ECJ EUROPEAN Cleaning Journal

Housekeeping teams have taken to social media to tell guests what they are doing right - and wrong - when checking out of their hotel rooms.

Guests asked staff in a thread on Reddit about what they could do differently to ease the cleaner's burden. And the responses revealed that a stripped bed and a tidy room were often preferable to a tip.

The "Hotel Maids of Reddit" thread incorporates posts from cleaners and guests regarding practices that would help to make life easier for housekeeping teams. One cleaner wrote: "Flush the toilets please. Leaving a toilet behind that looks like an open septic tank is really just mean", while another asked guests not to leave rubbish strewn around the room.

"Put your garbage in the garbage and empty all water bottles and cans before putting them in the recycling," read the post. Hotel customers were also asked to refrain from making their bed before leaving, but to remove the linen instead and leave it piled up on the bed ready for washing.

And guests were asked to organise any items left behind for washing or binning. "Consolidate 'like' items so that all towels can be dumped together in the bathtub, and throw out any used amenities such as soaps, shampoo and coffee pods unless the hotel has some kind of recycling programme," was the plea.

Surprisingly, cleaners claimed that tipping was neither necessary or expected, adding that an appreciative note and a tidy room were considered to be more important.