Significant changes in holiday guest behaviour have occurred in recent times – including their expectations about linen. Gone are the days when all guests expected to supply their own linen, or make their own arrangements to hire linen. Younger guests, families, interstate and overseas travellers, and the vast majority of guests booking through platforms such as Booking.com and Airbnb all expect linen to be provided, and cam get pretty upset when it isn’t.
Despite clear descriptions on websites relating to linen supplies, guests rarely read the information and continually call our staff after hours complaining that no linen was supplied – this may occur up to ten times on a single weekend. Alternatively, when some guests arrive and realise linen was not supplied, they sleep between the quilts and mattress protectors, which is pretty unsanitary and creates additional laundering costs.
These changing guest expectations coupled with ongoing price increases are now forcing a change in guest linen services:
1. The laundry that supplies the linen informed us of a dramatic cost rise as of 1 July 2023 (about 40 – 50% on average per item). This is a huge jump in costs, and while we will absorb some of the increase, the linen prices to guests simply have to rise. As a result, guests with pre – 1 July 2023 linen orders will pay the old price and we will pay the difference for their bookings. Guests with post – 1 July 2023 linen orders will pay the new prices. We will also pay the price difference for all linen increases for owners who have linen supplied and beds made until 1 September 2023, at which time the new prices will apply to their bookings. Our own costs for bedmaking will not increase.
2. In addition, we will be including linen with all new bookings made on or after 1 November 2023 onwards. It will be a bit complicated for a start due to the number of forward bookings post – 1 November 2023 that do not have linen included, or have ordered linen at the old prices, but we’ll work our way through it.
3. All linen services will also be included in the tariff that guests pay, and not as a separate item. This is because guests quickly complain if there is an additional cost for linen, but are quite happy to pay the same amount if it is included in the tariff. The linen component of the tariff will not be subject to our commission charges, and will be cost neutral to owners. As always, guests will continue to pay for the linen service, not the owners.
4. This all sounds pretty straight forward, but a problem arises with bookings by owners who do not want to use or pay for linen. With thousands of guests bookings and about 600 owner bookings each year, there is only one realistic and workable solution:
4A: Soiled linen must be collected on the guest’s departure, and to avoid double handling, this is also when new linen will be provided. This means, in time when most forward guest bookings without linen are completed, new linen will usually be in the property when owners arrive.
4B: We will assume owners will either not use the linen (and therefore we will not plan to collect soiled linen when the owner departs) or if the owner does use some or all of the linen, the owner will tell us. If so, the soiled linen can be collected and replaced for the next guest, and the owner charged. If a guest arrives and and soiled linen is at the property following an owner booking, the guests will not be happy and our staff will no doubt bear the brunt of their dissatisfaction. If this occurs, we will need to replace all of the linen and charge the owner.
4C: So it’s pretty simple – either don’t use the linen to avoid the costs, or if linen is present and you do use the linen – let us know about it.
4D: Approximately 35% of our owners always have the linen provided and the beds made for their guests. There will be no changes to their current bed making arrangements. That is, virtually all of these owners always have the beds made for them when they visit, but those owners who do not want the beds made for them need to let us know prior to the previous guest departing, otherwise the beds will be automatically made when the guest departs, and the owner will be charged. At present, owners with beds made are invoiced separately each month for the service. With the shift to linen services being included within the tariff, these owners will only be invoiced for linen services for bookings that were made prior to the ‘linen in commission’ shift. As time goes by, these owners will see less and less ‘bed-making’ invoices and eventually won’t see any at all, as linen costs will be paid by the guest as part of their booking, and directly to us – alleviating the need for monthly linen service invoices, and eliminating the unnecessary transfers of money in and out of the owner’s accounts for linen supplied to guests.
Due to the complexities of organising thousands of linen deliveries and thousands of beds being made each year, we cannot entertain different arrangements for different properties. Therefore, all bookings made after 1 November 2023 will come with linen supplied, with the only variation being some owners also having the beds made.
Due to almost 1,000 forward bookings, the transition from our current linen arrangements to the new system will definitely be a bit ‘messy’. There will also probably be some mistakes along the way, but with a little understanding by all concerned, we will get there and when all of the current forward bookings have departed, the management of linen will be heaps simpler and easier than it is at present.
Linen is a bit like Wi-Fi – a few years ago it was seen as an ‘optional extra’. Guests now expect Wi-Fi wherever they go – and they see linen the same way. By providing linen with each booking we expect things will run much smoother, the guest experience to be better, and return bookings will continue to increase.