Loud people in hotel hallways.
 

Okay, this isn't a "I'm bored again and without wine because I'm waiting until Friday" post. It's a real question/issue to me.

My family, and I as a solo traveler, have been awakened, usually very early hours, like 4 am-6 due to the poeple who seem to feel that since they're up and leaving, why should anyone else be sleeping. I think people headed to the airport(okay, it's been male voices) have been frequent offenders.

Besides calling the desk, by which time the person/s are usually gone anyway, what do you do? And who wants to wake up anyone else in the room to complain to someone who may or may not care.

We have encountered this from upscale places to moderate, usually all in nice areas. I guess I wonder how this is best handled, if you've ever lost it or what is a good way to handle future incidents without making the police report.

I am a light sleeper and is wakened easily by noises in a hotel. Usually the slamming of the doors prevents an early bedtime for me. Kids screaming and running up and down hallways. People on cell phones talking to someone very far away because they are shouting. People who are also just rude loud talkers who think everyone else is up till 2 am hitting the bars like them...
Okay I am with you jetset. I am not sure how to respond. Usually I roll over and try to sleep. No one else in my family ever wakes up.
Maybe we should open the door and yell something rude like 'Shut the .... up!" or we could just roll over...:)

I especially hate it when two couples have had a nice evening and want to recap all the events, plus plan tomorrows schedule while standing in the hall at 1 am! I have on occasion stuck my head out the door and said (in a very sleepy tone of voice), "This is a fascinating conversation, but do you think you could move it to your rooms or the lobby downstairs?

For this reason, I like to request rooms at the very end of the hall.

I like to listen to something specific they say, then stick my head out the door and sort of repeat it "Really? The steak was tough?" or "Why do you think you need that much time to get dressed before you leave in the morning, does she always take that long?" People will only get mad if you tell them they're being too loud. But they get very embarrassed when they realize you actually heard what they were saying, and I assure you'll they'll shut up then.

There's a lot to be said for packing earplugs, just in case.

LOL jetset, when I am in Italy and stay in hotels (versus friends home) I always stay in hotels where Europeans and a lot of Italians stay, very few Americans. If you want to hear noise from midnight on in the hotel hallways you should hear the Italians,sigh. I love the Itaians but not when they are returning to their hotel rooms during the night. But fortunatly I can always go back to sleep pretty quick, well until the next group comes talking down the hallway.

That is funny Neo, I would love to be a fly on the wall!!

My problem was not the noise. It was the reaction of my ex-GF about the noise.

I may got woken up, but I just ignore it and go back to sleep. But for her, NO WAY. She'll go out to find who's it. Then she'll call the front desk to complain. WORSE, she wakes me up to tell me all about it, and make sure I support her action! Or EVEN WORSE, she asks ME to call the front desk to complain.

Needless to say, I hate traveling with her, and everytime we check in to a hotel, I have to make very very sure that we have the last room in the hallway, as far away from the elevators as possible. And I still worry everytime that there's ANY noise she'd notice. I'd put pillows, blankets at the door seam if there's any gap.

This is true even at real 5* hotels. One time we almost had to check out 2am at a NOLA 5* hotel because of this, even though I paid good money for the room.

All true story, and no wonder she's an EX.

LOL rkkwan :))

On one of our trips to NYC this year, we had the room at end of hall, and still, at 4am, the two rooms next to us must have been leaving early. They felt it necessary to keep going between the two rooms, speaking loudly, in the hall, the doors repeatedly banging shut, and their radio playing loudly.

Lcuy and Neopolitan,, I tried your ideas of sticking my head out the door and asking ever so nicely if they'd be quieter as some were trying to sleep. My daughter read me the riot act about how if she ever did that I'd be telling her not to b/c you never know today what someone else will do -

It continued, so I did call downstairs but it took five tries at various extensions to get anyone to answer - well they sent security right up - and I watched thru the peephole, and he knocked on their door, pointed to my door, and told them to keep it down b/c the people in that room over there complained !!

I was upset by this, I told the manager when I left that although it is unlikely something would happen like retribution, I didn't feel it necessary for security to announce who had complained and point to my room - he could have just acted like he was on his regular rounds ?

Once in DC, there was a group taking up 5 rooms on our hall and they felt they could hold their party between all the rooms, and in their robes, and until 4am.....this is what suites or renting condos are for

So jetset, I don't know what to say except yes it happens, and to all of us, and there are rude people everywhere....

I've always wondered, if I knew the room number, and called them from my room, would they know who it was? I could think of some lovely things to say....

escargot~ I wondered that too, if the front desk or operator could tell them who the number came from.. but some form of punishment seems like a normal wish when you've been the victim..
We were in Calif. a couple weeks ago, staying near Anaheim, and according to the coversation at 2:30 am, our neighbors upstairs had just arrived from back East. We were in a townhouse suite, but the walls were paper thin.
Earplugs and condo type arrangements might solve the sitaution in the future. It's frustrating not to have control. You wonder if anyone is considerate anymore, but I see other examples of good things too, so it's just that one element of brainless dolts.

We travel a lot and this bothered us too until we bought a sound machine (they make travel sizes too) and we have not been bothered on any trips since then. It isn't so loud you can't hear things you must hear but it just blocks out people in the distance or next door and that is wonderful. We used to get about two hours of sleep in a hotel room because we were constantly awakened by noise in the neighboring rooms or hall but have had many good nights of sleep since we purchased and carry a sound machine.

I think we are just becoming a lot more rude and loud in general. Can't grocery shop in peace...always someone YAPPING on their cell phone two feet away, mothers SCREAM at their kids as if nobody else is within a mile of them, I could go on and on. I swear some people SLAM those hotel room doors just because they want someone to pop their head out a door and start a fight.

I also like to stay at the end of the hall because I am a light sleeper. One time we were in a VERY nice resort in a room at the end of the hall. At about 6:00 AM I heard someone talking in a loud voice outside our room. I opened the door and there was a woman on her phone. I just said, "How nice of you to not want to disturb the people in YOUR room". She turned red and went into the stairway.

Generally , people think the world wakes up at 6 and goes to bed whenever. I've always worked nights; the people in my neighborhood feel fine about letting their dogs out to bark and howl at 7 am. Wonder how they's like it if I played loud music at 2 am? I agree, it's a rude world, increasingly so.

I lived in a hotel for 12 years with my GM husband, so believe me, I know just what you are talking about! It's amazing how adults act when they are away from home!! LOL

We had a doorbell at the entrance to our suite in Savannah. When we first moved in, we kept it on, thinking that's how staff would come to our door. Well, that didn't last long. Every Tom, Dick, and Harry passing by had to ring it--not a once in a while thing, but daily, several times a day. Who acts like that at home? Are there adults roaming neighborhoods somewhere ringing doorbells?

My own husband had the best response I've seen yet to serious noise from neighboring rooms. We were traveling, staying in one of his chain's hotels in Austin. We had a lovely room with a small balcony overlooking Town Lake. All was well until about 1 in the morning when the group next door returned and brought their party with them. We had someone playing a saxophone for Pete's sake...with the sliders to their balcony open. One of the women had the most hideous laugh, which sounded for all the world like a horse whinnying. At first we did nothing, but as the party progressed and the sax kept on and on and the braying horse did as well, DH called security. That resulted in about 20 minutes of peace, then the pace picked up again. A 2nd call to security didn't do much better. We had to be up and out early the next morning. Our wakeup call came at 6 AM, my husband got up, pulled on his pants, and went out...I thought to get the paper, but he was checking the room number next door. He came back to our room and dialed them up.

DH: "Hello, this is the room next door. Is Saxophone man there? I'd like to congratulate him on the fine playing job he did last night"

Guest next door: (mumbled) No, he's gone home.

DH: "Oh I'm sorry to have missed him, please pass on our regards--we so enjoyed his hours of playing last night. Well then, how about horse woman, is she there? What a wonderful laugh, I thought maybe I could hear it one more time."

Guest next door: dead silence.

Then DH hung up. We might have lost a lot of sleep but gosh that did us a world of good. heehee...and that from a hotel GM and one of the normally calmest, coolest, and most collected people I know. :)

A great revenge that my husband and I got on noisy neighbors once -- we were staying in a hotel with our 12 year old and our room had to be moved in the middle of the night due to a fire sprinkler going off in our part of the hotel. So we had to pack up and move to another wing at midnight. When we were moving into our new room (and we were aware of the hour and were trying to be considerate) the people next door knocked on the wall and told us to be quiet. We went to bed and at about 3am the same neighbor's baby woke up and started crying. We didn't do anything, but when we left the next morning (early, about 6am) I set the alarm clock in our room to go off 15 minutes after we left.

I always try to be really careful closing the door to my hotel room and we are always cautioning our son to be quiet -- likewise if I get up early I keep the TV volume as low as possible. I am a light sleeper and I really try to be considerate of others in the hotel. But don't piss me off!

Our worst night of noise in a hotel, ever -- New Year's Eve, Y2K. Good Lord, it really should have occured to us that the hallways would be FILLED with revelers. Our early-to-rise time wasn't as hard to take as usual, as it was an opportunity for a little retaliation . . .

Lol, Neopolitan, I LOVE your approach.

I say, first and foremost--earplugs. And don't wait for the noise, just put them in when you go to sleep. (They're good on airplanes too.) If that isn't enough, complain to the front desk.

Ohhhhhhhhhhh, this thread is great, for I thought I was alone...

I am such a freak, while we travel, when DH and I are watching the news before bed, or a movie, I turn down the TV when the commericals come on and DH just smiles and laugh "with" me.

Maybe it's all those apartment buidlings I lived in during my twenties. Maybe it's because my Dad worked shift work while we we growing up and we always tried to be quiet so Daddy could sleep and have a safe night at work well rested. Possibly it is because that every time I travel and have a quiet room, I am so completely grateful.

Here is to peaceful zzzzzz's and considerate travelers!
I-)

I don't think there is much one can do about those who slam doors when coming and going.

However, when the noise is prolonged by people partying, a good hotel will make an adjustment on the bill. The price is one nobody wants to pay: a sleepless night.