotels probably have different expectations and demands.

More fees will only incovenience ordinary people. Business travelers and rich people aren't going to care much.

janisj

The OP's profile is gone. He posted a couple of threads on the Air travel board . . . one was nuked and the other is gibberish. A troll

MmePerdu

"A troll"


Indeed. It occurred to me right after I'd posted. Live & learn.

TiggerToo

I've stayed in high end hotels and they, too, have become environmentally savvy. I've never gotten the thing with needing new towels and new sheets every day anyway. God knows I don't do that at home.

Woody_Emissary

There's probably a role, but it might not be the best way to reinforce good behavior. Assigning a cost to something is often a form of permission that their usage is justified.

Perhaps, instead, start with a cost, but refund some of it? ex: refund based on how many towel replacements were saved?

In any case, it becomes a complex problem of defining where the savings is made as well as how to account for it.

laurie_ann

I stayed a Westin recently and upon checkin was offered a $5 gift card for each day I hung on my door a sign to the effect of "I don't need any housekeeping service". So for the three days I was there I made my own bed and hung up my own towels (the housekeeping service did enter to leave the gift card each day) and then I used the $$$ in the little lobby gift shop to take home 6 "Allkind" bars which I love. I am sure it saved the Westin more than $5 each day but I thought of it as getting rewarded for the card I would otherwise leave on the bed of "save energy, don't change my sheets" or the towels I would hang up for the same reason.

mlgb

That's cool laurie_ann. What really irks me is when I hang towels up because I intend to reuse them and the maids change them out despite the signs~