When you can’t do a thing about it...

[David6]

2 night stay. Over years we got the whole ‘get housekeeper to take pictures once she’s finished  cleaning’ . Send on WhatsApp as date/time stamped proof. 

But today these guests outsmarted. Smoked but blew smoke out of window. The room has lingering smell but managed to clear it . But this damage to the window frame is new! But of course i can’t prove it, as I didn’t take a picture before they arrived.

Host zero!  Guests win again!

* Managed to remove the red wine  ‘ring’  stains, but the burns have actually melted the plastic window frame, and can’t get off 😞 

[Emiel1]

@David6 

The least you can do is provide them a bad review...

[David6]

Yep, @Emiel1 

I can do that. 

but now my listing looks like some kind of run down crack den. Imagine the guest who checked in tonight?  It’s humid in london - she’ll open the window, imagine  I ‘allow’ smoking & think the maintenance of my place is absolutely non existent! Got to find away to cover those scorch marks 🤨🤨🤨

[Susan17]

@David6 

A bit of a patch-up solution, but try covering the scorch marks with Tipp-Ex as an instant short-term measure. At least it should improve the cosmetic appearance until you can figure out something more permanent.  

[David6]

Yep, thank you @Susan17 . We had 1 hr turn around as tonight’s guest arrived exhausted from early arriving flight from Australia & i’d agreed a  noon check in. She’s here only 4 night. Then I’ll have time to ‘paint’ over it.

I once used tipex mixed with brown sauce to patch up burns in a carpet. Added carpet  ‘fluff’ & and it all kind of dried & ‘set’ all  together & you couldn’t tell 🙂 

[Susan17]

Lol! As hosts, we do have to come up with some ingenious fixes in our desperate efforts to maintain the illusion of "perfection", don't we? I have to admit, I've never tried the Tipp-Ex and brown sauce trick yet - I'll be committing that one to memory for possible future use though! Brilliant! :))

[David3267]

Where did you come up with that combo???

[Branka-and-Silvia0]

@David6 

idiots! they extinguished cigarettes on the PVC window frame! Jesus! 

The truth is - smokers will always smoke. On the window or in the backyard, or, if they really don't care - inside. So I would recommend to all hosts to leave an ashtray somewhere, it's better if they use it than to do what they did to you or to throw cigarette butts in the yard or even more dangerous - in the trash can.

We allow smoking inside, we have an ashtray in the apartment and outside on the staircase. In three years of hosting, I've sent a smell just once and it aired very quickly so the next guest didn't sent it

Most of our smoking guests don't smoke inside or do it on the window and we didn't have any damage done by smokers yet. Most of our guests are nonsmokers and I am sure they don't even know they are staying at the place where smoking is allowed.

[Sarah977]

@Branka-and-Silvia0  That's more or less what I keep telling hosts who are mad because guests smoked in their non-smoking listing. Smokers will smoke, they will also book non-smoking listings. So while any host should be able to say they don't allow smoking, it's easier to provide a smoking area than to try to deal with smoking damage. 

As both you and I know, smoking is a serious addiction. Smokers may book a non-smoking listing, thinking, Oh, I'll just go outside to smoke. But when it's 1AM and raining out, and there isn't any dry place to have a smoke, they're just going to smoke inside, hopefully at least by an open window.

[David6]

Very good point @Branka-and-Silvia0 

*ashtray buying*  tomorrow 🙂 

[Helen350]

@David6 Why not put a saucer or small diameter soy sauce dish out instead? Tell them its for used teabags, or put a couple of wrapped sweets on it as a welcome gesture...... I do this anyway, it never occurred to me that someone might use it as an ash tray... - but in the light of your predicament, that would be better than rogue smokers damaging the window, or anything else! - By giving them a little dish meant for something else, (food) at least you are not giving them permission to smoke, which a proper ashtray might imply.

[Susan151]

@David6  I bet a magic eraser would take care of those marks. Do you have those in the UK?

[Sarah977]

@Susan151  Magic erasers truly are magic. I can't get them here in Mexico, but a lovely guest from your neck of the woods who asked if there was anything she could bring me from the US, brought me 2 whole boxes of them!

But those burn marks look like they go right though the PVC and melted it, rather than surface damage. If they worked for that, they're even more magic than expected.

[David6]

@Susan151 

Good tip! We do have a version of them here. Yes, that could be worth a try. Thank you 

[Sarah977]

@David6  Nail polish also works for many touch-up repairs, I've used it to cover chips in tile counters. Because it comes in so many colors, you can usually find a pretty good match.