Disturbing Room Key Situation...Seeking Advice on How to Procede
 

Hello, first post here though I've read these forums from time to time.

Last night I stayed at a Best Western SureStay Suites in Wilmington, DE. I was in the area for an engagement party and didn't make a reservation but stayed later than I thought so decided to book a room rather than drive back to Philadelphia.

I arrive to the nearest hotel (the best western surestay) and stop at the gas station in the same parking lot grab a bottle of water and a snack before checking in. While walking back to my car a very nice looking, normal sounding female asks me if she could borrow my phone for a minute. Her's was dead and she was trying to get in touch with her friend who was supposed to be picking her up. I let her make a call, but nobody answered.

Trying to be nice to this perfectly normal seeming person I offer to let her charge her phone in my room. She is very grateful and I was happy to help out.

So we walk into the hotel lobby together. We had exchanged first names, so that is the only information of mine she knew. She stood in the lobby while i checked in at the front desk. 1 room key. 1 name. The man at the front desk did not acknowledge or ask if the girl that walked in was with me or needed a room key as well.

As soon as we get to the room she uses the bathroom for 20 minutes. I do not know what she was doing, but I assume it was drug related. This was obviously a red flag as she had still not plugged her phone in. When she got out of the bathroom I told her I really needed to go to sleep, because, well I did and she was very weird and making me uncomfortable. She got upset saying she didn't even get to charge her phone. I offered to buy her an uber home just to get her out of there but she seemed sceptical...as was I. So I told her she had to leave. Walked her outside to the parking lot and went back in.

Flash forward to 4 am. Im fast asleep. My door busts wide open and it is the girl yelling at me about god knows what and threatening to slash my tires! (?!?!) I get up and ask her what the hell she is doing in my room and how she got in and she said she needed her purse? ( I didn't see it). She then left. Now Im wide awake. I go outside to see if my car tires were indeed slashed...in 30 degree weather...in shorts and a t-shirt. They were not and this lunatic appeared to be gone.

I go back to my room to get warmer clothes on and go give hell to the person at the front desk. But MY ROOM KEY IS NOW DISABLED. Furiously, I found an employee and ask them to re-code my key and ask them why in the world would they give a RANDOM PERSON, who was NOT ON THE RESERVATION, who DID NOT KNOW MY NAME, a CARD to MY ROOM...WITHOUT CALLING ME or asking for any form of proof that this person knew me.

The employee, who was very unapologetic gave me a new key and I just went back to my room and planned on filing a complaint in the morning because it was now almost 5 am.

When I woke up and packed my bag I noticed that my iPad was gone. That person stole my iPad. The person who the front desk employee gave a card to without any information about me at all.

I filed a complaint with headquarters and the location. They are telling me I will receive a call within 7 days.

I am just wondering if anyone here may have any insight on what i can expect as far as compensation goes. It was a new iPad Pro. Those things are not cheap.

Thank you, and DON'T TALK TO STRANGERS (apparently). LOL! Crazy.

Sounds like a the problem was you inviting a total stranger to a room in the first place. If they saw you walk in with someone and proceeded to take them up to your room i would have thought either your wife or girlfriend. These people are skilled at doing these kinds of stuff and lying their way through these situations. If you fell for her lies then the FD agent may have too. No good deed goes unpunished. Im not saying the hotel is not at fault as well but you are putting all the blame on them when its not.

When she was in your room the first time, she could have taken your key and replaced it with one she had found someplace.

Inviting a "very nice looking" woman up to your room...so she can charge her phone.....

Ummm..... OK....sure.

How about the police report? With the story you've told here, that should have been the first place you called, as you are the victim of a crime. There could be video that might help them identify the suspect if she's known to work that area of town.

I remember several incidents, when I was working, of victims calling from hotel rooms to report their property taken by someone they allowed in for the night. We went out on every single one and took a police report.

Why invite her into your room? She could've charge the phone in the lobby, while you keep yourself safe in your room. When you invite her into your room and she does go in, there's more to the story.

You have fallen to one of the many scams that go around. The hotel has no blame on this, you should have filed a police report immediately and requested the hotel to see if their security cameras saw anything. The mere fact that you allowed her to be with you while checking in and walk her to your room will clearly indicate in the eyes of any one nearby that she was with you, no reason for the FD clerk to think something is going on, besides, you mentioned exchanging name, therefore she knew who you where. To a mere outsider, there was nothing suspicious going on between the 2 of you. Never give your phone/keys/car/etc. to a stranger, never give your real name to a stranger, never give your home address to a stranger. Just never deal with a stranger. My # 1 rule of thumb, if I don't know you, I move on.

No need to shout with capital letters. We can all read.

This is 100%.on you and represents a careless approach to your own personal safety. You should count yourself lucky that you suffered no personal harm and that all you lost was an iPad. You have to take responsibility for your own actions and one of those is not inviting strangers into your room at night.

The fact that the room key was disabled suggests to me that the stranger found a random card key and swapped that for yours when she stole your iPad. While it's always possible that the front desk issued her a new card key, I'm not sure why you have jumped to that conclusion.

Finally, the fact that you are pursuing this with the property, but not the police, opens a lot more questions.

Wow. I'd be wary of ever offering assistance to anyone, especially someone with a dead phone. Every time my phone's died, I've been able to find a plug in a public area. The OP's lucky to be alive.

I agree that she swapped room keys with the OP.

I think you got very lucky. Another scam is to have the girl's huge boyfriend show up at the door and accuse you of cheating. And shaking you down for every penny you have. Or dragging you to the nearest ATM. Or worse.

Did she offer you a pizza? 'Cause that would have been kind of cool.

Mike

I am actually surprised at the judgemental tone all of the previous responses. Regardless of your actions being smart or stupid, the hotel has a basic responsibility for ensuring safety of guests. Even if this woman was a sex worker you hired, under no circumstances should a front desk cut a key for a non-registered guest. That is basic. The morality of the guest is irrelevant: a hotel should only allow guestroom access to registered guests. Period.

I am unaware of what US laws are, but in Canada a hotelier would be partially liable for any damage or injury caused from a situation like this.

It seems far fetched to lurk in a gas station, equipped with a dead matching hotel key card, on the off chance of scamming a hotel guest.

Not really, scams come in many different ways, so that you do not even suspect of what is going on, until you find out that you have been the victim of one. There's the phone call from "front desk" in the middle of the night asking to verify the credit card for the reservation, the random knock at the door with the food delivery, etc. Also, is not that difficult to find a hotel key card, sometimes people just throw then away as they exit the premises, I've seen many key cards laying around, perhaps this one in question may have been stolen, who knows. The scammer will not be lingering around the hotel lobby, as he/she could certainly be spotted after awhile, security footage will most likely capture their image. We also do not know front desk clerk version of the events that transpired that night, if he actually gave the lady a key or not, but the fact that that OP key was disabled lead some to believe that the key was switched while she was in the room.

OP has not come back to provide input, such as what happened after he received a call from HQ and the location, also he has not commented on why he did not file a police report. Once he let the lady in, he exposed/opened himself up to anything that could potentially happen, just like if you open an attachment from a strangers email asking to verify your bank details, or click on a link from a strangers email, you shouldn't be surprised to what comes next. You basically let trouble in to your home.

Well, IceWhitecube, welcome to FT. I suspect you're not going to get the response you are hoping for here.

There are a lot of holes in this story, and I can't quite decide whether some of the information you've provided is fanciful or whether you really didn't see this coming.

- If the gas station and hotel share the same parking lot, why couldn't she charge her phone in the hotel lobby?
- Did you try and call the number that apparently wouldn't answer? Is it even real?
- You invited a very nice looking female to your room? There has got to be more to this. I couldn't imagine inviting a complete stranger into my hotel room.
- If she didn't get to charge her phone in the room, would you not have alerted the front desk to what was obviously at this point a scam? You must have had alarm bells ringing by now.
- Why would you not file a report with the police? This does not make sense to me.

It is pretty obvious that she switched key cards with you. The hotel owes you nothing, in my opinion.