Wha to do if a guest isn’t following house rules

[Pamela-And-Jack0]

It’s not over-the-top, but our guest is taking too long of a shower.  Our house rules state because of water shortage, no longer than five minutes. She took double that. 

How shall I handle this without sounding like a mean host?

 Thank you.  

[Helen427]

@Pamela-And-Jack0

It's not unreasonable to ask politely of a Guest to be considerate about water usage.

They may be used to having an endless water supply & unless one has experienced those challenges it can be hard for others to understand.

Maybe suggest that when they do things like washing their hair 'In xyz we turn off the water whilst we apply the shampoo to conserve water & then turn it back on to rinse it"
It can be a bit challenging depending on the time of year.

I had a challenging guest who was taking 2 x 15 minute plus showers a day who it was "Lost in Translation" so it's important to be firm. She dinged me for it in her review despite my kindness & been well looked after.

Other guests who have had to pay for there own water growing up have without my asking have been considerate  & turned off the water as they soap themselves etc despite not needing to as they have shorter showers. I've asked them if they had a problem with the shower to which they said that's how they always shower.

We win some of the time!

All the best

[Sarah977]

@Pamela-And-Jack0  I can certainly empathize, as my water supply is also quite limited and I practice a lot of water conservation and also ask my guests to, which almost all have complied with.

But like you said, it's not a huge deal, so unless this guest is going to be staying for a long time, I wouldn't bother mentioning it. If a woman is going to wash and condition her hair, and shave her legs, all but the quite aware among us might need 10 minutes to do that. Perhaps it seemed like 5 minutes to her-unless she had a timer on, an extra 5 minutes in there may not have seemed so. If you heard the water running for 20 minutes, that would be a different story, but I think calling her out, no matter how politely you do it, on an extra 5 minutes beyond the short time you request could seem petty.

What I actually do, both for myself and a request to guests, is not flush the toilet every time I have a little tinkle. Even with a low flush toilet, I think that's just a huge waste of water. Imagine how much water a family of 4 uses, flushing the toilet every time they have a pee-that seems like an environmental crime to me. My guests have a private bathroom, though, so it's not like they have to face my pee in the toilet, or me theirs.

[Pamela-And-Jack0 · Accepted solution]

I actually left a little note asking if she slept well ( she left the house super early) and what time we would be home this evening. Then I asked is she would please keep

her showers shorter to help the environment and save water. She lives in Oregon and they get a lot of rain. 

Hopefully she won’t wake us early again tomorrow morning. 

Thanks for your response. 

P.S.After reading your reply, I took the note off and left it at that. She is t home yet so she won’t see that note.