Those who regularly stay in hotels probably face this same issue
It’s a top guest complaint but many hotels can’t or are reluctant to fix it.
Upon arrival one night at our resort hotel, during a three - night vacation with my wife and young son, we hopped from one bedroom to another in the same hotel to get some peace and quiet when in the room. Night problems feel worse because you’re tired, options are limited, and you want a fast solution – which sadly didn’t happen.
The first room we entered had an ancient air-conditioning unit which apart from making a weird noise was quite loud and unsettling. When we were moved to a second room, it was the noise from the mini refrigerator that was disturbing. We were then relocated to another room, where we could hear muffled conversation from the adjoining room which happened to have a (locked) interconnecting door to ours. We checked out the following day to another hotel.
Ask guests what luxury feels like and they will describe the bed, the bathroom, the view. But ask them what ruins a stay and one answer dominates: noise: A service corridor door slamming at midnight, the sound of the television from the adjoining room coming through the wall, a fridge compressor cycling on at 3 am. Quiet is the invisible amenity — guests never compliment it directly, yet its absence overrides everything else the room does well. No thread count survives a sleepless night.
Ask any night manager what wakes a guest at 2 am and the answer is rarely the traffic outside. More often it is something inside the hotel. Most noise complaints in hotels are attributed to the obvious culprits — corridors, lifts, neighbouring rooms and electrical appliances in the hotel room. Talking to other friends who like me who regularly stay in hotels, another pet peeve was staying in a room close to the elevator, where the “dinging” of the elevators opening and closing all night can awaken even a heavy sleeper.
After cleanliness, noise is the top concern of hotel guests. And with an increased emphasis on quality sleep for health and wellness, hotel guests are more adamant than ever that a good night’s sleep is a key part of what they’re booking. The expectations of today’s travellers go beyond questioning whether a bed is comfortable; they are thinking about the complete environment — sound, light, room temperature, pillow support and how easily they can disconnect from technology. Bottomline: as hotel prices rise, so do guests’ expectations, and in the end, guests need to sleep undisturbed. It’s what staying in a hotel is mainly for, isn’t it?
Quiet is a specification, not an accident
There are standards for sound transmission in modern building codes and one would be forgiven for assuming that the noise in newly build hotels would be controlled. In the US, a sound transmission class (STC) score of 50 is “the benchmark”. Rooms that are built with that STC score would shield conversation or loud music in another room from filtering through.
However, there are a countless number of hotels around the world that were built before such standards were put in place, and yet many of the rooms in those hotels, because they were built with either a cast-in-concrete wall or a brick-and-mortar wall, virtually kept out noise from the adjoining rooms or the corridor outside. However, these methods designed at mitigating sound cost money, and that’s something that translates into a financial unease.
Whilst hotels prefer to spend more in creating attractive public areas, bars, restaurants and recreation facilities, investment aimed at to a good night’s sleep is usually proportionate with the price point for the hotel room. Meaning: Only in higher end hotels charging a premium room rate, would the necessary investment be made to mitigate sound. Conversely, rooms sold at a lower rate often let in noise from adjoining rooms because budget accommodations use lightweight, thin partition walls and skip expensive soundproofing materials.
First-night effect
It’s nighttime and you’re exhausted on your first night in the hotel, but the bed feels wrong and you struggle to sleep. This is known as the “first-night effect”. It means when we sleep somewhere new, our brains don’t fully switch off, and it has nothing to do with the thickness of the walls or noise from the hallway. Brain activity recordings have shown that during the first night in a new environment, the left side of the brain remains more responsive to unfamiliar sounds, even during deep sleep, compared to the second night. Once we become familiar with the space, this vigilance usually fades.
The truth is that when we are in an unfamiliar environment, we fundamentally have a harder time unwinding. Most importantly, find yourself a hotel that takes its hospitality seriously. While there are many things you can do to ensure a good night’s sleep while traveling, there are an increasing number of hotels that are eager to help you on your journey.
Shafeek Wahab - Editor, Hospitality Sri Lanka, Consultant, Trainer, Motivational Speaker, Mystery Guest Auditor, Ex-Hotelier
|
|
|
|
