Tchiowa

Do we still have to tip them?

cbn42

There is a difference between perception and reality, and feeling safer does not actually make you safer. It could even be counterproductive. If you are at the check-in desk fixated on whether your room is at the end of a long hallway, counting how many duplicate keys are being made, and reminding the clerk not to say your room number out loud, you may be distracted long enough that you don't notice a thief pilfering your luggage.

Most people are bad at assessing risk. The best way to stay safe is to be rational and focus on measures that have the largest impact in reducing the most significant threats, rather than looking for random ideas of little things that people do to make themselves feel better.

MSPeconomist

OTOH, there are minor habits that can make one safer, such as always having keys in hand when approaching a locked door or vehicle rather than hunting for keys while standing at the door. Similarly, one can learn to lock doors after entering almost immediately. These little things need not be distracting and cost little in time/effort/money.

Tizzette

The title of this thread is "What are your tips for hotel room safety?" yet a few posters are taking macho glee in calling paranoia for contributing tips. When you are a young woman, you have to deal with unwelcome attention from strangers and it is hardly limited to travelling. Small precautions are helpful, especially if it is just as easy to do them as not. Why be at the end of a long hallway if you can just as easily be a few doors from the elevator? That's no different than trying to park your car in a lighted area close to the door. Do you leave spare keys and valuables out at home when you have a cleaning crew of strangers? At home, a mister doesn't feel the need to put a phony second name on the mailbox but it is a common precaution of single girls and no different than asking for two keys. The risk might be slight but small precautions do make a difference in not just feeling safer, but being safer.

MaxBuck

No question, safety and security issues are more significant to females, and especially those traveling alone. Good reminder, and mea culpa on my own part. (Some of us men are just so self-centered that we forget there's another gender with an entirely different set of problems.)

You want to go where?

It isn't just women traveling alone who get unwelcome attention from strangers. I have had more than one knock at my door from 'ladies of the evening' at 2 or 3 in the morning wanting to know if I 'needed company'. A number of times those knocks were accompanied by them trying the door handle. (Important to note: this was in brand-name hotels in Africa).

zkzkz

The handing in keys at the front desk and picking them back up on return always struck me as insane. Hotel staff rarely verify the identity of the person returning. If you're lucky they recognize you from earlier but often the night staff is different and in any case the issue is not whether they recognize you, it's what they do if they don't recognize you.

Any hotel that has you return the key when you leave I simply treat like a youth hostel where anything valuable has to be carried with me at all times and never left in the room.

I'm not paranoid about people targeting me specially or attacking me but pickpockets and hotel room thieves are hardly exotic animals.

Hot Pocket

I am a safety engineer by formal training. I do health, safety, and security consulting for my present organization, and I have given formal presentations on hotel safety and security concerns.

IMHO, the fire safety tips are highly relevant. Use your deadbolt 100% of the time. Most everything else in this thread is paranoia/nonsense.

WillTravel

For women travelers (like me), any rapist is more likely to be a business associate or a seemingly nice acquaintance than a random guy entering the room. I have read accounts of hotel rapes, and they seem to involve fellow conference attendees, bosses, or colleagues more than anything.

I have friends who tell me that I should tell people that I am waiting for my "husband" when I'm alone somewhere, that any conversation with a local man should immediately turn to this imaginary "husband", and that one should wear a fake wedding ring. But given I am about as transparent as Saran wrap when it comes to lying, I doubt any of these would be effective or useful.

klew97

Regarding elevators, I suggest that ladies not tell someone who offers to press the button for her by asking "what floor?" until they have already pressed their own. If they are waiting for your floor before pressing theirs, give the wrong floor (off by one above or below) and after they select theirs, press the real one yourself and claim you got mixed up with the last hotel you stayed in. Or if possible, reach over yourself and sloppily mash your hand/fingers on the buttons to press the one you want and at least one other. If they also change and step off on your floor, you are now suspicious, go only a few steps, pretend you can't find/lost your key and get back on the elevator to go back to the front desk and wait it out.

LondonElite

...or just say 'thank you, five please,' and chill out.

jspira

Plus they have little downside ^

You want to go where?

These minor habits shouldn't be ones that are practiced only while traveling. They should be life habits. Granted, there are places where it isn't really necessary to keep your doors locked but as the world's population grows ever more urban, for most of us, these are basic practices which make sense.

steveben53

Point 5 relating to leaving computers and valuables in the in room safe. Last year in Shanghai, I managed to forget the combination and I urgently needed to get into the safe in my room. I happened to ask the chamber maid if she could help cos I was in a desperate hurry - she had the safe opened in a flash

Also, you may find that certain travel insurance does not cover you for valuables stolen from the in room safe. If the item is of value, lodge it in the main safe

steveben53

If ever you have experienced a fire in a hotel, maybe you would not be so shocked that some people do not care to be locked in, in unfamiliar surroundings