@Kimberly54maybe we are going slightly off topic here, but I think it's all along the same theme.
I also try to be fairly environmentally consicous. I always was (brought up that way) but used to work for a company that educated people on energy efficiency, so after that, I've been all over it! I don't leave the window open overnight in a heated room, but it drives me CRAZY when I stay in a hotel room where I don't have the option of opening the window to let in a bit of air.
Lol, I've never stayed in a hotel where I got five bars of soap and 50 q-tips, and that includes the 5 star ones, but I suppose if you were devious about it, you could get them to provide such a stash! I stay in a lot of 4 and 5 star hotels because of my job and I have found that they are cutting back on the toiletries. They give you the basics and next to them is a card saying if you need other things (cotton wool, q-tips, toothpaste, sewing kit etc.) you can ask. I think that's a clever tactic. People will take it if it's there even if they don't need it, but can they be bothered to request it?
I live in London and here it is now almost always standard for a 'discrentionary' 12.5% service charge to be added to a restaurant bill. That means you don't HAVE to pay it, but it is automatically added and you have to make a fuss if you don't want to pay it. I'm sure very few people make that 'fuss'. I've only done it a couple of times due to TERRIBLE service, but the reaction I got was complete astonishment, e.g. "What do you mean you don't want to pay the service charge even though we've given you the worst service ever?"
What I meant was that, even before this automatic service charge was added, I always tipped in restaurants, even when I was very young and had no money. I guess it's becaue I've waited on tables, but I've never cleaned a hotel room...
Thank you for bringing up the point re slobs. You are so right. As hosts, we need to keep our places immaculate, so maybe we are cleaner than the average Jane or Joe. That being said, the slobbish guests still generally expect to stay in a place that is immaculate. I understand that. They are paying after all. What annoys me are the guests that are presented with an immaculate space, make a mess of it and then rate you down on cleanliness for the mess that they made!
I have certainly learnt that guests do not read/memorise the rules and even though I try to go over the most important stuff in my welcome tour, they will still forget a lot of it. I am having quite a few issues with my current guests, who can't seem to digest any information and are therefore causing all sorts of problems, including damage to my home. When I suggested to them that perhaps they hadn't actually read the rules as requested, the response was, "Yes, we read them. That doesn't mean we have to remember them."