On switching on a hotel room TV you would probably expect to see some sort of home screen with a message which welcomes you to the hotel. But one Travelodge guest was left stunned when he got to his room and found a slightly different take on the traditional welcome message.
Matthew Clarke, 39 from Swansea, had booked into the London Docklands Travelodge on Friday, September 30 as he was running in the London Marathon. But as he entered the room, his attention was very quickly drawn away from the race and onto the welcome message on his TV which read: 'Welcome to Premier Inn. Please don't wet bed'.
On seeing the sign, he said he was left baffled - adding it made him wonder what had go on before.
He said: "It does make you wonder what's gone on there before. It's a strange thing to see when you turn your telly on.
"My first thought was 'am I in the right hotel?', because it said 'Welcome to Premier Inn.'"
The dad-of-three was shocked to see the sign but did not take it as a personal attack against him and saw the humour in what had happened.
Civil Servant Matthew said: "Then when I read 'Please don't wet the bed' I thought 'it's not something I'm likely to do anyway', and I thought it was funny.
"I'd like to say that I've never wet the bed, so they weren't working with some kind of prior knowledge. It's not like they were aware in advance and thought 'Mr Clarke's coming. Let's remind him not to wet the bed'. I didn't see it as a personal attack on my reputation."
The keen runner decided to mention it to the staff when he checked out of the hotel and the staff were just as confused as to where this message must have come from or how it appeared.
"I mentioned it when I checked out the next day, and they said they'd take a look at the room. They were a bit surprised as well. I didn't know where it had come from or who would have access to the messages on the TV screens.," he said.
Matthew thought the message could have come from anywhere.
He said: "It could be staff, it could be a previous guest playing a prank on the next person in the room - I just really don't know. It could even be a bit of corporate hi-jinks between the rival hotels.
"Who knows, it's not something I've seen before.
"I didn't think anything bad of it, it seemed like someone was on the wind-up."
A Travelodge statement read: "“We are very sorry to hear that Mr Clarke saw an unauthorised message on a television in one of our hotels. We take the security of our guests and systems seriously and whilst this is an isolated incident, we have launched a full investigation.
"If Mr Clarke had informed the hotel team at the time of his stay, they would have arranged a new room and launched the investigation immediately. We will also follow up with Mr Clarke and personally apologise for this isolated incident."
Premier Inn declined to comment.
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