The No Show Ninja Ghost Scammer

[KhirasHY]

I debated this one going into a Cursing @ CWs, but since it involved a customer, it's gonna go in this forum. I've switched over to working the Night Audit (which I love), which for those outside of hotels means the graveyard front desk guy, so I get to be the one to deal with No Show problems overnight (which really isn't that bad). It's only annoying when someone gets No Showed, but arrives anyway, but we have an easy way to deal with that in my computer, so it's all good. Anyway, on to the story.

I got into work yesterday, and was told that there was one arrival left, but his room was a bit weird. Apparently, he had called earlier in the day and asked if they could see if his credit card would authorize for the full amount of his stay (about 12 nights); they thought it was weird, but tried it, and it declined. When he heard this, he was mellow, and just said he'd call his bank, then hung up. This all happened at about 1pm that day, and he never called back, so we assumed he wouldn't show. Sure enough, he never got there overnight with me, so I marked his room as a no show and tried to charge it (1 night room/tax for that), and the card bounced again.

I'll mention here that, due to my previous experience, I immediately thought that this was going to be a stolen credit card, and while I can't prove I'm right, I think that was the case. Now, to continue...

After his card declined again, I left some notes for the managers, and went back to doing other work. Things were more or less uneventful until the morning shift people arrived; I let them know what happened, and about an hour later, my CW came to me going "Uh...that guy Scammer just left...?"



Um...how could he leave if he was never here? Well, apparently after the same CW left (she was the one who talked to the guy on the phone too), another CW had this guy arrive. They tried to check him in, and somehow A) didn't notice that his card didn't clear and B) didn't SAVE HIS ROOM AS A CHECK-IN, which meant it never showed his arrival. Then the same other CW switched his room in the system...which meant that this guy was now sleeping in a room, but we had no record of that at all. When he left in the morning, he just tossed his keys to the desk and said "just email my receipt please, I'm in a hurry" and left. But let's look at some details...

One, his credit card declined for any amount we tried to charge on it.
Two, he was supposed to stay for 12 nights on his reservation.
Three, he instead stayed for one night, while not being fully checked in, and then snuck out in such away that he made it out the door before anyone could even ask his last name.

Between all of those things, it's more or less guaranteed (in my mind) that he was using a stolen credit card number, and decided to bug out before it could become obvious that it wasn't going to authorize for any amount. The good news is that he wasn't able to use someone else's money, but the bad news is that he both scammed us for the night, and made everyone look like idiots. There were two people working at the front desk that night, and neither of them will admit that they checked the person in (it obviously has to have been one of you since, you know, he HAD KEYS TO THE ROOM), but the whole thing also happened with the best possible timing: the morning before the owner of the company comes in to stay.

/facepalm

At least I didn't have to be the target of the ragebomb when it landed today...

[bhskittykatt]

That's just crazy. Sucky guy, and sucky CWs. How do you check someone in like that "accidentally"? I know our system won't issue keys during the check-in process until payment has cleared (or unless you manually make the keys).

Your manager should be able to run the logs to see who issued a key to that room, so they'll figure out which one did it. It's very easy to do on most systems. They can check any cameras you have in the office, too.

[eltf177]

That is some epic fail on your co-workers part. No doubt the ragebomb (I love that term!) will fall on some deserving heads. I wonder if somebody's going to have to cough this up out of their paycheck?

Do you have _any_ ID on this asshat? And has the credit card number been reported to anybody?

Agree, there has to be some record (written or filmed) of who checked this clown in...

[BroSCFischer]

How do you check someone in like that "accidentally"?

With our system at my hotel, you can print a reg card without checking them in fully, and you make the key manually, so it is possible. On top of that, when a CC declines, the window pops up BEHIND the main screens, so, often times, you don't realize it if you don't look for it (which I have gotten in the habit of doing). While we occasionally have it happen that we have to call the room to get another card, it is rare.

Without the earlier phone call, I would say that the customer was completely unaware of the situation. This could still be the case, but it IS more suspicious now.

SC

[KhirasHY]

It's made difficult by the fact that we print reg cards and make keys for each guest before they check in, so just going by who made the keys isn't a good indicator. Either way, I'm just glad that it wasn't me who did it...

[skeptic53]

Any chance there was an element of this being partly an inside job? Mr. Scammer is a buddy of one of your co-irkers?

[PepperElf]

Any chance there was an element of this being partly an inside job? Mr. Scammer is a buddy of one of your co-irkers?

if that's the case then the security footage (if it exists) may reveal some of that?


otherwise it just sounds like the guy was purposefully trying to scam on his stay, which may be why he called ahead to see if the card worked too... checking to see if he stole a good card?

[Comechatcha]

Oh that makes me glad our card machine is a separate system. We print out the sheet, and table the signed pre-auth to it, so if it declines it yells at us and doesn't print a signature line I think. It's easy to forget to change an arrival from New to Checked-In, but a quick box check fixes that.

[Sapphire Silk]

When I first started reading the story, I thought the scammer was checking the card to see if it was good before he tried to use it somewhere to pay for something.

In a sense, I guess, he did.

[KhirasHY]

if that's the case then the security footage (if it exists) may reveal some of that?

otherwise it just sounds like the guy was purposefully trying to scam on his stay, which may be why he called ahead to see if the card worked too... checking to see if he stole a good card?

When I first started reading the story, I thought the scammer was checking the card to see if it was good before he tried to use it somewhere to pay for something.

In a sense, I guess, he did.

As far as the inside job, I'm not sure. We do have a newbie CW who may have screwed up, but it happened twice in 2 nights (first one was no showed when their check in wasn't saved, but their payment had no issues, so it doesn't look related). I wasn't there when he called to try and authorize the card to begin with, but the MOD at the time basically said that it wasn't fair to automatically suspect him with no evidence (which, I guess, is true...but I guarantee we were right to be suspicious ). My thought was the same, that he was trying to check the card for validity before he came in and tried to scam with it, but it had already been shut off. Unfortunately, I can't go over the head of the managers to report it possibly stolen, so it's dead in the water now.

[smileyeagle1021]

I've switched over to working the Night Audit (which I love), which for those outside of hotels means the graveyard front desk guy, so I get to be the one to deal with No Show problems overnight (which really isn't that bad).

Slight nit pick, some larger hotels have an actual graveyard desk person and a separate night audit position (I'm a graveyard guest service desk agent, and I'll work the front desk exclusively on guest service issues, then the night auditor spends most of their time in the back office doing the audit and only coming to the front desk to cover breaks or when it gets busy enough to need two people).

As to the scammer, that sadly would be fairly easy where I work... our wonderful software when you do the credit card authorization (which, btw isn't always automated, sometimes we have to run it manually) it always comes up with a screen with a red box, always red, whether approved or declined. Most new employees don't realize that, they have only ever seen the red box with approved and assume that red box = approved. More terrifyingly, it will print a reg card and issue keys even after it declines (yeah, not the best thought out system).