‘Call the police, the front desk is in on it’: Chicago-based flight attendant has overnight layover. Then, someone tries to enter her hotel room
A Chicago flight attendant shares a PSA for other hotel guests after someone opened her room in the middle of the night. This one smart move prevented them from entering.
In a video with over 96,000 views, TikToker Kelly Ann (@kelldow89) shares a recording of a phone call with the hotel’s front desk, during which she reports the incident.
“Somebody just got into my room,” she says. On-screen text explains that the incident occurred around 12:10 A.M. during her overnight layover in Los Angeles, Calif.
The TikToker shows that the door latch had been pushed away from the wall. However, it prevented the door from opening fully.
The front desk worker asks her for her room number and apologizes, claiming that they accidentally gave another guest access.
The caption reads, “After my nerves finally settled and I processed what happened, I went downstairs at 4:30 AM wanting answers. And honestly, I still don’t understand how this can happen so easily.”
Why did they give someone access to her hotel room?
In a follow-up video, the TikToker says a hotel worker told her that their system went down in the middle of the night. Therefore, they couldn’t check which rooms were occupied.
Kelly Ann notes that when she looked through the peephole after hearing the door partially open, she saw a man and a woman standing outside.
The worker claims that the woman was checking in, and they gave her a key to go “check” if the room was occupied. The man was a member of the hotel’s security team.
“I don’t get how this happens. I feel like hotels should have a paper trail if your system goes down,” she says. “You don’t just start opening up doors.”
While hotels are required to keep a record of guests, according to hotel managers on Quora, many chains stick to digital-only records and may not keep a paper trail. This can create awkward situations at check-in if the online system goes down.
However, hotel workers on Reddit say they’ve successfully checked in guests when the system is offline.
“They should be able to check you in if they did their job and printed a contingency report at the start of their shift,” one writes.
Another suggests, “The front desk should print contingency reports every few hours so that you can run the hotel via paper. You need a room status report to show what rooms are clean / occupied. And then you have to manually take down cc info, etc.”
A third adds, “Manager here—— This has happened to me multiple times. We still get people in their rooms.”
How did viewers react?
In the comments, other viewers say they’ve experienced similar situations when staying at hotels.
“Somebody got into my room, they were on some substances and the actual frame of the door tore off from them kicking it in. Crazy way to wake up,” one says.
Another shares, “This has happened to me at a hotel before… and the people tried to stick things between the door to move the latch. Guess front desk gave them a key to my room by ‘accident.'”
“Had a Hyatt give someone else my room while I was sleeping in it. Woke up to maintenance trying to open the door for the other guests because, big surprise, their key didn’t work,” a third writes.
Others suggest the TikToker should escalate the situation to prevent it from happening to other flight attendants who could be staying at the same hotel.
“Report the incident to the airline. Issues with hotels can make the airline change the layover hotel. May not help you immediately, but will help others later,” a commenter writes.
Kelly Ann responds that she reached out to her airline and to the hotel’s management. She notes that she hasn’t heard back from the hotel.
“Call the police, the front desk is in on it,” a second urges.
“This definitely needs to be reported to the people assigning that hotel for staff. Get them out of rotation and into a new hotel. Airlines pay way too much for hotels to have your safety questioned. My husband is an FO and would be livid if that happened at his overnight. Stay safe, babe,” another comments.
@kelldow89 After my nerves finally settled and I processed what happened, I went downstairs at 4:30 AM wanting answers. And honestly, I still don’t understand how this can happen so easily. #hotel #scary #wrongdoor #creatorsearchinsights #flightattendant ♬ original sound – Kelly Ann
The Mary Sue reached out to Kelly Ann via TikTok direct message for further comment.
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