Preparing For Trying Customers at your B&B
Patti Rob
For any business there tends to be a handful of difficult customers that come in. Depending on your policies and the situation you will react accordingly. A bed & breakfast is a very personal type of business so you get to interact more with guests than you would if you ran a hotel. Unfortunately you are going to come across some customers that make you uneasy.
It is also your responsibility to provide a safe environment for all of your guests. You certainly can't allow the behavior or one individual to affect all of them. People should never feel uneasy at your business due to how other people are behaving. That isn't what they paid for or why they chose to stay at a bed & breakfast. How you deal with these types of situations is going to affect their decision to return in the future or not.
Many owners of such a business are very intuitive and that is a good thing. You many not be able to explain why you are uncomfortable with a certain person in your business and you don't have to. You can simply tell them that things aren't working out and you will help them find another place to stay. You can even offer to refund their money just to keep things cordial.
Effective communication skills can help to take care of many of the types of problems that may arise at your bed & breakfast location. However, you may not be able to take care of issues that are developing between them. Should a couple be having issues at your business you can do your best to give them space to discuss it. Should the situation appear violent though you need to get the police involved to investigate it further.
Your guests need to keep things such as noise under control, especially late at night and early in the morning. You may have to approach a guest and ask them to lower the volume of music or their visiting. In most cases if you explain they are disrupting other people they will do what they need to in order to remedy the situation. Those that don't may warrant a request to leave from you.
It is reasonable to have a policy about no drugs or alcohol being brought to the premises. Those that violate such policies need to get rid of what they have or they need to leave all together. You definitely don't want your business being caught up in problems with drug use. You should also have a policy that smoking isn't allowed inside either. It can be dangerous and cause a fire. You also don't want your bed & breakfast to smell like smoke.
Sometimes you will have issues that arise when people come back late at night and they are drunk. Many people don't handle alcohol well and they may be angry and difficult to deal with when they return. You always need to remember that you have the right to refuse service to anyone at your business. Exercise the right when you feel you need to.
Asking guests to leave your establishment is often a very last resort. Yet it is a legal right that you have and you should exercise it when you feel the need to do so. Never put yourself or other guests at risk by allows these types of behaviors to continue. You can always contact the local police to handle any types of complains you wish to follow.
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