by Jenna Obney

Created on: November 22, 2008   Last Updated: February 02, 2009

I am the front desk manager at a popular hotel chain. I take a turn at every shift and deal with a variety of guest issues. I am there when everyone checks in and deal with all the problems that may arise during the evening. I give directions on where to eat, where to shop, answer phones, make reservations, keep the coffee hot and fresh, set your wake-up calls, and field calls from rooms that feel the a/c isn't working well enough, or a room is too cold, or people that lock themselves out of their rooms, or need a cot brought up, or put a do not disturb tag up and now need fresh towels, and I do this all by myself, 5 days a week, in a hotel of about 80 rooms.

If there is a lull in my night there is always a meeting room that needs to be cleaned, a computer that needs fixing, faxes to be sent, etc etc etc. I don't mind this. I like to keep busy, but there is a breaking point.

Last night I checked in 23 rooms in less than hour. A normal check in takes about 5 minutes, but there's always someone who has 20 questions about where to eat and when is checkout and how do I find the pool? In the middle of all this a woman tells me that she needs a cot put into her room. Mind you when making a reservation you can reserve a cot and then housekeeping can get it all set up in your room before you get here, making my life a little easier. Now I will have to find a way to get away from the phone and go to the 3rd floor to get a cot and bring it back to the 2nd floor and put it in her room, and I still have 20 more check-ins due in(on top of the 23 I just did). I explain to the woman I will get to it as soon as I can and wish her a good night.

Not even half an hour later she is back at my desk to let me know that no one has brought her a cot yet. I feel like telling her that no one is going to bring her a cot because I am the only one here and the phone is still ringing as we speak but I calmly inform her I will bring it up as soon as humanly possible. 15 minutes later she calls the desk to inform not to bother she will make do with what she has. Mind you its not even 7:30pm and I sincerely doubt her teenagers are attempting to go to bed, she just has no patience.

Tonight on top of my normal duties I was apparently a daycare. Two girls, no older than ten thought it would be great fun to ride up and down the elevator repeatedly pushing the alarm button which makes a bell ring and makes me have to rush out to the call box to see if any one it actually stuck, but no. Then they decided

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