Keeping stuff safe in a hotel

I'm not sure what the question is. I sometimes use a room safe and will deposit passport, credit cards, etc. I've never had a problem getting it to open or work properly. If there is no safe, I carry my valuables in a money belt on my body. For other things in the room, such as a laptop, I usually stash everything into my luggage and lock it. I make an effort to clear up loose things in the room and put them in the luggage, also. This removes temptation to browse thru my stuff or even take things. Another advantage of clearing up before leaving my room is that I come back to a neat, uncluttered place at the end of the day. The only time I lost anything was when I left some loose change lying on the desk. I suppose someone thought it was a tip. I learned not to leave money unless I wanted it to go to the housekeeper.

I usually don't bother with the hotel in room safe. On the occasions that I do, the first step is to test the lock-unlock to see if I can open the safe before I put anything in and activate the lock.

I like hotel room safes for my tablet and sometimes extra cash or my purse. I always test the lock first to make sure it will work and let me reopen it. I also always open the safe as soon as I return to my room to make sure I don't forget anything and to make sure I can still reopen the safe. Luckily I have never yet had a problem safe, but I always worry that will happen.

In going to Europe for a month in 12 of the last 13 years, I have never had a problem in getting stuff out of my money belt. I always put everything important, passport, cc/debit cards, reservations, money, itinerary, etc. into my money belt and feel a lot safer knowing exactly where everything is. At night I put my money belt inside and at the bottom of the bed covers.

What Edgar and Leigh said about testing the safe before you lock anything in it. If you have a safe, which I usually don't. I keep passport, cards and money in a neck wallet whenever I'm outside the room, and put the tablet and anything else valuable in my locked suitcase. Haven't traveled much with a phone but I guess I'd keep that on my person as well.

Number 1 hotel pet peeve: Adding a surcharge for the safe whether you use it or not. This is more common in US than Europe I think. I always object and so far they've always reversed it. Cheesy and dishonest, imho.

I always use the room safe. Having managed a hotel here in Germany, I know how the safes work and I have no qualms that my items are safe in there.

Any hotel that would be irresponsible enough to have staff that steals would soon find itself out of business due to the immediate reviews available on Trip Advisor, various travel forums, and the hotel consolidators like HRS, Booking.com etc. What hotel is going to risk that?

Why not ask the question, who here has had something stolen from a safe? In all of my years on this forum and the forums on Trip Advisor and Fodors, not once has someone posted that they had items stolen out of a safe. So, they must work well keeping items safe. If people forget stuff, that isn't the problem with the safe.

I trust the hotel staff becase, as Ms. Jo said, there are accountability measures and all.

But just about every hotel I've ever stayed at, housekeeping props the door open while they're cleaning. The housekeeping cart won't fit through the door, it takes up too much space to try to clean around, no manager wants a Dominique Strauss-Kahn scenario for their staff, etc. So while I'm hit or miss on safe use, (passport and credit cards are always on me) nothing valuable shall be visible when I'm out of the room, lest a fellow guest walking by while the door is open see something a little too nice, decide to claim my room as theirs to housekeeping and have a camera lens or computer go walkies on me.

I prefer to keep all valuables with me, mostly in my money belt. Just two exceptions: my iPad might indeed be locked up inside my large bag, since I don't carry it all day. If going to the beach, where there is no place to hide valuables, my money belt might also be locked up in my large bag in the room (out of sight and not an easy temptation), or I could take advantage of a room safe at that time. My consistent routine of putting the money belt on every morning with my clothes helps me not to leave anything behind, which I fear I might do with a safe. I even worry about forgetting food that I put in the refrigerator!

I'm with Laura. I don't use the safe for the same reason that I don't use the wardrobe or nightstand drawers: because I don't want to forget anything. I keep everything in my suitcase or in plain sight on surfaces. Everything of value stays in my money belt which is on me at all times outside my hotel room. Inside the room, I put in my suitcase.

"Any hotel that would be irresponsible enough to have staff that steals would soon find itself out of business "

1. It only takes once if you are the one.
2. How are you going to prove it? Does TripAdvisor accept unfounded accusations?

I once returned from a day out to find my room locked, with the cleaning staff's key in the lock.

Lee,

Interesting article! I normally do keep my Passport, Wallet and Smartphone with me whenever I leave the hotel room, even if just going down for breakfast. My Netbook always stays in the room, as there's no way I'm carrying the darn thing around with me all day when I'm touring like a useless boat anchor. So far I haven't had any problems with that approach.

When I'm out touring, the Netbook is locked inside my Daypack, which tends to be some deterrent to "rifling" as seen in the video, or opportunistic theft. As someone else noted, the hotel staff often prop the doors open on a block of rooms, and it would be easy for anyone passing by to simply wander into a room when the maid is working down the hall, and grab whatever is conveniently available. The maid would probably be accused of the theft, and it would be difficult to investigate something like that.

I never use hotel room safes, as I don't trust the level of "security" that they provide (check YouTube for examples). As a former Locksmith, I also know how they work and some models are easily compromised. Hotel room Safes are not designed for a high level of security, and they usually have a "back door" that allows untrained personnel (hotel room staff) to open them if necessary. As you found, there's always the possibility of the safe malfunctioning at a crucial time, such as when I'm ready to depart and have a reserved seat on the train ("Murphy's Law"). This topic was covered in an article in Conde Nast Traveller.

On my most recent trip to Spain (October 2014) I stayed in five different hotels. All the hotels had safes in the room and I used them in each hotel. I put my wallet, credit cards, US cash, etc, along with my 11 inch laptop computer. A couple of times I had to work to get my laptop to fit, but it did in all of the safes. Only odd thing was that the hotel in Barcelona did not use a digital code. I had to go to the Front Desk and they gave me a key for the safe, I paid a 10 euro refundable deposit for the key. Everything remained secure during my stays.

"How are you going to prove it? Does TripAdvisor accept unfounded accusations? "

Trip Advisor publishes all feedback unless it contains foul or derogatory language. Owners and managers can respond to them all , of course. So I agree with Ms. Jo. There are so many consumer feedback websites now. If there were patterns where more than one person complained of something being stolen or feeling unsafe, I would definitely stay away from a hotel. I have never had a problem with a hotel safe and I have never had anything taken from my hotel room. Might it happen one day? Yes. Might I get pickpocketed on the street one day? Yes. Might I leave my valuables somewhere yes? But if I am careful, probably not. I think the most important thing is not to keep all credit cards/cash in one place. I usually take my debit card and cash with me and leave some cash and a credit card at the hotel.

Not to hijack the discussion on hotel safes, but TA also doesn't seem to sometimes publish "accurate" trips reports. We had a bad experience with an apartment in Sciacca, Sicily this past September which we booked through TA and left after only one night. We asked TA to mediate between us and the property owner on compensating us for unused nights. TA initially agreed to assist but then repeated emails to them went unanswered. We proceeded to review the property on TA. Finally, we received an email back from them that the review of the property would not be published as it offended their posting guidelines. There was no foul language, no derogatory statements, everything was factual and we included photos of the concerns we had with the apartment. However part of the review included a statement about the difficulty we had with TA and their inability to assist us with the property owner. We think they were using the posting policy as a means of avoiding publishing the review to protect their reputation.

Nonetheless, the property owner was paid for nights not used, TA received their commission and we are out about 500 bucks and a day of our vacation time, finding and moving to another apartment.

I can not believe people really do not use safes because they are worried about forgetting stuff in them.. really?? I simply do not understand that.. perhaps because I have travelled solo, and alone with my kids.. I am simply very aware of details and I never forget anything.. there is no other adult to help me out .. no partner with another card or money etc..

I love hotel safes and could care less if management of course knows how to access them. People forget their combination codes all the time , the same folks who likely forget stuff in their safes I imagine.. lol

If I felt insecure in the hotel I chose.. I would leave .

And these types of informal polls are useless in a way.. since nothing anything can say is likely to change anyones mind about doing what they feel is best.

I feel its best for me to use and wear a money belt while in transit.. but not to haul my stuff around every day sightseeing. Other folks feel they need to have all their stuff with them at all times and do not trust safes.. pretty simple.

There are a lot of forgetful people out there. And those people know who they are and know that putting something in a box at the base of the closet is a perfect recipe for leaving something behind.

I agree with some of the others that the biggest threat of hotel room theft is the open door during cleaning. I don't leave valuables out in the open for that reason. They go in my bag and the bag is locked. That avoids the quick "grab and go" theft.

@Peter

Last year I stayed in a very nice hotel in a spa town in the Black Forest. After the trip, I went on TripAdvisor to give the hotel a positive review and found a totally erroneous, bad review by a "Senior Contributor" with over 30 reviews. I flagged the review and told T/A why. The review stayed up. I have flagged it two more times (3 total) and, as of today, they have still not done anything about the error.

The reviewer obviously had the wrong property. They described the location as "... about 20 minutes from Freiburg" ..."located in a small, quiet village just off the Autobahn." According to both ViaMichelin and Google maps, the town is over 2 hours from Freiburg by the fastest route. It's a major resort town, not a quiet village, and it is nowhere near an autobahn.

It's such a pity that TripAdvisor obviously does not care about a veracity of their reviews. This was such a nice place, and I hate to think someone would avoid staying there because of this one false review.

BTW, I booked directly from the hotel and got a package deal including entry to both of the two spas in town. I arrived late the first day and left early the third day, so I only had time to use the main spa in town, but subtracting the regular price of that spa from what I paid, I paid 12% less than what I would have paid using Booking.com.

A colleague once had a camera stolen from her room in a five stars hotel in the very centre of Madrid, and most likely by a chamber maid. So no hotel is completely risk-free; on the other hand, I have travelled extensively in a lot of countries and nobody ever stole me anything (including tablets and laptops).

I often use the hotel safe to leave passports, small sums of money or my laptop. My camera is so cheap that the person who stoles it could even do me a favour. The laptop itself is old and not worth much more than a couple hundred euros, data like bank account numbers and passwords are much more precious; so all personal data on my laptop are always encrypted and backed up to minimize risks. Never bring jewels with me, no glamorous watches in third world countries (and even in first world countries my watches are not really precious).

I always test I can open the safe before putting anything in it. And during my last night and last breakfast the safe stays open - you may not have the time to cope with a stuck safe the morning you are leaving. The probability of a safe getting stuck (happened twice) is likely higher than being robbed during the night.

It's a matter of minimizing risk (nowhere has a 0% chance of theft). I think the odds are lower in a hotel safe than with me in my purse. Yes, money belt is safest. But you can't keep a computer in a money belt ;) So in the case of a computer, I'd rather lock it in the hotel safe and hope that the maid/hotel staff aren't thieves and that no thief with safe access breaks in. Foolproof? Of course not, but on a day sightseeing in Rome, I will pass more thieves on the street. A purse snatcher grabbing my bag just seems much more likely than the hotel scenario. Add in the fact that if it's with me unnecessarily I could drop it or loose it. Keep it in the room safe.

What other options do you have? Yes, you could keep it in your suitcase, locked, in the room. This might be about as safe as the safe, but anyone walking the hall can seize an opportunity and grab a suitcase out of your room. Maybe when housekeeping leaves the door unlocked? That opportunistic thief may not be able to unlock the safe.

Really, though, I think all this worry about theft is overdone. Keep cash and passport in a money belt if you feel safer, keep any pricey electronics in the safe or hidden in your room, and don't worry about it. If it's super expensive, insure it. If you REALLY can't afford to loose it, don't bring it. So no priceless family heirlooms. For me, the only irreplaceable objects I bring are the photosI I take and I upload them daily to several places.

Interesting topic. We generally will use the hotel safe (next time, I will make sure it works first). I agree with the last writer. What are the alternatives to using the hotel safe and is there any alternative that is less risky. I would love to see someone carrying a laptop in their moneybelt underneath their pants. Having a pickpocket or a grab and run person steal your stuff is much higher than a hotel person stealing from your room. Just think of how many people on this forum reporting pickpocket episodes versus having something stolen from their hotel room. Here is what we do:
1. We split the credit cards, debit cards, and cash between the two of us, always using a moneybelt underneath our pants.
2. Passports and electronics, that fit, are in the safe.
3. Laptops and iPads in a suitcase that is double locked (with both zipper lock and belted lock around the suitcase) and the suitcase cable locked to large chair or table.
4. Safe is opened as soon as we get back in and only used when we are out of the hotel. That way, if there is a problem with the safe not working or theft, we know it right away.
5. The night before leaving, everything is removed from the safe and all drawers to ensure nothing is left behind (and double checked the day of departure).
6. Finally, most importantly, we don't have the room serviced but every fourth day, which means at most once during the stay and the vast majority of time not at all. I figure, how often do I clean the bathroom and bedroom at home, I can make my own bed, and I don't need a brand new towel every day. That eliminates anyone even being in the room or having the door propped open.

great topic and I have gotten some great tips....

We use hotel safes. We make sure to check it when we leave.

i do bring my laptop cause I blog and it is easier to do it with the laptop. I now store it in my suitcase and have a lock that has a metal cord with combination that I put thru zipper and thru item in hotel. We use this when travelling on trains too to secure our luggage. Also use it to secure our knapsack/camera bag or whatever around an arm of a chair when dining too.

We also recently bought a portable safe that is slash proof and has a metal cord and lock that attaches to things in the room. This item was bought from pacsafe but there are numerous brands that sell them. This pouch can hold phones, small camera, tablet, passports etc.

Also came in handy when we go to the beach as we close it up and attach to something.

Nothing is full proof but they sure will make the thief look for something easier.