Some people may leave a hotel and take a pen or a mini shampoo bottle with them as a free souvenir or their stay. Some may even be more daring and steal towels or robes. However this is nothing compared to the extravagant items that some thieves have gotten away with.
According to a survey of 500 hotels around the world by hotel website lastminute.com, people have stolen items such as telephones, curtains, and even mattresses. If that sounds bad, it gets worse.
Nothing is safe when it comes to hotel room thieves.
The survey notes that a hotel guest stole the carpet from a Las Vegas hotel. They cut out the carpet and took it with them when they left.
One guest at a five-star hotel in Dubai really liked the mini-bar. A single mini bottle of liquor can be pretty expensive in a hotel, but this guess decided to literally take the whole mini fridge... as well as a sofa.
Another guests at a hotel in Berlin really like the hotel bathroom. It seems they wanted their own bathroom to look just like it, so they stole the shower heads, hydro massage shower units, taps, interior plumbing, the toilet seats and even the sink.
A room in a luxury hotel in Istanbul was almost left empty as a guest stole everything that they could, including the furniture. They left the bed, desk and TV behind. This wasn't the only incident where a guest tried to steal just about everything.
"Some even developed enlightened enthusiasm to dislodge every single bulb in a room as reported by several hotels," the survey said.
Other popular items that you'll probably see on eBay, such as artwork, heavy statues and sculptures and antiques were stolen from hotels. Someone even got away with a cigarette machine.
While these items were probably sold for a good price, one thief at a Dublin hotel got jipped. He stole all of the wrapped presents that were under a Christmas tree in the hotel. He later discovered that the wrapped packages were nothing more than empty boxes.
Stealing these extravagant items is no easy task of course. Lastminute.com notes that a lot of planning goes into these thefts.
"In some cases the theft is very much premeditated, with guests apparently packing their tool bag to remove some items," Kathy Dover from lastminute.com in the UK said.
Hotels are not happy with these savvy thieves. The thefts wind up costing the hotels thousands of dollars.
This article is copyrighted by Travelers Today, the travel news leader
