Tag: Hotel Strikes
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3,000 Union Workers Walk Out On Hyatt
Remember when we told you "today's not a good day to stay at a Hyatt in Chicago?" Well, this week isn't looking so good either. As of this morning, unionized workers at the Hyatt Regency Chicago and Hyatt Regency McCormick Place have have launched a week-long protest.
But that's not it: workers from other Hyatt hotels in Los Angeles, San Francisco and Honolulu have all followed suit in similar week-long protests. According to Unite Here, the strikes are comprised of about 3,000 union workers across six hotels. Yikes!
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Today Might Be a Little Rough if You're Staying at the Park Hyatt Chicago
If you're checking into the Park Hyatt Chicago, you might not get the welcome you hoped for. That's because hotel workers from the Unite Here Local 1 union will be striking in front of the hotel for better working conditions for hotel housekeepers.
Apparently Hyatt Hotels is the last major hotel chain in Chicago to agree to a deal with the union. In fact, over a year ago in May, a few hundred Hyatt employees walked out on their jobs in protest. But that was only for a few hours while today looks like it will be an all-day thing.
Hyatt's also got the same problem today in other cities too, nine to be exact including Boston, where two years ago 100 Hyatt employees were suddenly fired. Hopefully, Hyatt and hotel workers in Chicago can kiss and makeup, or at least come to an agreement on a contract, very soon.
Are you currently staying a hotel that's in the middle of a strike? Let us know from the frontlines what's going on!
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Here a Strike, There a Strike, Everywhere a Strike Strike
Hilton Hotels are under fire this week as hotel workers in three different cities staged strikes to protest increased work loads and less benefits.
The strikes occurred at Hiltons in Chicago, San Francisco and in Honolulu at the Hilton Hawaiian Village, the largest Hilton Hotel. Most workers at Hilton hotels have been working without contracts for months as they continue to negotiate fairer terms with Hilton.
According to People's World, Hilton wants to up the housekeeping room quota from 14 to 20 rooms a day as well as cut some seniority privileges and combine jobs. Wage increases and pension benefits proposed by Hilton have been deemed insufficient by employing unions.
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Trouble is Brewing at the Hotel Frank
About a month ago, we stopped into two of the former Personality Hotels in San Francisco, which had been taken over by Provenance Hotels in mid-May.
As far as we could see, things seemed to be A-OK. Free WiFi was still in place and Provenance was working hard to get the renovations back on track at both the Hotel Vertigo and the Hotel Frank. Yet things were not as copacetic as we thought.
Provenance has been tussling with employees of the three hotels (including Hotel Metropolis) over increased workloads and slashed employee benefits. A longtime hotel bellman at Hotel Frank, who's also Unite-Here Local 2 union activist, was fired last week after a "boisterous picket line" convened in front of the hotel to protest these changes.
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Hyatt Housekeepers Walk Out on Job (But Just for a Little Bit)
Just remember that a certain someone makes this bed look so good.
Things are getting dirty in Chicago at Hyatt Hotels. Nearly 400 housekeepers staged a three-hour work "stoppage" yesterday at the Hyatt Regency on Wacker Drive. The housekeepers, spurred by employee union Unite Here Local 1, were protesting their growing workload (specifically with hotel bedding) and this little thing called an expired contract.
Yup, over 6,000 hotel employees at 31 hotels in Chicago have been working without a contract since last August. We just hope this issue ends better than it did in Boston where Hyatt Hotels there had all the housekeepers train their replacements before effectively firing them.
For now, the housekeepers have been told by Unite Here Local 1 to return to work but this is definitely not over. We just wonder what Lady Gaga song might be used next.
[Photo: lug00ber]
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When Visiting San Francisco, You May Get 'Caught in a Bad Hotel'
Guests at the Westin San Francisco over the weekend had some fantastic entertainment to watch in the hotel's lobby.
That's because gay rights' groups, San Francisco Pride at Work and One Struggle One Fight (along with the Brass Liberation Orchestra) put on a special show just to urge guests to boycott the hotel. Their cause? Fair contracts for hotel workers. (This has been a very long ongoing issue in San Francisco.)
Part flash mob, part political rally and part "Glee" episode, the event used Lady Gaga's "Bad Romance" song (and choreography) to voice their problems with the hotel.
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The Bowery Hotel Loves You Sydney Fife
We're guessing "I Love You Man" actor Jason Segel isn't going to be using the name of Sydney Fife to check into the Bowery Hotel anymore, thanks to this gossip item, but it was fun while it lasted. The NY Daily News reports:
Jason Segel knows how to keep a low profile when he's in our fair city: We hear the funnyman uses the name of his character in "I Love You, Man" when he stays at the Bowery Hotel. "He checks in under Sydney Fife," says a source, who reveals that Segel uses the pseudonym when he has a rendezvous with a prominent upper East Side socialite.
Any idea on the mystery UES socialite? Tip us off. (Please, we pray it's not Tinsley Mortimer.)
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More Hotel Workers in San Francisco Go On Strike, This Time at The Palace
Do not expect this scene today at The Palace Hotel.
Over the weekend, hotel workers from the union, Unite Here, staged a three day strike in front of The Grand Hyatt San Francisco to protest the contract negotiations that have been ongoing. The workers have been working without a new contract since August and the main sticky point, as ever, is the issue of health care.
Hotel workers have repeatedly gone on strike over contract negotiations in the last few years but rarely does it ever happen back to back at different hotels. Last night, hotel workers at the famed Palace Hotel which is part of Starwood's Luxury Collection, began a three-day strike as well, at a time when the hotel was at 100 percent occupancy, thanks to a few conventions that are going on.
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Hyatt's Boston Hotels Create a 'Task Force' for Fired Housekeepers
Perhaps sensing that the outrage from the Boston community over the recent firing of longtime housekeepers would not die down, Hyatt Hotels has announced that they are putting together a "support plan" to help their former employees. The official statement from Hyatt:
We are announcing today the formation of a task force to provide additional support to the 98 Boston-area Hyatt employees affected by the recent restructionf of the hotels'housekeeping services. In support of their transition to new jobs, the program will include extended healthcare coverage and retraining assistance tailored to the situation of each individual.
Management and HR directors from each of the Boston Hyatt hotels will create and administer the program. Retraining is the main focus and health coverage will be extended through the end of this year (which is only three and a half more months). It was previously set to end this month.
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Boston's Hyatt Hotels Have No Love for Housekeepers
This bathroom will now be cleaned by outsourced housekeepers.
It's never easy for the hotel housekeeping staff. The things they have to put up with from us guests! But whether or not you agree that they should receive an extra tip for their work, you have to admit the latest news from the Hyatt Hotels in Boston is unfair. The Boston Globe reports:
Hyatt Hotels Corp. laid off the entire housekeeping staffs at the Hyatt Regency Boston, Hyatt Regency Cambridge, and Hyatt Harborside Hotel after the morning shift had ended on Aug. 31, citing challenging economic conditions, and immediately replaced them with workers from an out-of-state staffing firm. The housekeepers had been training those very workers, from Georgia’s Hospitality Staffing Solutions, who they were told would be filling in for vacations.
So basically, these housekeepers--some who have worked at the hotels for years--were asked to train their replacements without even knowing it. Not cool.
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Essex House Workers Stage Protest During Sean Penn's Movie Shoot
Well, this is sort of awkward timing for everyone: yesterday, workers at the Jumeirah Essex House on Central Park South (non-front-deskers, that is) staged a protest to call attention to "what they said was the hotel's failure to pay its banquet-room staff nearly $2 million in tips."
According to the New York Times, hotel workers in uniform stopped work entirely and "filled the hotel’s lobby with more than 100 red-frocked chambermaids, toque-topped kitchen workers and banquet waiters, casually chatting among themselves." A few feet away, Sean Penn and a film crew were filming a scene for an upcoming movie (we assume it was Fair Game with Naomi Watts). Yeah, kind of uncomfortable timing.
Per the Times:
...The strike was called to protest what the union said was the hotel's failure to heed an arbitrator's ruling in 2007.
The ruling required New York City hotels, bound by the union’s collective bargaining agreement, to pay their banquet-hall employees what amounted to millions of dollars in tips that the arbitrator said the hotels had improperly calculated since 2003.
Fortunately, the protest was peaceful enough that the film shoot wasn't disturbed (good thing; wouldn't want anyone going on Christian Bale on the set) and, even more fortunately, the dispute between the hotel and its workers will be settled by an independent arbitrator on Thursday.
[Photo: Patrick Andrade / New York Times]
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Martinique Hotels Promise They're Still Welcoming Guests
As we reported last week, times have been tough out in the French island paradises of Martinique and Guadeloupe. Protests over living costs have been plaguing the islands for weeks, and as workers continue to strike, local businesses and tourism are seriously hurting.
Needless to say, the civil unrest and the strikes have paralyzed the tourism-dependent economies of both islands. Cruise ships have been diverting to other destinations, and at least 10,000 travelers have canceled flights.
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