A longtime OMAAT reader asked for my take on a situation he recently dealt with. I’ll share my perspective, and then I’m curious how others feel.
In this post:
Crowne Plaza guest makes alarming breakfast discovery
An OMAAT reader who asked to remain anonymous (since he frequents this property) shared the following unfortunate hotel breakfast story with me:
On one of my stays at a Crowne Plaza, I almost got hurt badly by a sharp metal shrapnel in the bakery item at breakfast. I say almost because luckily that day, I had time to kill and was eating slowly, so detected it immediately on biting. I raised it to the hotel and they were clueless what to do. They didn’t take away the bakery items, didn’t apologize, and offered no compensation — just “manager is busy in a meeting and we will call you tomorrow.” That was July 31st.
For additional context:
- I have stayed at this property multiple times prior. It’s nothing stellar, but breakfast has been decent and is attractive with points bookings. I had paid for this stay using points. On prior occasions, there have been ants in the room, a hair in breakfast, but I have let it slide.
- For this stay, I initially stayed 4 nights on points and encountered the issue on my last day. I had to then extend my stay so I paid on my own for a 5th night and was told by front desk that my 6th night was already paid for (unsure if this was the manager’s way of compensating, but I had clearly mentioned that it was not acceptable).
- I tried contacting several times, but got the same “busy” response, so I contacted IHG. After multiple follow-ups to IHG, apparently they were also getting the same message from the hotel, that “she will call tomorrow.”
- Finally after escalations within IHG, the supervisor just told me – hey we cannot do anything. It is the hotel’s fault and we will ask the GM to call – the person avoiding any comms is the GM in the first place. The supervisor was also clear that the hotel is our franchise and they know best – we don’t get involved in quality and other matters.
So, this reader poses several question to me and the OMAAT community:
- Has anyone encountered a similar situation, with IHG centrally not taking any responsibility for what happens at a property?
- What are a guest’s rights in situations like this? He notes that “even though there was no physical trauma (thankfully), the mental anguish stays,” and “it seems IHG is punting me to the hotel GM, who is not responsive in the first place”
- How should one handle a situation like this, and could he have done something differently?
- Are some hotel groups better than others when it comes to actually taking care of guests in these kinds of situations?
My take on this frustrating hotel situation
If you ask me, there are two separate issues here — the food problem in the first place, and then the general manager’s lack of responsiveness.
I’m really happy that the hotel guest discovered the metal in the food immediately upon biting into it, and nothing terrible happened as a result. That’s positive, because this could’ve been much worse. People will have vastly different takes as to how a hotel should handle this, and how much liability they should have. Here’s my personal view (which is no more valid than anyone else’s):
- I tend to think that stuff like this happens every once in a while, terrible as it might be; even when best practices are followed, mistakes happen
- I of course think a hotel should cover any medical expenses or other issues that arise from something like this, though fortunately it didn’t get to that point here
- I also absolutely think it’s important that the situation is taken seriously, and that the guest feels like the staff and management understand the gravity of the situation; you can’t help but feel dismissed when that’s not done
- In addition to an apology, I think the hotel should share what actions are being taken to investigate this, and also offer some sort of reasonable gesture of goodwill
Unfortunately it sounds like none of that was done. What bothers me more in this situation is that this happened several weeks ago, and the hotel has just gone totally silent. The hotel promised to get back to him, but that never happened. Even when he reached out to IHG centrally, the hotel still didn’t get back to him. That’s unacceptable, and shows poor management on the hotel’s part.
Is there something the reader should’ve done differently? No, it sounds like he tried to express his concerns, and was basically dismissed, so I’m not sure that could’ve really been handled much better on his part. If he wanted to have the issue taken more seriously, perhaps leaving negative reviews on every review platform would make sense, and blasting the general manager by name (that might get her attention). I suppose one could also contact local media in the city where the hotel is. It’s really frustrating when as consumers our only real recourse in some situations is to be super annoying online. 😉
Here’s the sad reality, though — I don’t think IHG is alone in simply not wanting to help guests with individual property issues. I think this has just become the norm among the major hotel chains, given the extent to which they prioritize growth above all else, and increasingly treat hotel owners as their customers, rather than the actual guests. I wouldn’t necessarily expect that Hilton, Hyatt, or Marriott, would handle this any better, sadly.
Bottom line
A guest at a Crowne Plaza found sharp metal in his breakfast while biting into a bakery item. Fortunately he immediately discovered it upon biting. However, hotel staff didn’t seem to take this issue seriously, and while there was a promise he would be contacted, that never happened. Even after escalating and asking to speak to the general manager, no one ever got in touch with him. Centrally, IHG has basically told him to pound sand, and that it’s a hotel issue.
Back in the day, booking a chain hotel would at least give you some reliable level of service, and assurance that if something goes wrong, there’s a system of escalation. Unfortunately that concept seems to be a thing of the past.
What do you make of this Crowne Plaza breakfast situation?
The whole hotel industry is a service dumpster fire. Don’t expect anything like the good service and professional communication you got 5+ years ago.
Contacting the local health department the hotel is located in is also an avenue to take. It is a health issue, no matter how rare it probably is (hopefully), but it's still something worthy to report. Using that as nudge to the GM to do something before reporting might also work.
Didn't he get comped a free night?
Remember most hotel properties are owned by a franchisee. IHG, the Hilton Brands, Marriott Brands etc. are in the business of selling hotel franchisees not running hotels. Similar to airlines derive their profits from credit cards not flying. Status means even less for hotels.
Selling those hotel franchises is only viable while those brands have a value and are trusted by consumers. When that stops being the case, and customers will no longer wish to stay with those brands, what will they have left to sell to hotels?
If you slap your name on a product, you need to own the quality of the product. Especially when slapping your name on products is your entire business.
If the metal was truly embedded in the baked good and not just stuck to one side or something, it probably came from a manufacturing plant. Mass-produced food usually goes through a metal detector before leaving the facility, but things slip by. It doesn’t sound likely to me that this middle of the road hotel is baking fresh pastries or bread each day, so the hotel’s overall liability may be rather low, but their response...
If the metal was truly embedded in the baked good and not just stuck to one side or something, it probably came from a manufacturing plant. Mass-produced food usually goes through a metal detector before leaving the facility, but things slip by. It doesn’t sound likely to me that this middle of the road hotel is baking fresh pastries or bread each day, so the hotel’s overall liability may be rather low, but their response was totally unprofessional. The foodservice staff should have immediately removed all of the relevant item and contacted the manufacturer.
Correct order of response: Immediate apology, remove the food, a promise to contact the manufacturer, some token gesture of points/F&B credit/ANYTHING other than silence. If the hotel isn’t cooking these, they still have a responsibility to own that they served it.
I don’t necessarily think IHG is in the wrong for putting this on the GM unless IHG is specifically mandating what exactly is served at breakfast. It’s likely at the GM(ish) or franchise operator level that food choices are made.
Again, most of this is predicated on the hotel serving a pre-baked product. If they’re baking in-house that makes their lack of response orders of magnitude worse.
It’s fortunate he wasn’t injured and yet so easy to have been resolved. Express empathy and say it would be investigated, and then offer a gesture. Not doing anything makes a bad situation worse.
1. Look after yourself, which means chew gently and slowly all the time.
2. No dental harm done. No compensation (money or points) but there should be expression of regret and some follow-up as to the manufacturer of the product.
Obviously a disappointing customer service reaction. Just piping in to guess that the metal is likely part of a stainless steel scrubbing pad that the dishwasher uses. As a former restaurant GM, I've seen maybe 4-5 times over the years where a little piece would break off when scrubbing pans/baking sheets and somehow get in the food. Not ideal obviously, and whenever it happened, obviously we were apologizing, buying the whole meal, etc. to recover for the guest.