It’s funny how some minor things about hotels can change on a widespread basis, without most people noticing. This is totally not important, though I do find it to be interesting.
In this post:
Why hotels often have phones next to the toilet
At least historically, you may have noticed that there’s almost always a phone right next to the toilet at upscale and luxury hotels. Now, cleanliness concerns aside, one would probably assume that this is a safety feature, perhaps since people are most likely to slip and fall in the bathroom, so it’s useful to have a phone nearby.
While that might indirectly be the reason that hotels have had this feature, the actual reason is a little more nuanced than that. Historically — at least going back a decade or so — hotels did this with an ulterior motive.
Specifically, AAA has its hotel “Diamond” ratings, and in order to get a four Diamond or above rating, one of the requirements was to have a phone in the bathroom. So hotels offered this feature so that they could check that box, in order to get that rating.
This AAA requirement was quietly dropped, and you’ll notice it
In the past several years, it’s much rarer to find phones in hotel bathrooms, especially at newly built hotels. For some reason, this “clicked” for me during a recent hotel stay. After all, you wouldn’t really think of a phone next to the toilet unless you actually needed it, so it’s easy to not put much thought into it.
But for whatever reason, it’s something I recently processed while photographing a hotel toilet (as one does!). “Hey, there’s no phone anymore, I wonder what happened.”
So I looked it up, and as it turns out, AAA completely dropped the bathroom phone requirement from its ratings system. I’m trying to figure out when exactly this change happened. Best I can tell, it was with the 2018 standards update that AAA eliminated this requirement, as that was largely intended to reflect updates in technology. Prior to that, the last major update to AAA Diamond requirements was all the way back in 2003, so that’s quite a long gap.
Now that I go back and look at all the pictures I’ve taken, I notice a majority of luxury properties in recent years don’t have these, and I just haven’t noticed. It seems logical enough for AAA to drop this, especially since we live in an era where most people have a smartphone that they can use in an emergency.
For those curious, you can find AAA’s current Diamond rating guidelines here.
Bottom line
Up until 2018 or so, upscale and luxury hotels pretty consistently had phones in the bathrooms. While one could argue that was for safety, the ulterior was certainly to be able to get a AAA four Diamond rating. However, those guidelines were updated over time, and it’s no longer necessary for hotels to have phones in the bathroom in order to get any sort of a rating.
I recognize that I might be the only person who finds this interesting, so I’m sorry/you’re welcome.
Am I the only one who is just now processing the lack of phones in hotel bathrooms?
At Okura and Prince Gallery in Tokyo, on my most recent stay, each hotel room had a phone in the toilet area.
The Okura also had tv by the tub.
This is so funny you should write about this as I just noticed this yesterday at the hotel I was staying. Thought about it and realized that more and more hotels were going without the phone in the bathroom. Made me wonder why.
The past two hotels I've stayed in didn't have ANY phones in the room at all.
Almost 50 years ago a buddy and I checked into a hotel paid for by the company we were job interviewing with. This was a more upscale hotel than either of us had stayed at previously. We were shocked to find a phone in the bathroom. After a fair amount of laughter, we had to have a "john" to "john" phone call between our rooms. When we returned back to our university, our friends couldn't believe it. Who knew such things existed?
Lol, I remember staying at hotels as a kid and being shocked how some of the really nice ones had TVs in the bathrooms. I loved it! I could watch cartoons while in the shower!
My strict parents didn't let me though (they would confiscate the remote), so I didn't get to live that fantasy until I went off to college lol.
Almost 50 years ago a buddy and I checked into a hotel paid for by the company we were job interviewing with. This was a more upscale hotel than either of us had stayed at previously. We were shocked to find a phone in the bathroom. After a fair amount of laughter, we had to have a "john" to "john" phone call between our rooms. When we returned back to our university, our friends couldn't believe it. Who knew such things existed?
Fun fact - in order to get that 5th Diamond - AAA used to require each room have their own Fax machine. That didn’t need to be in the Bathroom though ;-)
hey how do I need to call for toilet paper now ;-)
It's the Tim Dunn phone.
You use it to talk shit.
When I was younger this was one of my informal “tests” of the quality of a hotel, with luxury hotels expected to have 3 phones - Bedside, desk and bathroom. I thought that the bathroom phone meant that you could always pick up a call from the front desk, even while on the toilet. With the advent of mobile smartphones, landlines have increasingly become obsolete, which makes the need for multiple landline phones in a room unnecessary.
My parents built their dream home in 1988. Every loo had a phone. I was a distracted teen then so I don't recall the rationale. Convenience, I suppose?
Of course, the truly nice hotels still have bidets.
Few years ago me and my friend checked into a hotel in Antwerp and after he used the bathroom, he found out that the door handle didn't work from the inside. If a solo traveller got that room and didn't take their own phone into the bathroom, the bathroom phone would be their last resort.
It's a neat feature and I assume not that expensive?
Until today, I never thought of the hygiene issues arising from having a phone right next to a toilet :s
I thought those phones were to make calls to the front desk when you run out of toilet paper. This problem was solved by keeping an extra roll in the bathroom.
And there was me thinking it was so you could order room service, just as you were making more room…
Bathroom phones used to be really useful when i got room service calls in middle of my me time.