Executive Travel : Check Hotel Room Before Checking Out

Hotel rooms, like washing machines, are famous for spiriting off miscellaneous things you could have sworn were in your luggage when you left home.

And, like washing machines, hotel rooms may eventually yield up the mystery items.

A large hotel, such as the 2,000-room Hyatt Regency Chicago, finds an average of about 200 items a month, said Walter Brindell, corporate director of rooms.

“It’s a lot--anything from makeup pencils to prescription drugs. There have even been whole suitcases left behind,” he said. “Housekeepers turn in whatever they find, even business papers.”

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Most hotels try to find the owners of valuable items, although hotel policies vary in terms of how long they keep the things they find.

“Every effort is made to send things back to their owners within 90 days,” Hilton Hotels spokeswoman Kendra Walker said. At Hilton, property is returned via certified overnight mail, often at the expense of the hotel. If the item is worth more than $500, it is sent registered mail and insured. But small items such as hosiery, toothbrushes and cigarettes are not reunited with their owners.

Hyatt sends items back c.o.d., unless it feels responsible for the loss, Brindell said. It keeps non-valuables for 30 days and valuables for 60 to 90 days. At Marriott Hotels & Resorts, items are held for 90 days while the hotel tries to locate the owner. Valuables, such as cash, jewelry or cameras, are held for 180 days before they are disposed of.

Policies are similar at most major hotels. Most companies will log in any items with the date they were found and the room number.

They are usually turned over to the manager of housekeeping or security for safe-keeping. After the period for keeping an item is up, the item is usually returned to the finder or donated to charity.

Sometimes a hotel locates the owner of a lost item only to discover the owner didn’t want it. That was the case after Hyatt hosted a pet shop suppliers exhibit. When one of the guests checked out, the housekeeper noticed the drapes were hanging strangely, Brindell said. When the curtains were pulled back, the housekeeper found two iguanas crawling on them.

When the guest was contacted, he denied the iguanas were his. (Guests are not supposed to have animals in their rooms, Brindell said.) The engineer who rescued the reptiles ended up keeping them.

Some guests are more eager to get their property back.

Merle Llarena, a housekeeper for Hilton’s Fontainebleau hotel in Miami Beach, made headlines a year ago when she discovered $10,000 hidden under some sheets. The money was turned over to her supervisor, who notified the police.

Eventually, the guest contacted the hotel and described the money’s location, reclaiming the loot. (Although the guest didn’t provide a reward, checks rolled in from the community applauding the housekeeper for her honesty.)

And at the Newport Beach Marriott recently, a housekeeper found $50,000 worth of jewelry.

“A woman left it in the room after she checked out,” said Gordon Lambourne, spokesman for Marriott. “The housekeeper turned the jewelry over to her manager, who found the owner right away.”

“People lose cash in their rooms more often than you might think,” Brindell said. “A lot of people will hide the cash rather than put it in the hotel safe. Then they forget where they put it or just completely forget about it.”

Some things are harder to forget about once they’re lost, however. Once a Hyatt housekeeper found a false tooth. When the tooth finally made its way back to the owner, he wrote several letters to the housekeeper thanking her for not throwing it away.

Other items may be just as dear to their owners. “We get a lot of pillows left behind,” Brindell said. “That’s always a real challenge because they go through the hotel laundry.”

But the company tries to locate the pillows anyway, usually at the insistence of the owner, he said. “If they’re that attached to the pillow that they will bring it with them, then they definitely will call to get it back.”

Once in a while, a hotel will go out of its way to replace a lost item if the original can’t be found. That was the case when a guest at the New York Hilton and Towers left a 3-foot white teddy bear in her room. It never made it to the lost and found department.

However, the bear belonged to a woman whose husband had won it for her at Circus Circus in Las Vegas when the couple was expecting their first child. The baby died shortly after birth, and in her grief, the woman became attached to the bear. Hilton contacted Circus Circus and “won” her another.

The best way to avoid losing something of value is to look before you leave, Brindell said. Check under the bed, behind all the doors and in the sheets.

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And if you do call the lost and found department, be prepared to give as many details as possible about the item to help with the search.

Indeed, hotels want people to call in about lost items, since trying to locate the owners can be tricky. “We have to be very cautious when we call,” Brindell said. “Because sometimes that spouse doesn’t know anything about it.”