Hotel insider secrets to big savings and clean rooms
Houston - The summer travel season kicks off on Memorial Day weekend. Ever wondered whether your hotel room is really clean? Or wish you had the inside secrets to scoring hotel deals?
No one knows better what goes on in hotels than people who have worked in them. So we took the questions you want to know to a couple of former hotel employees. And boy are they giving us their inside scoop!
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Former hotel employees are pulling back the covers on hotel secrets. Tiktoker "Halee with a Flair" tells us how to check for bed bugs and other surprises.
"I turn off the lights and use a flashlight to check the bed seams for bedbugs. Microwaves, mini-fridges, those usually get missed. The coffee makers are very easy to get missed," said hotel expert Halee Whiting, who owns travel agency Travel With A Flair.
Former hotel employee and freelance writer Alene Laney says while sheets are washed, comforters and bedspreads are usually not.
"If your hotel has a bedspread, just rip it right off. You don’t want to be touching that thing. Just sleep with the sheets," said Laney.
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And while many hotels do clean phones and TV remotes, you may want to bring wipes just in case.
One way to know a hotel is clean is to check if it has a AAA Diamond rating from one of their anonymous inspectors who gave it the white glove test.
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"No lipstick, no residue, no water spots. Very clean," said an inspector we followed as he checked out a hotel room.
The AAA inspector showed us a secret to find out whether your hotel room has really been cleaned. If you see spatters on the bathroom mirror, that's a sign that your bathroom may not have been cleaned.
When it comes to saving money on hotels, the former hotel insiders say you can shop around for the best price on travel websites, but book directly with the hotel, and sign up for its reward program.
"You can have that price matched at the hotel, so you can still get your points. And some brands even offer a discount on top of it for you finding that," explained Whiting.
They recommend utilizing reward credit cards and hotel points to save even more.
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"Sometimes it’s cheaper to buy points for hotels than it is to pay outright," said Whiting.
Whiting says most people don't check the promotion tabs on hotel websites. We clicked on Hilton's promotion page, for example, and found a long list of deals.
And the insiders say hotel clerks have many discount codes behind the counter. Just let them know you're a member of things like unions, AARP, AAA, or the company where you work.
"Until you’ve been in an industry, you just don’t have the industry secrets," said Laney.