Please keep yelling, I like it

A gentleman walks up to me with a glass of complimentary wine in his hand and starts yelling at me.

"I don't have time for this! I need someone to help me right now!"

First off, yelling at me without even telling me what the problem actually is isn't going to get you very far, especially because you're dealing with a person who has 2 days left and nothing to lose.

"What exactly do you need help with, sir?" I ask between clenched teeth.

"I need to get in my room!" he bellows. "Whoever the idiot is that checked me in didn't put my name on it because someone else paid for it. The person who paid is at a very important dinner with his family right now and I need to get in my room to get ready for dinner in an hour. The lady at the desk has his number but isn't calling."

I look over. Yes, there is a line and unfortunately one of the girls is on break. The manager is doing her best to get through the line of people. We had very few check-ins for this day but inevitably all 30 of them arrived at once.

I stared at him for a second and then picked up the phone.

In any hotel in this country it against the law to give out a room number or a room key to a person not registered to the room. I don't care if you are their mom, dad, husband, sister, babysitter - your name has to be on that room and you have to have an ID. If you left it in the room a security officer will escort you and you can describe something in the room. It never ceases to amaze me the hissy fits people will throw to get a room key or someone's room number. Lots of people come to hotels to escape or cheat on their spouse or whatever. We don't judge, we just do our job.

Before I can handle the situation the manager calls me and tells me she's got it under control. The man had failed to mention he was extending his stay. I thought his key just stopped working (the bane of all front desk agents exitstences) or he lost it, but no. Someone else is paying so we can't just extend your stay without permission. Drink your wine, buddy, and calm the fuck down.

Plus, calling my colleagues "idiots" makes me want to just smack you.

What I will never understand is how people have utter lack of patience when waiting in line at a hotel registration desk. This has happened at every hotel I have worked.
At this hotel people will walk into my office and ask if anyone else is working or, my favorite, can you help check in? As if I'm not doing anything else important. The funny thing is, I can check people in, but only because I started off at the front desk. But my other concierge are not able to, and I know if I step in I'm going to get stuck at the desk 45 minutes and ignore all the people who need my help. Anyway, you don't see people walking up to loan agents at the bank and asking them to cash their check because they're sick of waiting in line. People aren't (generally) bitching out stock clerks because the line is too long at the register and can't you check me out?

I don't get it.

But like I said before, there is something about hotels that make people forget themselves.

I thought today, anyone who works a front desk must have some kind of sadistic streak. When things go wrong, its the front desk that bears the wrath.