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Luxury hotel guests keep stealing mattresses
- neaden 7y agoFor the actual information from the survey see this link: https://www.channel3000.com/lifestyle/the-surprising-things-stolen-from-luxury-hotel-rooms/1149593225 https://www.channel3000.com/lifestyle/the-surprising-things-... 49 out of 1,157 hotels in the survey reported having a mattress stolen. "Whereas many four-star hotels have taken to tagging their items to trigger alarms when smuggled off the premises, five-star hotels are less likely to confront thieves or to report the theft to police, Keilmann told CNN. "In a lot of cases, they don't report it to the police, because they don't want to be connected to crime," Keilmann said." This makes me think that these people are only staying at the hotel to steal things and choosing hotels accordingly, presumably using a stolen credit card as well to make them harder to track.
- dmix 7y agoIt’s funny the lengths they’ll go to not have the police walking around the hotels and potentially getting in the news. People can be so touchy with the thought of crime being done in a hotel. I know the sort of person (hotel guest) who would overreact to that sort of thing.
- leeoniya 7y agonot such great lengths if you ask me. having even one customer turn away from an upscale hotel isn't worth recovering a $700 item, let alone doing this on an ongoing basis.
- praptak 7y agoMy guess would be the hotel just charging their credit card for the cost of replacing the item.
- lotsofpulp 7y agoYou can just do a chargeback. Merchant agreements with card issues forbid charging the card for anything other than what the cardholder explicitly agrees to.
- Scoundreller 7y agoIt’s probably in the agreement. There might even be a price list in the unit somewhere too.
- lotsofpulp 7y agoI know from personal experience. The issuing bank will state they are not responsible for damages etc etc. Maybe you might win if the cardholder admits to stealing or smoking in a room AND admits to knowing about the fine, but that's never going to happen.
- heelix 7y agoI have very different expectations on how Marriott reacts to me smuggling in a bit of booze vs the TSAs reaction.
- sokoloff 7y agoCouldn’t you openly carry booze into a Marriott? It would never occur to me to worry about it in the least.
- rbritton 7y agoI worked at a hotel for ten years. You’d be amazed at the number of things that are suppressed. Dead bodies, bed bugs, etc all happen far more frequently than you’d think but are cleaned up quietly and quickly.
- oefrha 7y agoBed bugs sounds like the cost of doing business, but are you serious about dead bodies? How do you clean those up “quietly and quickly”?
- 52-6F-62 7y agoBetty fetches the lye will Jim brings up a barrel from the custodial locker?
- walrus01 7y agoStatistically if you have a hotel with 300 rooms and tens of thousands of individual night guest stays over many years, people definitely will randomly die of natural causes. Same as if they were in bed at home.
- adriand 7y agoSuicides are common in hotels because people don’t want to burden their loved ones with the shock of finding their body or having to clean up the mess.
- ben509 7y agoPick a time during the day while most guests are out. Put the body in a body bag, load it on a stretcher. Take the service lift to avoid the lobby.
- lotsofpulp 7y agoNo hotel deals with bodies themselves. They will call the police.
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- Spooky23 7y agoHoteliers are always in a balance between seeing or not seeing things. Guests are too. Hotels service the public, and people's outlook on life vary greatly. If you have a bunch of cops getting to know everyone every time a lamp is stolen at a fancy hotel, they may recognize the escort at the bar, or notice some person of note with someone other than their partner. Usually hotels have security folks who interface with the police only when necessary. One time I was at a beach resort where there were 4 big groups: an association of retired DEA or FBI agents, Chick-Fil-A franchise operators regional meeting, a (very) large same-sex wedding complete with a troupe of drag queen dancers, and a CBD-oil MLM scheme sales meeting. Everyone was best off minding their business!
- avaku 7y agoI love that beach situation ;)
- smokey_the_bear 7y agoI was once at a hotel for a high school quiz bowl tournament. There was also a (very drunk) darts competition, and a Shibari meetup (Japanese bondage + furries?). There were some awkward elevator rides.
- cbanek 7y agoIf this was in Chicago, pretty sure I was there for this. It was indeed a very interesting time! If not, I think it's hilarious that this could have happened multiple times!
- skyyler 7y agoOnce a year, the furries gather in Chicago. It's quite a sight.
- smokey_the_bear 7y agoYes, Chicago. I doubt it has happened again, the quiz bowl organization took steps to prevent similar conflicts.
- neaden 7y agoBack in the day they used to have Hotel Detectives, one of whose key roles were preventing premarital sex or affairs from occurring. I think Hotel Detectives are almost totally gone now, but the attitude of protecting the hotel from scandal hasn't.
- Rychard 7y agoBecause it was posted to HN a few days ago, I checked the Wikipedia category for "Obsolete occupations"[1] to see if this might have been listed, but alas, it wasn't in the cards. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Obsolete_occupations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Obsolete_occupations
- mixmastamyk 7y agoHow does one add a category to an article to get it listed? Just figured it out. Should show when approved.
- 8bitsrule 7y agoHere's a humorous take on the old stereotype. "Unlike the private eye, he's not a romantic figure; he's paid by the hour and probably on the take. Maybe he has a little drinking problem. He...turns up. He always has, at least as far back as July 30, 1917, when two New York hotel detectives caught then-senator Warren G. Harding in bed with an underage girl ..." https://www.travelandleisure.com/articles/behind-closed-doors https://www.travelandleisure.com/articles/behind-closed-door...
- mturmon 7y agoGood point. This character is a staple of many old novels and films -- Arthur Hailey's novel Hotel (1965, adapted as a movie) has such a detective, who is corrupt and mainly wants to extract bribes from any guest who breaks a rule.
- FDSGSG 7y agoDuring a longer stay a FS property planted a bunch of ozone generators and an IQair unit outside our suite to cover up the weed smell. They never said anything, didn't even charge a smoking fee.
- coldtea 7y ago>It’s funny the lengths they’ll go to not have the police walking around the hotels and potentially getting in the news. Well, not really great lengths. Luxury hotels I know of can charge anything between 1K to 20K for a night's stay. Once in a while having a mattress they've mass bought for like $100 stole is hardly a big inconvenience...
- brianwawok 7y agoLuxury hotel beds are not $100
- megablast 7y agoWow, they cost even less? Amazing.
- wongarsu 7y agoI imagine there's a big price difference between buying one mattress and buying a hundred of them.
- coldtea 7y agoI didn't say beds, I said mattresses. I don't think people steal beds. As for mattresses now, with bulk buying it can be even less.
- joshmn 7y ago> presumably using a stolen credit card as well to make them harder to track. Credit card fraud expert here: It's very unwise to book a hotel room with a stolen credit card — trust me, I would know. Carders aren't stupid either, especially the guys that do in-store stuff. Plus, to check-in, you still need a card for incidentals; you need an ID to check in. Obviously, those can also be acquired, but... There are lots of other things that are easier to flip than mattresses that could be had with less effort and less risk. Why don't they just card a mattress online? Those lighting fixtures? There are thousands of small online stores with bad/poor/non-existent fraud prevention practices outside their processor that would love to ship them to non-billing.
- csomar 7y agoYou don't need a "fake" credit card; just one from these online debit card "fintech". Luxury hotels, if you are business-dressed, will not ask for the bill payment until checkout (at least the few I tried). So you can get away with paying the bill without even needing to steal a credit card.
- stordoff 7y ago> you need an ID to check in Not necessarily - it depends on the hotel. I've twice booked a hotel in London recently, with a card that is not in my name, and checked in with nothing more than giving my name.
- coldtea 7y ago>This makes me think that these people are only staying at the hotel to steal things and choosing hotels accordingly, presumably using a stolen credit card as well to make them harder to track. If they have a stolen credit card capable of getting charged into an expensive luxury hotel, they can do far lower risk / higher reward things than go into a hotel, use the card and risk arrest, to steal a mattress. People really do steal things, even if they are rich. Tons of rich cleptomaniacs, and lots of others who are not addicted to stealing, but wouldn't think twice about getting a matresss from a hotel.
- NullPrefix 7y agoDo they swap it with a cheap model or just take it and run?
- thrav 7y agoThat was my thought, but I’m guessing the housekeeping staff would notice that pretty easily when they swapped the sheets. They see hundreds of that hotel’s usual mattresses per day.
- zmzrr 7y agoI assume they just put it in their suitcase when they leave? At least here they don't check the room until you're gone. People stealing sheets and towels is a classic.
- gburdell3 7y agoAh yes, the old "mattress in the suitcase" trick.
- zmzrr 7y agoOh my god, I feel so stupid. I don't know why I read duvet, not mattress. That's funny though.
- lucb1e 7y agoMy Ikea mattress came rolled up very small. Not quite suitcase-sized, but if you find a way to get close to such a size using simple tools (something you can fit in a backpack or carry-on), I can see this happening. One wouldn't need a human-size suitcase to pull that off. Note that this is based on mental estimations of a ten year old memory. I may be off about how small it was, but I think the estimation should be accurate in essence.
- DonHopkins 7y agoHotels should be suspicious of guests with extremely enormous luggage.
- thunderbong 7y ago>> guests will most likely attempt to take the mattress at night when the reception desk isn’t open. But even then, how the heck do they lug a mattress out?
- ahmadss 7y agoService elevators are on every floor, so: Service elevator > service dock > load the truck > go
- dharmab 7y agoIt's amazing how many places you can go with a polo shirt or high visibility best and a contractor's clipboard.
- dsfyu404ed 7y agoDitch the clipboard for the kind of tools an electrician or HVAC tech would carry. Best to look like you're there to be helpful, not to snoop around and impose fines.
- DonHopkins 7y agoI've gotten into trade shows at Moscone for free by pushing a hand truck into the loading dock. If you look exasperated, people will get out of your way and point you in the right direction.
- anon9001 7y agoI've always wanted to do stuff like that. You sound like you have some experience. What actually happens if you get caught? Will you be arrested?
- dharmab 7y agoDepends on the exact circumstances and local trespassing and fraud laws. Ask a lawyer for details if you get a chance- perhaps reach out to LegalEagle, who makes Youtube videos about interesting laws and legal situations.
- gergely 7y agoWhy would anyone ever want a mattress permanently that was possibly used for sex by other people countless times?
- eloff 7y agoThey're less squeamish than you, apparently. For practical purposes it doesn't matter.
- asdkhadsj 7y agoAlso I already slept on it once, I'm not sure twice, thrice or hundreds of times would matter after once to me. If it grossed me out I'd rather not sleep on it at all.
- selectodude 7y agoI'm not sure these people are at the point in their lives where they demand un-fucked-on furniture.
- optimuspaul 7y agoI'm guessing that there is also a segment of society that already-fucked-on furniture is a plus.
- mhd 7y agoUnless we're getting somewhat kinky, I don't think that counts as the biggest deprecation of mattress values. I'd rate sweaty obese salesman higher than a short spout of bonking. Unless we're talking about "impure" from a moralistic pov. In which case I'd recommend slipping your local priest a few bucks to have it blessed.
- bryanrasmussen 7y agowhy would anyone want to sleep on a mattress that just recently was being used by someone else possibly also for the sex, perhaps imperfectly cleaned afterward, and get overcharged for the experience?
- gregoriol 7y agoSo five star hotels don't have... security? cameras? How can someone move something big like a mattress or a tv out of the hotel without being noticed?.. That's a horrible security mistake on the hotels' side!
- 52-6F-62 7y agoThe old "I brought it with me from home" line aha
- jmpman 7y agoWonder if you can slip it off the balcony. From one story up, I bet it lands fine into the back of a pickup. Heck, you could probably haul another one up with a winch, and cover your tracks or at least have plausible deniability.
- gregoriol 7y agoIf you can drop something that big from balcony without getting noticed, the opposite with something getting in through the balcony is also possible then, still a major security issue.
- lotsofpulp 7y agoLitigating against someone who steals from a hotel costs more than just banning the person. Hence, checking IDs and credit cards at hotels to make it easier to ban people. I'm surprised hotel chains don't have a nationwide blacklist.
- ehnto 7y agoI suspect people planning to steal a mattress didn't use their real name and credit card.
- lotsofpulp 7y agoForging government IDs and credit cards would dissuade many people, especially with the difficult in cloning the chips in credit cards.
- rolltiide 7y agoI’ve been thoroughly surprised by how much I can do to a hotel room that doesn’t result in any “incidental” charges So I’ve definitely upped the ante and I guess others have taken it to a further extreme I think a lot of hotels are a conduit for phantom customers as an accounting convenience so this stuff really isnt a priority
- ALittleLight 7y agoWhy would you "up the ante" to do unnecessary damage to people who are being kind to you?
- dahdum 7y agoCongratulations, you’re part of the reason we can’t have nice things.
- hammock 7y ago>phantom customers as an accounting convenience You referring to money laundering? Accounting fraud?
- rolltiide 7y agoin the universe of obfuscating the origin of funds those would be subsets of it yes, but it doesn't have to have an illicit origin
- technofiend 7y agoLinen theft is enough of an issue that some hotels invested in RFID-tracking to cut down on loss. https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2011/05/rfid_tags_prote.html https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2011/05/rfid_tags_pro... https://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/roadwarriorvoices/2015/02/06/yes-your-hotel-knows-that-you-just-stole-that-towel-because-they-sewed-a-microchip-in-it/83191436/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/roadwarriorvoices/2015...
- jojo2000 7y agoIn that case RFID is used to keep track of how many times the linen was washed. This way, you'll never get premium linen/towel if you are in an eco room =]
- paultopia 7y agoWhat I want to know is what five-star hotel doesn't have someone at the reception desk 24 hours?
- CaptainZapp 7y agoItems, like matresses, are usually stolen in hotels with direct access from the room to the parking garage.
- lucb1e 7y agoI presume you're asking for a friend?
- RcouF1uZ4gsC 7y ago> The club offers more than a 100 resorts in North America and the Caribbean to their owner-members. The caption explains a lot. It seems these aren’t necessarily the full service luxury hotels with the fully staffed reception and bell service 24 hours a day. These seem to be time shares which are glorified condos. I have stayed at these before. While they are nice, there is not the level of service that you get at a full service hotel. For example, There is no bellman, instead they provide trolleys for you to being up your own luggage. The cleaning staff only come between stays, the reception desk is only open during business hours, etc. Given this, a lot more stuff make sense. It would be trivial to load up a trolley with the mattress and take it where you want it. At night, there is not a lot of people around so it would be easy. The cleaning staff don’t come everyday so it would be be some time before the missing mattress was noticed.
- apacheCamel 7y agoCouldn't they just figure out who stayed in the room last? Or am I missing something entirely?
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- moftz 7y agoUse a stolen CC or use a stolen identity to open a new CC and use that. And if they did track you down but the mattress was already sold off, can they prove that you even stole it? You could easily just say someone must have slipped in after you checked out and stole it.
- zwayhowder 7y agoI returned to my room in a hotel I stayed at frequently while housekeeping were still in there. I chatted to the staff got an extra towel and more tea and only when they left realised I was in the room one floor below mine, that I'd stayed in the week before. Housekeeping don't know who the guests are if you walk into the room confidently they won't say anything at all.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- murgindrag 7y agoThe stealing remotes / batteries line bugs me a lot more. If I'm in a hotel room, and something has dead alkalines, I'll toss the batteries, and try to make it very obvious the batteries were removed so they can be replaced for the next guest. That's not theft. I really can't imagine anyone stealing batteries. I've never taken a remote, but I do sometimes find a hotel keycard in my luggage when I get home. I stay at the same hotels, so I tend to return them, although sometimes a few months later. Small items like that tend to be misplaced or lost by absentminded guests (and possibly even employees). I can't imagine anyone taking a remote on purpose. What would be the point? Most are specific to a given TV model, and wouldn't even work with a TV back home. There is natural shrinkage which happens everywhere (especially my sock drawer). If someone takes a mattress, coffee machine, or towel, that's theft. If someone tosses dead batteries or misplaces a small item, calling that theft just seems mean. It's attributing bad intentions to something which is just part of life.
- atomwaffel 7y ago> If I'm in a hotel room, and something has dead alkalines, I'll toss the batteries, and try to make it very obvious the batteries were removed so they can be replaced for the next guest. That's not theft. I agree it’s not theft, but the correct thing to do is probably to ask the front desk if they could replace the batteries, like you would for a light bulb. That way, the batteries can (hopefully) be disposed of properly and you get a working remote control.
- gsk22 7y agoIn my city, the current recommendation is to simply throw alkaline batteries in the garbage - no special disposal. Only rechargeable batteries require special disposal. This goes against what I was taught growing up, but then most recycling isn't as green as we were led to believe.
- praptak 7y agoWell I remember a handyman who came to our room to fix an AC remote. He found that the batteries were dead and the brand the hotel does not use. He sort of shrugged and told me it happens all the time - guests just swap their used batteries for the hotel ones.
- remmargorp64 7y agoI've always thought it was weird how people have no problem sleeping on a hotel bed that has been slept on by potentially hundreds/thousands of people (and will even steal those mattresses), but they would never dream of buying a used mattress that even one person has slept on.
- Spooky23 7y ago> they would never dream of buying a used mattress that even one person has slept on Lol. Many people buy "new to you" mattresses.
- all_blue_chucks 7y agoNot in countries with bedbugs.
- Scoundreller 7y agoBedbugs are easy to kill. Just steam ‘em long enough. Or some other fumigation method. Or an autoclave. Or ethylene oxide if you want to sterilize it. Or freezer temperatures for enough days. That’s an easily industrializable problem for mattresses. They’re standard size. Seal them up in plastic when you’re done. Getting them out of furniture or behind floorboards is harder.
- TurkishPoptart 7y agoYes, and that might work 99% of the time, but if one customer even THINKS he/she got bedbugs at your hotel, the PR hit and reputational risk hit eliminates all benefit.
- lucb1e 7y agoIs that a regional thing? I was under the impression they just popped up every now and then, though I've never heard of any except in stories on Reddit. Don't think I heard anyone mention that it only occurs in a certain climate, and we do have airplanes so it's bound to spread to any place it can. That said, I would totally buy a second hand mattress. People buy used clothes all the time, isn't that similar? Could contain anything (including bed bugs, the top ddg hits seem to suggest).
- poulsbohemian 7y agoI'm disappointed given the headline that there wasn't any mention of the make of mattresses that are being stolen. We bought a new mattress about a year ago and sampled some in the $20K+ (yes!) range just for the fun of it. If these are legit 5 star luxury hotels experiencing mattress theft, they could be of the same cost variety. We like our much less expensive one a lot better, even if it isn't the same model that was on the Titanic or used by royalty.
- adwi 7y agoThere are 10,000 mattress stores in America—for reference there are 14,000 Starbucks [0]. The markup must be sky-high to sustain that, and I‘d assume hotels buying factory direct at a fraction of retail. Never mind the product tie-ins mattress companies do with hotels [1] (which is pretty genius... how often do you really get to test a new mattresses?) [0] https://www.npr.org/transcripts/676543180?storyId=676543180?storyId=676543180 https://www.npr.org/transcripts/676543180?storyId=676543180?... [1] https://www.serta.com/mattresses/hotel-collections https://www.serta.com/mattresses/hotel-collections
- fnord77 7y agoYes, the markup is huge. There's a local retailer that sells "natural" latex mattresses for about $2200. You can find sites online where you can buy all the components and make your own latex mattress ("make" being stack the components in the outer shell and zip it closed) for under $500 shipped.
- benibela 7y agoIt goes in both directions In Germany I paid like 20€ for my mattress
- professorTuring 7y agoI was asking myself, how would I steal a mattress in a hotel? Probably buying a new one, the cheapest for the size, I will exchange packaging, make the bed and... profit? How long till the staff detect it?
- chiph 7y agoOpen a window, have your friend waiting down below ready to catch it?
- asdff 7y agoYou can open a window in a hotel?
- culturestate 7y agoLike many other things, it depends on some combination of which hotel you're staying in and where you are in the world. There are plenty of places that would be suffocating if you couldn't open a window. That said, if this were my mattress theft scheme I'd probably prefer to source a suite that had a usable balcony rather than worry about the windows.
- ec109685 7y agoAnd then use a pulley to pull up the replacement one?
- DonHopkins 7y agoMaybe they just don't want room service finding all the blood on the mattress and reporting it to the police.
- stickydink 7y agoFriends of mine recently opened an Italian restaurant. It's not low-end, $20-25 plates. They have a huge problem with people stealing salt and pepper shakers, silverware, ($1 IKEA) candle holders...
- quotha 7y ago1) Scratch 1 day off from your stay at a luxury hotel 2) Buy a Casper
- reaperducer 7y agoThere have been a few hotels where I've wanted to take home the bed or the bedding. (The Marriott in Brussels FTW) Fortunately, most high-end hotels allow you to purchase their stuff online.
- qes 7y agoI haven't actually measured, but I would swear the mattresses are smaller than standard sizes as well. Every king bed hotel room I've stayed in for the past decade is certainly smaller than my king bed at home. Timeshares and resorts are hit or miss, personal rentals like AirBnB are often normal mattresses, but hotels must be buying some weird hotel only stock where they undersize the mattresses enough to save money in volume but little enough where they feel like they can get away with still labeling them standard sizes.
- asadhaider 7y agoI've stayed in a few hotels with cards in the rooms advertising to sell the mattresses to guests if they've had a good nights sleep.
- bertab 7y agoHere is the original source (results of the survey): https://www.wellness-heaven.de/wellness/study-theft-in-hotels/ https://www.wellness-heaven.de/wellness/study-theft-in-hotel...
- hshs80008 7y agohaylah09@gmail.com
- soapboxrocket 7y agoI'm more likely to believe that its employees stealing the mattresses than guests. And not because of social economic reasons, but because I think it's a lot easier for employees to sneak out a mattress than a guest.
- selfishgene 7y agoNow I know why I see so many mattresses for sale on Craigslist.
- gatherhunterer 7y agoThere is no link to the actual data in the article (https://www.wellness-heaven.de/wellness/study-theft-in-hotels/ https://www.wellness-heaven.de/wellness/study-theft-in-hotel...) and even it claims that mattresses were the least commonly-stolen items on the list. It also provides no information on frequency of theft. Are there 300 pens stolen for every one mattress? Fewer than 1 in 20 4 and 5-star hotels even reported mattress theft. Bereft of meaningful data and fluffed up with speculation, this is out of place on HN.
- andykx 7y agoFrankly, even a single mattress theft is absurd. What are the logistics of that?
- systemtest 7y agoI feel guilty stealing a used bar of soap from the hotel. I would punish myself for decades if I stole a mattress.